Not trying to be arrogant here, but who listens to this?

[Andretti60]

Indeed, actually I think this survivorship bias is why everyone always thinks "music today is terrible". Music today is always terrible - compared to the music people still listen to from past eras.

Your are absolutely right IMO.

And that is true for almost everything, not only music, we (as humans) like to stick with what we are comfortable with, that is mostly what we grew up, everything uncharted new territories make us uncomfortable. Talking about pineapple pizza here

When I was a kid (60s) I had endless (although amicable) discussions with my dad about music. He liked the Italian songs of his youth, I found them boring (believe me) and was listening to The Beatles on our tiny transistor radio (AM only), then I moved to the Pink Floyd and that point dad and I stopped talking about “new” music (for him it was just cacophony). But we were still listening to opera, we didn’t miss any opera that was broadcasted at the television, and we enjoyed it together (even though it took me some tries (and some readings) to understand it.

That thought me a great lesson. I promised that in my life I will always open to make new discoveries, never be afraid of the “new”. It doesn’t mean that I have to “like” everything, but at least give it at try. At 62 most of my friend are still listening only to Prog, I have no problems listening to Beyoncé and actually have pleasure with many of her songs. And, of course, I am still enjoying Giacomo Puccini.

 

[Multicore]

Messiaen is an acquired taste even for those who like mid-20th Century modernism. I'd still start someone new to his music with his Quartet for the End of Time.

Strong agree. That is a good place to start. As a teenager I had a cassette of it I made off a BBC Radio 3 live broadcast and a Walkman and listened to it a lot. A few years later at Edinburgh Uni I got the score out of the library.

As a kid I got into rock music like the rest but I gravitated to the more noisy and improvised stuff from King Crimson or Frank Zappa that often incorporate sheer noise and destroy the meter. From there it's not much of a step to, for example, Stockhausen: Mikrophonie I or Kontakte. A couple of decades later I ended up hosting a weekly radio show in Boston presenting modern composition (mostly post ww2) among other things. In the last couple of years I've been podcasting with my friend Gav (we were in a jazz-rock band as teenagers) who is now a professional orchestral musician who often has to play this music that I like but he doesn't. One episode has celebrated composer Ken Ueno as guest. It discusses some issues mentioned here. It centers on a Birtwistle CD made by Gav's orchestra. I'm a Birtwistle fan and so is Ken but he got to study with him, and has some funny stories. So does Gav.

Birtwistle - A Round of Drinks with Ken Ueno

Tom and Gav are joined by composer Ken Ueno to discuss the upcoming release by Porto's Casa da Música of a CD of Live recordings of works by Harrison Birtwistle.

gasgiants.substack.com

I made the second youtube linked on that substack page which combines video of the performance Gav is in with the score. That all happened around the time of Birtwistle's death.

 

[Multicore]

Indeed, actually I think this survivorship bias is why everyone always thinks "music today is terrible". Music today is always terrible - compared to the music people still listen to from past eras.

Most music from the 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s etc was equally deplorable compared to what's coming out today, if not worse, but we don't listen to or think about the losers, so it seems like everything from "the old days" was better. It wasn't, but the bad stuff just doesn't stick around.

Sturgeon's Law: Ninety of everything is crap.

Hence anyone who holds up examples of the crap, declares them as representative of a genre, style, zeitgeist, generation, culture, etc. is wasting everyone's time. Serious comparitive critical discussion concentrates on the good ten percent of whatever categories we are considering.

 

[Geert]

For every person who is an appreciative student of the genre, there are a dozen chin-pullers pretending to admire something out of social pressure

Indeed. On the opposite side of unsophisticated is elitism. Is someone who can't appreciate the beauty of a painting like this, and has no clue of its artistic value unsophisticated?

(This painting from Basquiat has been sold for $93.1 million last year, just to say it means something in the world of art).

 

[computer-audiophile]

Ich würde mit seinem Quartet for the End of Time immer noch jemand Neues mit seiner Musik anfangen .

Zufälligerweise habe ich das Glück, das Messiaen-Stück „Quatuor pour la fin du temps“ jedes Jahr mit anderen Musikern am Entstehungsort hören zu können. (Stalag VIIIa in Zgorzelec, Polen). Ich finde es immer noch spannend, obwohl ich es sicherlich mehr als 10 Mal live genossen habe.

 

[Rednaxela]

I think this is a perfect example of music that doesn't necessitate understanding.

Not a genre I normally spend time on, but I had a listen, and I like it. I enjoy the way it affects my emotions.

Fair enough but when OP did the same he heard a piano fall down the stairs.

So now there is at least something he’d like to understand about the music. Right?

 

[Rednaxela]

Zufälligerweise habe ich das Glück, das Messiaen-Stück „Quatuor pour la fin du temps“ jedes Jahr mit anderen Musikern am Entstehungsort hören zu können. (Stalag VIIIa in Zgorzelec, Polen). Ich finde es immer noch spannend, obwohl ich es sicherlich mehr als 10 Mal live genossen habe.

Just so you know, you’re posting in German.

 

[computer-audiophile]

Just so you know, you’re posting in German.

Sorry, my mistake, thank you.

Coincidentally, I'm lucky enough to be able to hear the Messiaen piece 'Quatuor pour la fin du temps' every year with different musicians at the place where it was created. (Stalag VIIIa in Zgorzelec, Poland). I still find it exciting, although I've certainly enjoyed it live more than 10 times.

 

[dtaylo1066]

People like sour beers, also.

 

[Daverz]

Sorry, my mistake, thank you.

Coincidentally, I'm lucky enough to be able to hear the Messiaen piece 'Quatuor pour la fin du temps' every year with different musicians at the place where it was created. (Stalag VIIIa in Zgorzelec, Poland). I still find it exciting, although I've certainly enjoyed it live more than 10 times.

The old Tashi recording is still my favorite, but there have been tons of recordings over the years, despite the "non-standard" instrumentation.

For an all digital recording, I also like Shaham and friends:

Are any of you listening to this kind of music (what (sub)genre is it?), and what exactly are you enjoying in the music?

To answer the original question, I don't listen to Messiaen often, but I do find some of his music very beautiful, particularly his mystical piano works like Visions de l'Amen for two pianos:

On the other hand, there's his other famous piece the Turangalîla-Symphonie, which has many moments of bombast and kitsch, but is really fun music to play LOUD when I'm in the mood for it.

 

[sergeauckland]

Indeed. On the opposite side of unsophisticated is elitism. Is someone who can't appreciate the beauty of a painting like this, and has no clue of its artistic value is unsophisticated:
View attachment 257299
(This painting from Basquiat has been sold for $93.1 million last year, just to say it means something in the world of art).

I must be terribly unsophisticated, as I wouldn't pay more than 93cents for that painting, and then only if it was in a nice frame I could reuse.

S.

 

[Alfy]

I completely understand wanting to explore sound in different forms, breaking away from existing harmonics and rhythms. I really don't understand the impulse to call it music...

I think in contemporary classical music, the furthest I can go is something like Avro Pärt's Tabula Rasa.

I understand what it's trying to achieve, and at the same time, there's still enough melody for me to enjoy.

 

[MRC01]

Try Rite of Spring. On a good system too! ...

It requires a good recording too, like this (Urbanski & NDR Orchestra): https://play.qobuz.com/album/mssq8jws9cdbb

I was imprinted on this [Rite of Spring] at a young age and continue to love it but, imho, it is hard to regard it as modern these days.

Agreed.

 

[computer-audiophile]

...On the other hand, there's his other famous piece the Turangalîla-Symphonie, which has many moments of bombast and kitsch, but is really fun music to play LOUD when I'm in the mood for it.

Interesting point of view. After attending the concert, I wrote down the following: (automatic translation, maybe not good English)

"Sweet Hollywood sound meets brutal heaviness. In this colossal work he shows himself to be a master in juggling rhythm, sound and colour: a music that is very rich in the most diverse sound worlds: sometimes calm, melodic passages alternate with fast, rhythmic ones. Sometimes the tonal language is exotically colored in the manner of Balinese gamelan orchestras; sometimes the solo piano imitates bird calls. A special coloring is achieved by the Ondes Martenot, which has an amazing range from the most delicate piano to the piercing siren tone. With these means Messiaen conjures up a Fantasy-India full of exuberant euphoria and unrestrained sensuality."

I made a photo of the Ondes Martenot - a very early electronic instrument.

 

[Prana Ferox]

- I reject the notion that the music in question is 'ugly' or 'bad' music. It can be made to reject traditional norms of beauty, but the point of those traditions is that they change, anyway. Nearly every craftsperson has examples of their work they made just to see if they could pull it off, independent of external merit.

- On the other hand a skilled musician can choose whether or not to produce a work whose appreciation demands years of music theory study, and I would argue many have squared the circle of making challenging and innovative music popular. If we leave the 'modern classical' world we can see many of these principles of polytonalism, unusual / amorphous time signatures, extended rests etc are routinely demonstrated in both modern metal and electronica (especially Aphex Twin / Squarepusher breakbeat) and enjoy considerable mainstream appeal.

- ... which is part of why a lot of the stuff linked doesn't sound 'adventurous', it just sounds 'bad'. Part's Tabula Rasa is some 45 years old. Messiaen's work is older than that. That's the far end of the Prog revolution. Any norms they're attempting to subvert were consigned to the ashheap ages ago, so the novelty is gone.

- I also reject the notion that to maintain popular appeal as a musician, you have to continue to pump out the same radio-grade piffle night after night all career long, or that it is a binary choice between pop dreck and, uh, emulating birdsong.

- There is also an inescapable trend where, with other forms of classism demolished or shunned, people desperate to show themselves above the base hungers of the petit bourgeois will flock to 'difficult' art exhibits and nod 'hmm, yes, I appreciate this' at a banana stapled to drywall. @ahofer up above used the 'emperor's new clothes' reference before I could get to it. Artists would be fools not to milk that market, but it does not mean it generates enduring art. For centuries being a 'successful artist' and having money enough for paper to scribble on meant appealing to nobles who may or may not have had any musical training, but were generally too busy schtupping their cousins and pillaging each other's land to care anyway; it's a minor miracle anything was preserved.

I used to have a radio show where we'd segue stuff like Squarepusher into Ornette Coleman or Arvo Part, and from there into stuff like African exotica. It was great fun. We didn't retain many listeners.

 

[DVDdoug]

Maybe similar...

A long time ago before the Internet and before digital audio the audio magazines (or maybe just Stereo Review) were talking a lot about Stravinsky's Firebird Suite. I don't remember if they were using it for equipment listening tests, or what, but it inspired me to buy it.

It just "sounded weird" to me. I think it's supposed to be "modern classical". It was written in 1910 but for classical music it's considered modern. I'm not a big classical fan but of course I've heard some Beethoven, Mozart, Tchaikovsky, etc. I don't think I've ever heard a full-professional orchestra... I've been to Davies Symphony Hall in San Francisco... Maybe for The Nutcracker, or maybe just music from from Nutcracker, or something. But I just don't remember if it was a full orchestra. I seem to remember a choir behind the orchestra/musicians or maybe that was something else, somewhere else, at some other time. (I have seen Nutcracker more than once in various venues with smaller ensembles or "canned" music.)

I don't have my vinyl anymore and I didn't like it anyway so I only listened once or twice.

...I just found The Firebird on YouTube and it's not actually that "weird" or dissonant or "unmusical" at all! Not what I remembered (mis-remembered)!!! Now it sounds it could be used as movie background music. And a little quick research tells me that it was from a ballet so that's sort-of like "movie music".

 

[Multicore]

The old Tashi recording is still my favorite, but there have been tons of recordings over the years, despite the "non-standard" instrumentation.

There are indeed very many and I've had a hard time finding one that isn't somehow disturbing. Tashi is tip top. Martin Fröst perhaps my favorite. Have you heard it? Another interesting recent one is Akoka: Reframing Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time.

 

[JaMaSt]

Now it sounds it could be used as movie background music.

Both the Firebird Suite and Rite of Spring are ballet music.

The Firebird (French: L'Oiseau de feu; Russian: Жар-птица, romanized: Zhar-ptitsa) is a ballet and orchestral concert work by the Russian composer Igor Stravinsky. It was written for the 1910 Paris season of Sergei Diaghilev's Ballets Russes company; the original choreography was by Michel Fokine, who collaborated with Alexandre Benois on a scenario based on the Russian fairy tales of the Firebird and the blessing and curse it possesses for its owner. It was first performed at the Opéra de Paris on 25 June 1910 and was an immediate success, catapulting Stravinsky to international fame. Although designed as a work for the stage, with specific passages accompanying characters and action, the music achieved equal if not greater recognition as a concert piece.

Stravinsky was a young, virtually unknown composer when Diaghilev recruited him to create works for the Ballets Russes; L'Oiseau de feu was the first such major project. The success of the ballet was the start of Stravinsky's partnership with Diaghilev, which would subsequently produce further ballet productions until 1928, including the acclaimed Petrushka (1911), The Rite of Spring (1913), and Apollon Musagète (1928).

 

[ahofer]

People like sour beers, also.

People like mayonnaise, which is barbaric.

 

[Multicore]

Indeed. On the opposite side of unsophisticated is elitism. Is someone who can't appreciate the beauty of a painting like this, and has no clue of its artistic value unsophisticated?
View attachment 257299
(This painting from Basquiat has been sold for $93.1 million last year, just to say it means something in the world of art).

Paintings are different because of the strictly limited supply and their role as stores of wealth and tax dodges.