@Angelo Clematide said:

...

- However, and that is what you are refering to, the grammatics of musical indications are always relative to each other. A good example are the terrace dynamics of baroque music, and to give you a very extreme example, and again expressed in a technical value, was a sudden change from pppppp to ffffff where the difference from pppppp to ffffff was 72 dBFS in the recording. The composer just indicated this to make clear that he want it performed with so extreme dynamics. The background noise in the 9 minute long pppppp of the not playing musician was nearly as loud as the solo violin. I must add that this recording is difficult to listen to, even in the best listening conditions, it also provoked a scandal and SONY refused to pay the production for a long time, but released the recording later.

.

I suppose the salient question is: did you find the recording musically satisfying? Your comment seems to infer that you didn't. I suspect that even in modern composers not many actually want such extremes that actually mask or destroy the underlying musical ideas (if it is music that they intend!)

@Cutler said:

I suppose the salient question is: did you find the recording musically satisfying? Your comment seems to infer that you didn't. I suspect that even in modern composers not many actually want such extremes that actually mask or destroy the underlying musical ideas (if it is music that they intend!)

As a producer you have to accept what the music is, but in the mentioned case the dynamics where overdone, the compact disk is basically not listenable for a consumer, it also endangers the stereo system for serious damage. As for the contemporary composers, yes, it is certainly the goal of most to entertain people in the best possible way, and the times where the audience throws rotten apples and cries "that's no music, this is noise" is more or less over.

.

.