Robin L
Master Contributor
I could read the incoherent, would-be post-modern diatribe via the captioning on the screen so I didn't have to listen to the awful time-compressed vocal delivery. Burnt up a quarter hour reading his bullshit. There were any number of angles this person could have gone to talk about the canon, to talk about the history of the "Concert Hall" and all that, but the actual purpose of the video is to advertise an on-line learning course on how to produce music on a computer. You want revisionist history of Classical music, try Joseph Horowitz.Hmm, I get the feeling all the people who claimed to watch the video didn't actually listen to what's being said, because he directly refutes some of the opinions written here. Especially about the musics supposed transcendence being proved by the fact it survived for hundreds of years. I'm waiting for someone to directly address the arguments that were made there. And you can spare me the comments about how his delivery annoys you and that's why you watched only half way through…
In point of fact, no one told me to listen to Beethoven when I turned 15. It happened to be his 200th birthday. I began to listen to his music, chills ran up and down my spine. I've never had such a strong visceral reaction to any music before this. I went after it like an addict for crack, wound up with God knows how many recordings of the Symphonies, Chamber Music, Concerti and Piano Sonatas, was emotionally and intellectually drawn to the music without being told to by anybody. This during one of the most prolonged periods of development of music of all sorts throughout the world, thanks to recordings making musics accessible that previously were known only to limited audiences. It wasn't as if some music instructor told me to stop listening to James Brown or Led Zeppelin, it wasn't as if I lacked alternate options. The fact that I am drawn to the music of Beethoven has nothing to do with the topics the author of the rant decided to put on display.
It is clear that the ax this person has been grinding has very little to do with music. I didn't learn anything I didn't already know, didn't think the author had anything useful or interesting to say. It was clear that music wasn't the point. I'm not even sure there was a point. The constant mindless scribbling on the music paper in the visual field struck me as nothing more than a stupid distraction, which could be said of the whole enterprise. I got zero indication that the author even cares for music.
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