Hi Errikos
Thank you for your rich and profound statement.I think there are many aspects regarding the large variety of music written in the 20th century beyond the simple alternetive of tonal or atonal, wich is worth to kept in mind as a whole. And of course it is ridiculous to force anyone to compose anything (For me it is as reasonable as if you wold try to force any plant to grow).
However when anyone is tired of any musical revolution, I think than he will be the first who abandon fighting against others, and would just to do what he himself believe is the right way to do. No one writes good music just because he is against any other kind of music. You can only write good music if you have the music already in your own mind and just realise it as you know it must be. Whatever which University will tell is in my eyes completly irrelevant. No university could do the job of musical invention for you. What ever kind of musical history they might focus on, thhey will never write a singlenote of any of your own compositions.
So here is my point we are living in the 21th century. The time of conflicting ideologies is over since decades. What is left is the question could you convince anyone with exactly that music you intend to do. And if so than it is OK.
And yes there are nowadays very much very different contexts in which you might give the answer what good music might be. And therefor let me even prezise my point. You are right with what you are doing, if the answer you give on the question what is good music convince those who you adrress with that music.
Yes there will be a big difference, if you adress any action film producer (who not so seldom are great friends of most bizarr atonal compositiontechnics), or any gangster rap-guys (who I fear dont give anything at all for the question if something is tonal or not since the bassdrum easily dont care at all about) , any intellectiall sophisticated avantgardists, any director of an Opera anyone who needs a cue for an TV-advertisment or any traditional concert audience in a large or in a not so large town. And be sure only very few of them would be satisfied if you argue your composition is good because it is in any way serialistic or explicitly anti-serialistic.
Take for instance Bartok and Messiaen who already in the early 20th Century completely rejected to decide the only seemingly important alternative of tonal and atonal music, and the same thing seem to me true for instance for Ligeti.
Even Schönberg is not a good example for any conflict of tonal and atonal composition. You know that Schönberg made his first Scandal with tonal compositions like his first Stringquartet and Verklärte Nacht and was estimated as one of the great Late-Romatic Composers of its time after he premiered his very large scaled mahlerian Gurre Lieder. In so far he was ranked among the first Composers of his time long before inventing the Dodecaphonic Technic. And Gustav Mahler himself belong to the first who defended Schönberg when he experienced his very first public scandals. Even in one of his latest Works the survivor from Warsaw he ends up in a plain Eb Major final chord. So far to the matter how far it is possible to make tonal and atonal music something like an alternative, (which it imho in reality never was).
BTW. (to keep this discussion always concrete and in direct relation to VSL-recordings 😃) I am proud to read several composers on your list, whose compositions I already recorded with VSL like Carl Nielsen (3. Symphony yes I should think on doing '4+5 also😉) Skriabins Promethé, Debussy, Nocturnes, or Prokofiev, and Ligeti. Meanwhile I confess I also was interested enough in Alban Bergs widely unknown Works which I recorded for the first time nearly complete (except his Operas) and which are for the by far most part very ambitious, very romantic mostly absolutly tonal compositions.
I wonder what you think about those 20th century composer which are all definitly not dodekaphonists: Frederic Delius, Bernhard van Dieren , Arthur Honegger or a nice guy who several years lived in Berlin just a few houses apart from me and is called Arvo Pärt,
To conclude: this is my point: Composing is at least today no ideological "yes or no" question of any concept any more ( and pesumably never was in reality). It is a matter of doing the right thing in the right context. And this has brought up in all centuries a tremendous variety of inspired and convincing musical creations. This is in my Eyes the only real and much more important Benchmark for each composer today to convince with exactly what he intends to do in music.