RIP Bernard Haitink

[christian bayon]

Very sad new, one of the most important conductor of the XX and XXI century and an incredibly humble musician, great human person, always respectful to orchestra members, not always common in this field.

[PhilipKT]

I remember buying his recording of Shostakovich 4, which might have been the first recording of that symphony available in the west, after it was suppressed for 30-ish years.

I found the symphony to be outstanding, and was a fan of Haitink ever after.

[matesic]

The first recording of Shostakovich 4 was by the Philadelphia conducted by Eugene Ormandy. In 1983 I heard Haitink conduct No.8 at the BBC Proms which I found impressive rather than apocalyptic, but way earlier than that in the late '60s his Mahler 2 blew me away.

[PhilipKT]

I looked it up. Haitink was 1979, but there were several earlier recordings which surprised me.

[Carl Stross]

15 hours ago, PhilipKT said:

I found the symphony to be outstanding, and was a fan of Haitink ever after.

After listening to a Symph you never heard before, from a cultural space far, far from yours and with a mildly characterless conductor ?? 

[PhilipKT]

1 hour ago, Carl Stross said:

After listening to a Symph you never heard before, from a cultural space far, far from yours and with a mildly characterless conductor ?? 

Well, the first time you hear a piece, you’re hearing the piece, and because you don’t have a real frame of reference, the role of the conductor is less apparent. That’s why, for someone who has never heard Beethoven nine, any competent performance of Beethoven nine is acceptable.

If I were to hear the piece a second time with a different conductor, I would almost certainly notice a difference between the two performances, assuming that the second conductor has something significant to say with the music.

I don’t think there’s any particular cultural gulf between Shostakovich and me. I am a trained musician, but more than that, great music is universal. It has no specific culture. It’s just music. Shostakovich‘s music came from his reaction to his environment, and I suppose in some sense His reaction was a Russian reaction to a Russian environment, but his music is great because it is universal. We do not listen to Shostakovich and say, “what great Russian music.” We just say, “this is great music”

So anyone can appreciate Shostakovich, just as much as anyone can appreciate Bach. Any barriers come from the listener, and not from the composer.

[cellopera]

I had the privilege to perform Beethoven’s 9th Symphony under his baton in February 2019, together with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra in Munich. There were two performances and we all knew that this would be the last time to see him conduct, as he already announced his retirement. Rest In Peace!

[Carl Stross]

1 hour ago, PhilipKT said:

I don’t think there’s any particular cultural gulf between Shostakovich and me. I am a trained musician, but more than that, great music is universal. It has no specific culture. It’s just music.

You're kidding yourself BIG time. I think you may want to reword your post. Once you realized how many national schools and national composers you carelessly insulted with unqualified blanket statements. Music may become universal but at the time of creation is with almost no exception, local and tied to a school. And it can take a long while to get out of that closet.

[PhilipKT]

3 hours ago, Carl Stross said:

You're kidding yourself BIG time. I think you may want to reword your post. Once you realized how many national schools and national composers you carelessly insulted with unqualified blanket statements. Music may become universal but at the time of creation is with almost no exception, local and tied to a school. And it can take a long while to get out of that closet.

No I didn’t, sheesh. To say that the art of somebody is universal is the highest compliment one can pay to an artist.

[Carl Stross]

6 hours ago, PhilipKT said:

No I didn’t, sheesh. To say that the art of somebody is universal is the highest compliment one can pay to an artist.

You can say many things. That does not make them true. In the end, what does it really mean "art is universal" ??? Some is, some isn't. A LOT isn't. There is nothing wrong with that and who knows, with time it might gain universality. You should be able to come up with countless examples. The simplest ones are where you for example, do not understand the language.

When you write :

 

I don’t think there’s any particular cultural gulf between Shostakovich and me. I am a trained musician, but more than that, great music is universal. It has no specific culture. It’s just music. Shostakovich‘s music came from his reaction to his environment, and I suppose in some sense His reaction was a Russian reaction to a Russian environment, but his music is great because it is universal. We do not listen to Shostakovich and say, “what great Russian music.” We just say, “this is great music”

So anyone can appreciate Shostakovich, just as much as anyone can appreciate Bach. Any barriers come from the listener, and not from the composer.

You are basically just throwing around words.  

 

[matesic]

Great stuff - I've never witnessed a funeral fight over the meaning of a word before.

[PhilipKT]

13 hours ago, matesic said:

Great stuff - I've never witnessed a funeral fight over the meaning of a word before.

I’m not fighting, I’m just perplexed it takes quite a stretch to create a conflict where there is none. Carl doesn’t seem to like Haitink, which is fine, and he doesn’t seem to think that Shostakovich is a universal composer, which is also his right if not to His credit.

meh, I don’t care.

I have no problems with Haitink, and I like the symphony a lot, definitely a-very very loud- underplayed masterpiece.

[violinnewb]

Lol.

1. RIP Maestro Haitink.

2. Whether a composer, conductor, or performer targets a specific audience, that does not mean that said composer, conductor, performers' work is or is not universal.  The very definition of the term universal encompasses a premise of reach.  I cannot say that Shostakovich never meant for his music to reach outside of Russia, but I can reasonably assume that an artist who makes a living creating content, is not necessarily trying to limit its reach to the broadest audience possible.  The intent may be to compose for oneself or a community, but I doubt that the composer says, "hey, I am going to write this piece so that other people CAN'T listen to it or appreciate it in some way or another.

3. Popcorn is universal...but not necessarily the appropriate food choice for a memoriam post.  Back to Maestro Haitink.

[PhilipKT]

8 hours ago, violinnewb said:

Lol.

1. RIP Maestro Haitink.

2. Whether a composer, conductor, or performer targets a specific audience, that does not mean that said composer, conductor, performers' work is or is not universal.  The very definition of the term universal encompasses a premise of reach.  I cannot say that Shostakovich never meant for his music to reach outside of Russia, but I can reasonably assume that an artist who makes a living creating content, is not necessarily trying to limit its reach to the broadest audience possible.  The intent may be to compose for oneself or a community, but I doubt that the composer says, "hey, I am going to write this piece so that other people CAN'T listen to it or appreciate it in some way or another.

3. Popcorn is universal...but not necessarily the appropriate food choice for a memoriam post.  Back to Maestro Haitink.

The intent of a composer often has nothing to do with the result. Bach didn’t write for history, any more than Haydn or Mozart or Jomelli or Cherubini or Cimarosa. But the universal composers in this list are definitely obvious. Music survives beyond its generation solely because it has something to say to the next, and transcending time goes with transcending geography as well.

As Einstein wrote about Bach,” his cantatas were his daily work. They were not appreciated, they were merely used up.” But they were and are universal and eternal. One need not be a Protestant or a Christian or even a believer to deeply and profoundly feel them and enjoy them.

The book “Musical Anecdotes” has a brief tale about Hungarian ruler Tito claiming that Bartok belonged to Hungary, and Kodaly stood up and, rather bravely,responded,”no country in the world can claim Bartok.” The exchange was political( this was during the Cold War) but is true in a larger sense. Bartok-and Kodaly too- collected folk music all his life, but even though he used it constantly in his music, what he created was uniquely his. Anyone can appreciate it.

Universal music is music that has neither boundaries nor barriers except in the ears of the hearer. 
if the subject is of interest, I highly recommend a brilliant little book-length essay called “Greatness in Music” by Einstein, which specifically deals with the question of what Greatness is, music is great and why, and what music “stops at the borders” or is otherwise limited.

 

[Bill Merkel]

45 minutes ago, PhilipKT said:

Einstein wrote about Bach,” his cantatas were his daily work. They were not appreciated, they were merely used up.”

I disagree with Einstein here...  

[PhilipKT]

58 minutes ago, Bill Merkel said:

I disagree with Einstein here...  

If I understand the intent of your comment, I quite agree with you, but Einstein’s point was that the audience didn’t appreciate what they were hearing, they didn’t understand it, and it meant nothing to them beyond a part of the Lutheran church service. They did not hear the music.
I have the book right here, it is on my bedside table and I read sections of it very frequently. I will share the exact quote:

“A Bach cantata had its own restricted congregation; It did not get beyond St. Thomas’s church in Leipzig. It was intended to be heard once, twice, or three times on a certain Sunday of the year, and then-To be filed away. It was neither appreciated nor enjoyed by the congregation of St. Thomas’s, but simply used up. And that as enough for Bach-in general…he hardly considered himself to be a misunderstood or under-appreciated genius, to whom posterity alone could do justice. His cantatas were just as they had to be…”

Edited October 27, 2021 by PhilipKT
Grammar

[Bill Merkel]

^They were appreciated mostly, almost exclusively, by other musicians, which has always been the situation.  I thought I knew what he was getting at though, but after reading the whole quote, maybe not.  Really though, I just wanted to say I disagree with Einstein

 

"It was neither appreciated nor enjoyed by the congregation'

lol

[PhilipKT]

1 minute ago, Bill Merkel said:

^They were appreciated mostly, almost exclusively, by other musicians, like the situation has always been.  From that perspective the formalities don't matter.  I could take place in a church, a hall, a palace.  I thought I knew what he was getting at though, but after reading the whole quote, maybe not.  Really though, I just wanted to say I disagree with Einstein

It’s a different Einstein. One is Albert I think the other is Alfred, but I get them mixed up…

[Bill Merkel]

Biden said WHAT!?!?!

No, not Joe Biden.  Harvey Biden.

 

[PhilipKT]

2 hours ago, Bill Merkel said:

Biden said WHAT!?!?!

No, not Joe Biden.  Harvey Biden.

 

I thought Harvey was a rabbit and didn’t talk at all

[violinnewb]

14 hours ago, PhilipKT said:

The intent of a composer often has nothing to do with the result.

Yes.  Maybe I was not clear on this point and I apologize if there was any confusion.  I wholeheartedly agree with you.

[Carl Stross]

On 10/27/2021 at 3:02 AM, PhilipKT said:

If I understand the intent of your comment, I quite agree with you, but Einstein’s point was that the audience didn’t appreciate what they were hearing, they didn’t understand it, and it meant nothing to them beyond a part of the Lutheran church service. They did not hear the music.
I have the book right here, it is on my bedside table and I read sections of it very frequently. I will share the exact quote:

“A Bach cantata had its own restricted congregation; It did not get beyond St. Thomas’s church in Leipzig. It was intended to be heard once, twice, or three times on a certain Sunday of the year, and then-To be filed away. It was neither appreciated nor enjoyed by the congregation of St. Thomas’s, but simply used up. And that as enough for Bach-in general…he hardly considered himself to be a misunderstood or under-appreciated genius, to whom posterity alone could do justice. His cantatas were just as they had to be…”

How did Einstein know the audience "neither appreciated nor enjoyed" the music ? 

[Carl Stross]

On 10/25/2021 at 10:34 PM, PhilipKT said:

I’m not fighting, I’m just perplexed it takes quite a stretch to create a conflict where there is none. Carl doesn’t seem to like Haitink, which is fine, and he doesn’t seem to think that Shostakovich is a universal composer, which is also his right if not to His credit.

meh, I don’t care.

I have no problems with Haitink, and I like the symphony a lot, definitely a-very very loud- underplayed masterpiece.

Carl likes Haitink well enough. Carl likes conductors who restrain themselves from over-interpreting the score and let the composer  speak what and how he intended. What Carl doesn't like is your presumptuous and intellectually irresponsible use in this context, of the word universal.  

WHAT DO YOU MEAN BY UNIVERSAL COMPOSER and UNIVERSAL MUSIC ??? 

Who's deciding some piece of music or some composer deserve the universal accolade ?

 

[violinnewb]

38 minutes ago, Carl Stross said:

Carl likes Haitink well enough. Carl likes conductors who restrain themselves from over-interpreting the score and let the composer  speak what and how he intended. What Carl doesn't like is your presumptuous and intellectually irresponsible use in this context, of the word universal.  

WHAT DO YOU MEAN BY UNIVERSAL COMPOSER and UNIVERSAL MUSIC ??? 

Who's deciding some piece of music or some composer deserve the universal accolade ?

 

"Universal" does not necessarily mean "universal accolade."  Something can be universally disliked.  In the broader context, universal simply means accessible to the public at large.  Even that definition likely has some flaws; however, it is an extreme stretch of the imagination that using the term "universal" as it relates to music, can mean something as offensive as you might be suggesting.  

For example, language is universal.  Does that mean that a particular group of people who use language intended for themselves would be offended by the very notion that language, in general, is universal?

Lastly, if a member attempted clarifying a statement to try and mitigate a perceived offense, why keep bringing it up?

[Carl Stross]

4 minutes ago, violinnewb said:

"Universal" does not necessarily mean "universal accolade."  Something can be universally disliked.  In the broader context, universal simply means accessible to the public at large.  Even that definition likely has some flaws; however, it is an extreme stretch of the imagination that using the term "universal" as it relates to music, can mean something as offensive as you might be suggesting.  

For example, language is universal.  Does that mean that a particular group of people who use language intended for themselves would be offended by the very notion that language, in general, is universal?

Lastly, if a member attempted clarifying a statement to try and mitigate a perceived offense, why keep bringing it up?

You are not paying attention and you are lecturing me in things you know little about.  "In the broader context, universal simply means accessible to the public at large"  is a complete nonsense. A LOT of music is not accessible to the public at large, was never intended to be and may have been intended to be inaccessible to the public at large. As well, music using frequencies between 20 and 16000Hz is accessible to the public at large but may well be not "universal". 

And the "member" did not attempt to clarify anything. The member simply supplied to usual word salad.

Anyway, I am pretty sure that smart as you are, you figured out by now what a can of worms is the word universal when applied to music.