Here follows a discussion under a video airing Boulez' "Derives II":
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kUeRfwUU_oE&lc=Ugxm_4p4eytcFQt8GoZ4AaABAg.AGEC7CfPKKmAZa6M8Ssswt
Since this is one of B's later works, and 'softer' than his earlier modernism, it is 'nicer' on the ear. But fundamentally the same as all the other of B's works: it is decorative pattern making, sonic art, nothing wrong with it apart from the claims that this would represent something like music. So, I posted a comment under the video.
The reactions by some innocent Boulezian Believers and the discussion that followed, I here reproduce entirely:
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JohnBorstlap:
With music this has nothing to do, it is about sound patterns and if you like it, it is nice. But the notes are random and don't have any psychological dimension, as in music. It is a different art: sonic art. It is not supposed to isten to as music. Claims that this is a progressive form of the European musical tradition are false and nonsensical. It is a modernist fallacy, an ideological idea, an attempt to give it a respectability that it does not deserve because it wants something very different from music. It has to be enjoyed as Klangkunst, for the sheer pleasure of sound patterns, nothing more.
Sir, I fail to understand why you lurch on youtube videos of Boulez's music and make these hilarious remarks, reflective of a certain fundamentalist attitude; and a complete waste of your time since those of use who perceive this as music are never going to be persuaded by you. For what it's worth, I don't creep onto online platforms of the sort of neotonality you prescribe and attempt thereon to proscribe it. I would suggest, to avoid frustration, that you give up youtubing. The platform has become barely tolerable. I only came here because I wanted to hear the cor anglais solo in the middle of the piece and was too lazy to switch on Tidal. Having read your unwelcome remark, I wish I had just used my comment-free streaming service.
Yes, I know, it's all very difficult. I would say: keep trying!
Isn't the difference between sonic art and music interesting? And the lemminglike acceptance of sonic art as music an interesting mass-psychological phenomenon? The point is not to try to 'convert' the lemmings, because you have to be quite unmusical to miss the distinction so they are hopeless, but for musical people knowing what is happening may be interesting and even helpful.
The damage done by modernist ideology is, for the lemmings, invisible as so much is invisible to them, but for musicians and audiences of classical music it is helpful if they can understand what they hear and feel, while the small lemming choir sings something quite different.
I would advise some reading, instead of grumpy protests because you don't understand something: Alex Ross: The Rest Is Noise; Ernst Roth: The Business Of Music; W.A. Schultz: Damit die Musik nicht aufhört, and Avantgarde und Trauma (in Lettre International nr 71); Roger Scruton: The Aesthetics of music; and concerning Boulez - who brought leninism into the field of new music:
Indeed I think a deeper understanding of music and of Klangkunst / sonic art is most helpful to disentangle art forms from politics - because THAT is which is at the heart of modernism. Boulez, who was a very intelligent man, entirely thought in terms of historicist thinking: musical developments were something like developments as happening in the field of science. (As becomes clear from his essays in 'Orientations', Harvard University Press, 1986). But in science, nobody believes any longer in the ptolemaic world view, since we know for a fact the structure of our solar system is different from what Ptolemeus thought. But no music professional would take seriously the idea that with the development of the late 18th century, the work of JS Bach got obsolete, or that Scriabine has improved upon Chopin, or Stravinksy upon Brahms. Music history sees an ongoing accumulation of works, of styles, of means, and relevance or meaning is judged on the basis of artistic quality. But with modernism, such vision was replaced with the notion of progress, while there is an important question: what does the term 'progress' mean in the arts? This is a philosophical question. In terms of artistry, there is no progress; the only progress there can be in the arts, is the extension, or accumulation, of means, and this is something different from artistic quality or artistic meaning.
Scruton was a friend of mine, in spite of my very different opinions about politics - I am not a conservative. But Scruton was a specific British 'romantic' conservative, different from the usual conservative politicians. In the field of culture he was a great thinker and his Aesthetics of Music has nothing conservative about it. In my opinion, if a 'conservative' gets things right, this does not mean these things are conservative but that the said conservative got somethings right (a criminal who correctly explains the pythagorean theorem does not turn the theorem criminal by explaining it correctly). And I was much against Scruton's ideas about fox hunting. His BBC program 'Beauty' however is a brilliant take upon the artistic problems of the 20th century, in my opinion.
Whether Derives are music or not, is a matter of terminology and awareness. The proof is in the pudding: from medieval times onwards music (i.e. art music) was meant as a 'language', it had to convey something that was different from words a in real language. The 'meaning' of music could range from a 'cool', objective experience of space (Renaissance polyphony) to very subjective expression (Mahler IX), and everything in between. This was possible through the creation of relationships through tonality which is a natural given (the harmonic series). This created a network of connections which functioned like an 'inner space' where an imaginary movement could take place and qualities like logic and a personal signature and expression found their equivalent. It was a means of creating a coherence that could be immediately aurally experienced, without any effort of the intellect. This explains why listeners can experience the 'inner space' of classical music without having any knowledge of its structural properties. With atonal modernism, this idea was dropped as being 'outdated', and notes got another type of organisation where coherence was reduced to gestures without the inner space as created by tonal coherence. In Derive 2 this is clearly audible: the splintered material is organised in gestures but there is no inner space, no logic because any gesture can be followed by any other gesture. The result is a decorative experiene of patterns where the notes in themselves have only a local meaning, they could be changed to other notes in the same range of pitch without distorting the effect. However, in Derive 2 Boulez often leans against a tonal connection, but he merely touches it before he runs away again (compare this with his piano sonata or Marteau sans Maitre). The experience of Derive 2 for a sensitive and experienced ear is a very nervous jumping around without the sense of any reason for it, it is a 'cool' decorative art in quickly changing patterns. This means all we hear is foreground: it is the aesthetics of pure sound patterns. Compare this with another very intelligent kind of decorative and colourful sound: the music of Debussy, like his ballet music of 'Jeux': behind the refined foreground of sound patterns the notes themselves have a coherent, tonal structure, if a very free one. If you play the piece on the piano the notes cohere. Boulez has to compensate for the lack of an inner tonal space by putting all his ingenuity into the invention of colours, with Jeux the colourful patterns are added on a firm, coherent tonal, musical narrative, with a logical structure going from A to B etc. Such logic is entirely missing in Boulez, everything sounds OK and nice (at its best) but random, it is a static art without any narrative (a narrative implies a psychological content).
Listening to de Derives as music, you expect more than the works give, and it is boring because you miss something: the psychological dimension. When you listen to it as decorative pure sound, it is nice, interesting, and you don't expect more from it. I'm always reminded of abtract paintings in the lounges of expensive hotels, to give the impression of modernity without irritating the guests.
Classical tonal music can also be entirely superficially decorative, but then the language does create expectations which are not met, and the work is experienced as boring or wanting. Much music by Joachim Raff for instance is well-made, tonal, logical, but lacks the inventiveness and expressive inner space. Hence his fame faded quickly and no works of his ever formed part of the repertoire which is repeated because the works remain interesting and expressive, in spite of the distance in time when it was written, they have hit upon a timeless artistic quality. All of this was total mystery to Boulez of course, he wanted to conquer the music world with his works and his ideas of modernity, and since he could not do that by convincing players and audiences of its artistic qualities, he tried it politically. But he merely locked himself up in a fantasy bubble, and I think his works will always remain at the margins of music life, for a very minor audience who don't care much about all the philosophical aspects of music and are happy with nice decorative sound patterns.
prof.sirjeffreydarling-mil3463:
Sir, It will not surprise you if I beg to differ on some of your points. Unfortunately I do not have time today for the lengthy reply your comment deserves, though I hope to return to it soon. There are, however, areas of agreement. Your remarks about Boulez’s early work — Structures I, for example, which Boulez himself later described as merely a “text” rather than a piece of music — are, I think, broadly correct. Likewise, the statements he made as a young man about modernism do indeed align with aspects of your argument. However, it is demonstrably incorrect to suggest that Boulez continued to hold such hard-line positions as a mature artist. His later writings and, more importantly, his later music contradict them entirely. I remain unconvinced by your analysis when it comes to the mature works — particularly Sur Incises and Dérive 2. In fact, the whole discussion might usefully focus on Dérive 2, which is, in my view, Boulez’s ultimate expression (in the older sense of “final” or “summative”). One could even argue that Dérive 2 encapsulates the entire question of Boulez’s value as a composer. A longer response would necessarily become somewhat technical, since it would involve exploring the thesis that Dérive 2 is, in fact, tonal music. Beyond that, I would wish to broaden the discussion of what constitutes “music” at all, by looking beyond the Western classical canon. I would be interested, for instance, in your thoughts on a sixty-minute taqsim by Oum Kalsoum, or this extraordinary performance by Mohammad Reza Lotfi:You are, without question, an extraordinarily clever, erudite and well-read man. Yet in your enthusiasm to dismiss Boulez — and his listeners, whom you have described as “lemmings” — you sometimes lapse into statements that are simply untrue. You have said, for example, that Boulez was unable to convince audiences of his music’s worth. I must disagree. I have attended performances of Sur Incises, Répons and Dérive 2 in three different countries, each time before large and remarkably enthusiastic audiences (Dérive 2 at the Barbican in 2008, for instance).
As I may have mentioned in another thread, I do not listen to Boulez as “sound art” (which I too find empty), but as a musician who has studied Machaut and can play most of the Beethoven sonatas from memory. When I hear Dérive 2, I enter a world of ecstatic dance. In live performance I found the music trance-inducing — and under Barenboim, whose tempo I initially thought painfully slow, there were passages of such tenderness that one of them brought tears to my eyes. Yes: Boulez, tear-inducing.
Nor am I alone. The comments on this very video, many expressing joy, serenity, or deep fascination, suggest that not every listener is a lemming.
JohnBorstlap:
Just a short reaction: while PB mellowed his atonal stance a bit in his works, his cultural-political crusade remained as intense as ever even at the end of his life. In 2012 well-known french pianist Ducros was invited to hold a lecture at the Collège de France, an important academic institution, a lecture open to the public, where he criticized established atonal modernism in France, demonstrating the obvious flaws of the concept with elegant irony and effective demonstrations on the piano. This lecture provoked a scandal and a flurry of reactions in the french media, amply demonstrating the paranoid ambitions of a crumbling modernist establishment in France, not allowing for alternative points of view. Ducros was even accused of nazi sympathies by the defenders of modernism. This insane reaction was whipped-up by Boulez, who had got very angry on hearing about that lecture: he mobilized his followers to attack Ducros but remained himself tactfully in the shadows, as a courageous modernist behoves. The entire lecture can be seen on YouTube:An overall review of the affair can be read on Ducros' Wikipedia website:
Most serial music requires you to give up the expectation of hearing tonal harmony - that's why you have this reaction of "notes are random and don't have any psychological dimension". One you relieve yourself of wanting to hear something that simply isn't going to happen, you can focus on structure, phrasing, color etc. and the piece takes shape and taps into something that tonal music can't, because it's weighed by deep-rooted harmonic implications that the composer has less control over. Serial music was meant to be "freeing" and allow composers to convey emotion outside of western-tonal implications, though obviously at a certain point the sound of serial music then inhabits its own world of implications and becomes just as passé. I'm not saying one is better than other, but they are both definitely music, and there is definitely 'psychological dimension' in Boulez's music. And sometimes the emotional range in serial music is anemic (just as it can be in tonal music), but that is more a matter of quality, not of style.
JohnBorstlap:
There is an argument possible to explain the difference of the 'psychological dimensions' of music on one hand, and Boulez' works. Some object that does not intend to convey a psychological content, may produce an emotional reaction nontheless, but the nature of that content is fundamentally different from the psychological dimension of music. Looking at a 'conceptual art work' like a banana on a plank, complete with viewers manual on a plaque, may stirr a strong emotion (irritation, disgust, puzzlement) but that is not an aesthetic emotion. The less someone understands of music, the better he is prepared to appreciate 12-tone Schoenberg, late Webern, Boulez, Xenakis, Haas, Olga Neuwirth, etc. etc. It is always amusing to see defenders of modernism ('atonal music') explain tonality as something hindering creative freedom. In this comment [lucasa4301], the author appears to see 'tonal music' as something constraining the composer, as if 'tonal composers' don't have the great variety of colour that atonal 'composers' have. Such opinion can only be explained as the result of a limited knowledge of 'tonal music', which is a wider field than the major-minor system of old, as the works of Mahler (symphonies nr IX, X), Debussy, Ravel, Scriabin, Stravinsky, Szymanowski amply attest. They are all 'tonal composers' i.e. real composers - with an uninhibited feeling for colour, which is never restricted by tonality - in contrary: it is made possible by then infinite variety that tonal relationships offer. But only for the talented ones of course.lucasa4301:
Sorry, you misunderstand. I mean "freeing" in the sense that composers were no longer required to navigate whether their harmonic language was redundant or cliche, because they were operating on entirely new ground. That isn't to say that tonality didn't lack viable options going forward, nor is it to say that serialism provided an end-all solution to this dilemma (it didn't). I'm entirely with you on conceptual art - but serialism is not conceptual in it of itself, and a composer still has a lot of expressive freedom, even within a confined harmonic setting, which is kind of the whole point of Derive II, which has a really wide expressive palette despite revolving around a single chord. This is quite different than say, Andrew Norman's "Sustain", which is a conceptual work that begins with a 15ish minute statement, and then takes the same music and repeats it at 2x speed, and then does this again, and again until it's a chaotic blur. It's meant to symbolize how we're destroying our planet at an exponential rate, but the problem is that once you know what the piece is doing, it completely loses its teeth emotionally - and it also happens to be tonal.P.S. it may behoof you to re-read your second paragraph, and then ponder the great many musicians who worked both within tonal and non-tonal frameworks (composers, conductors, performers etc - including one of the "real" composers you mentioned!) who would fall under the umbrella of your statement. That is categorically a ridiculous thing to say.
JohnBorstlap:
Such discussion is meaningless because frameworks differ. One thing: the whole idea of serialism is based upon the idea of disconnecting the tones of a musical work from a natural given: the harmonic series, upon which tonality is built. This disconnection destroys many possibilities of music as a 'language' with a psychological content. This is a very obvious fact and easily tested. For instance, the indifference of so many music lovers to 'atonal music', among which 'serial music', is due to this disconnection. The point is: the listening experience is biologically rooted in the harmonic series. Therefore, serialism was a dead end and Boulez' works never extended beyond the decorative, the creativity of sonic patterns. The 'emotional effects' of his works are very different from those of music based upon tonality.lucasa4301:
Yes, discussions do become meaningless when one party isn't willing to engage with the fallacies of their arguments. I completely agree with you that music is a language. Language is also constantly building, shifting, and getting added to, and serialism is just another form of grammar and some added vocabulary. If you don't understand the language, I can understand how that would be frustrating. Incidentally I attended a performance of Derive II when I was 19, and had a miserable time sitting in the audience for 50 minutes straight with what felt like noise, so I empathize. But I went on to play large pieces by Schoenberg and Lachenmann, which helped me to understand how the music actually works and what to listen for. I wouldn't enjoy watching a French film without subtitles. But I also wouldn't describe the film as sonic noise, just because I don't speak French. The fallacy of your argument is that music is not a universal language, like the old adage goes, and the harmonic series may provide the building blocks, but it is not the language itself. To this day, I don't get much out of Gamelan music or Noh, because it's so far removed from my musical upbringing - but like any language, I recognize that if I spent enough time with it, I would learn to understand it, and would probably get enjoyment out of it once I did.
The Society of Boulez Lovers is planning to buy you your very own windmill so you can joust to your heart’s content and leave the rest of us alone to enjoy the pretty music.
JohnBorstlap:
I got very different information.... That the SBL has reformed their regulations for membership applications: now the aspirant Boulezians have to swear an oath to defend the Boulez Doctrine, with their left hand on the black tome of Boulez' "Orientations" (Harvard University Press 1986) and the right arm stretched to the fore at 90 degrees. This had been deemed necessary after 7 members of the Society had accidentally read my book on the fallacies of modernism, had a nervous breakdown and had to be hospitalized.--------------------
This shows how modernist ideologies which deny the nature of music have opened the doors to people (composers, performers, listeners) without musical understanding or even talent, occupying spaces where they don't belong, and thus undermining the art form in general by distorting it beyond recognition, reducing it to pure sound, without a psychological / expressive dimension. This is like a reductive description of the human being as purely physical, ignoring personality, character, temperament, in short: denying the human psyche and the entire subjective dimension of the species. It is not difficult to see here a link with the way modern Western society has treated nature, as something like pure physical material to be expoited for practical ends, thereby damaging nature's precious balances and its psychological meaning for us, humans, who form a part of nature and who are a product of evolution on this planet.
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