@Acclarion said:

This was a reply to your fixation with rolling your eyes, referring to me as Maestro, so as to continually imply that I think of myself in some lofty, self important way, and then to continue condescendingly rolling your eyes further after my explanation to you. I am done discussing anything with you. Report away.

I respect so many great musicians on this forum. What I can't stand, is to see these incredibly intelligent, gifted individuals constantly try to bring down others. My initial "humour" post may not have been received in the spirit for which it was intended, and for that I apologize. But your subsequent responses indicate to me that you enjoy stoking the fire, and then crying out when the flames get too hot for you to handle.

I shall leave you alone...do the same for me.

There is a decisive diference: I did not post a single word which was simply abusive attacking you as person here in any way. So dont take your own Interpretations of an emoticon as pretext to break existing rules of well behavior in this forum.

Someone who explicitly talks about his own works "I am quite pleased with the quality of my work" should be a bit more careful attacking others with words like "self-agrandising" etc. I personally did no parallel insult against you at all and will not do so in future. 

But it must be stated, that what you are doing is far beyond what is acceptable behavior covered by any rule of any public comunication platform.

My final response below:

Your repititious use of such an emoticon, even after an honest/sincere explanation as the reason behind my site's name, was explicitly being used to be condescending and antagonistic.  My "overt" insult is no more or less hurtful than your "implied" insult.  It doesn't take a scholar to infer the meaning behind your repeated emoticons and use of the term Maestro.  

You're also making leaps with regard to an individual RESPONDING in defense of their work with a simple comment of "I am quite pleased with the quality of my work", to now suggesting that in doing so, I shouldn't ever suggest another individual is self-agrandising.  Well, if I wrote, "to be serious, is there any greater example of music by a living composer?" I could completely agree with your point...but you will not find my regular postings on this forum to indicate a heightened sense of self-importance.  Indeed, I am humbled by the talent of others on this forum and strive to earn the same level of respect I have for them.

Enough.  I am truly done responding.  I apologize for my emotional outbursts directed at you Mr. Fahl. You hit a nerve with your initial and follow up responses.  And it is clear to me that you will not be satisfied unless I prostrate myself before you.  Consider it done.

@Acclarion said:

Well, if I wrote, "to be serious, is there any greater example of music by a living composer?" I could completely agree with your point...but you will not find my regular postings on this forum to indicate a heightened sense of self-importance. 

Of course because everybody knows so many great composers that it would really quite courageous to put your self on their level with such a sentence.

But this is obviously absoutly not the case with the bottomline you seem to criticise so emotional.

You seriously think the question in my bottom line if there is any comparable collecion of samplebased recordings of classical music would be in any way "self-agrandism"?

So the easiest way to verify if there is any real occasion for your constant insults in this point would be just to answer this question first.

And guess what: Just tell me where there is any comparable collection of more than 2000 sample based recodings of classical music (etc.). And my question would be answered and I'd be happy.

Thats all with my bottomline.

So just to ask something is for you pretext enough to constantly insult others for any alledged "self-agrandism" ?

I have already indicated that is simply a question and I am still very curious to know if there are others out there who work like I do.. So please do me a favour and give me a concrete answer on that question first.

But just because you are obviously not able to answer this question to hijack this Thread for constant personal attacks against my person is far from justifyable in any way.

@mh-7635 said:

Well Paul to address your post in order - my signature tells everyone who I am but your continuing adjectives tend to rule out congeniality.  BTW I suggest you do not click on my site as there are some pieces there that will not be to your taste, but you and everyone else are welcome to call me whatever you like, I only ask that you keep it civil if you want reasoned debate.

From what you write, I can't seem to escape the conclusion that you seem to think atonality and tonality do not mix whether it be musically or regarding someones creative preferences. I believe you are wrong on these points , firstly because I am not going to 'trash' your preferences and instead agree with you about the composers you have mentioned - although it is duly noted that the best you can come up with in a thread instigated by an appreciation of Salonen is Howard Shore who is of course a great film composer, but some here might consider his ouvre to be a little off-topic when considering the highest aspirational realms of our practice, if only because film scorings  raison d'etre imposes a utility on self-expression, which is in the main absent in the concert world. (I do not want to digress too much here, but accept that there is a good argument against this that suggests that the desire for self expression in film scoring can be quenched in practice, but as this thread is not about film scoring I shall leave it there). 

Secondly, your assumption that the 2 technical practices (tonal -atonal) are mutually exclusive is completely fallacious because one is surely an all-encompassing extension of the other and when used competently gives the composer a wide expressive arc - all that is needed are adventurous ears and a willingness to search.

Your assertion that atonality is old and therefore not a way forward is a subjective conclusion based on your antipathy and is not factual nor predicated on the reality of current practice. The fact is that atonality and tonality exist side by side in todays zeitgeist and can even be combined very successfully. You really are missing out on wonderful music Paul, music that has extended levels of functioning harmonic practice that is not proscriptive in a dodecaphonic sense. This makes me wonder if your definition of atonality is the same as mine and many of the great composers of shall we say the last 60 years, but if you haven't listened to any of their music, how are you to know and even insult their work convincingly.

For once I agree fully with the paragraph starting with your propositions for young composers. Some will venture into atonality and find a seductive world of possibilities.

Hi Mike,

I'm sorry that I did not see your name on your posts. No insult was intended, and if I made a mistake with pronouns, I appologize for that as well. Of course I do not appologize for my opinions and conclusions regarding music. I am passionate about the subject. 

I'm not sure if you wanted any sort of reply, I want you to know that I read your entire post very carefully.If there is something you want to debate or discuss, I am willing to do so. I am not going to change my conclusions about tonality and atonality, and I sense that you also are firm in your point of view. So that topic is probably a waste of time. But I am open to a discussion of any other musical topic. Regarding Howard Shore, he many not be innovative, but he is certainly a master of his craft. However, as I anticipated in my email, I expected you simply were asking me "who I rate" so that you could then trash them. That is OK, totally to be expected.

I'm glad we can agree about advice to young composers. It is in that vein that I was describing the fact that atonality is old. Many young composers idiolize the gound breaking inovator. I know I did. Many younng composers want to be relevant and current. I know I did. But writing atonal music is not going to make a composer today an inovator or relevant. Why not? Because atonality is old. It is no more of an innovation to write atonal music than to write Baroque or Romantic music. If the young composer wants to write atonal music because that is what they personally like to hear and they want to be a perfector, like Mozart, then great. They could have a solid future. University composition teachers are retiring and dieing off every day leaving room for new atonal composers. So I think composers should forget about being an innovator (unless they truly can come up with something totally original) and focus on perfecting their craft, writing the kind of music that they personally enjoy. 

Paul T. McGraw

 

Paul,

I have no truck with your opinion whatsoever, merely the seeming vitriol your adjectives convey because they appear brutally contentious and insensitive, but I respect your passion as I know it too. No problem about missing my signature and your apology is happily accepted - now if only I could get you to listen to some good representative music from more recent decades...😉

Joking aside, you may have missed the point that atonality is just one facet of compositional technique employed today and used as a resource it is as powerful as it was 100 or so years ago. I agree that composers' should not worry about innovation as that quality is only gifted to a few each century, but they should explore every development in music to date in order to be well informed when making a decision as to where their artistry lies.  I also agree that composers should perfect their craft as much as possible and especially in the familiar gravitational confines of tonality.  Now here is an irony of sorts, I believe that a composer who feels the pull (or lack thereof !) of atonality should, at the very least, be extremely well versed in the common practice. This a personal belief/conviction and based on my own experience. When one learns the great tradition, one is also training oneself in best practice and this gives a solid foundation with which to submit oneself to the inner fantasy that can be had whilst composing -  a flight of fancy that is sure in the knowledge that technical prowess and procedure will guide it subliminally to make an idea presentable and musical whilst allowing freedom of expression.....or in other words a reasonble way of hoping to achieve an art work. A somewhat strained metaphor might be the Renaissance painters who in their formative years had to paint in minimal or no colour in order to master value or chiaroscuro so that their glazing would literally have a solid foundation. OK....calm down, I'm not saying tonality is pale in comparison to atonality, but I hope you get my point.

My belief here feels appropriate to modern musical language and yet it dismays me that Academia tends to think otherwise - more agreement - at this rate we'll soon be best buddies.

No, Mr. Fahl.  There is no greater collection of sample based recordings of classical music anywhere in the world.  Now you have your answer, and you can change your tag line to a declamatory statement rather than a question.  Are you happy now?  Please, for the love of God...leave me alone with this back and forth bickering!  I've already expressed my apologies, removed posts, and have asked for this to stop.

This was the first day I've been able to visit the forum in a long while and I regret even trying to have a sense of humour with my initial post.  It would have been worth it if even one other person found humour in it, but clearly, you jumped in, got offended, and turned it in to a one on one battle with me.  I'm done with this conversation.  

You win. You are Infallible Fahl.  I am Medicore Maestro.  Let's move on.

@Acclarion said:

No, Mr. Fahl.  There is no greater collection of sample based recordings of classical music anywhere in the world. 

Oh that is really a pitty. You do also not no any, But guess what I am very optimistic. I still keep my hope that one day  I would find someone working like me, and until that moment I'll better keep my question open.

Perhaps one day soneone reads it who knows more than I and you actually know to answer that question.

So stay positive Maestro 😃 ( I hope I am allowed to call you so if you are yourself doing that - no insult intended 😉)

@Jos Wylin said:

My second point was, that this section of our forum has been hijacked for a long topic that actually doesn't belong here, however interesting. Maybe for that purpose a new section should be opened like "Personal views on the direction of future music". This sections should deal with Composition - Orchestration - Instruments. One could of course argument that the direction of composition fits in here, but that's more a cultural or historical consideration with aesthetic aspects (and taste).

Jos

Jos

My hope in starting this topic was to get insights, or technical opinions of others regarding Salonen's and other contemprary composer's orchestration techniques. Take this passage for example

. Isnt that beautiful how the bassess and bass clarinets (I think..I dont have the score) come in suddenly non vibrato followed by flutes and other wood winds fluttering on the top end? I do not believe that anyone here would deny the beauty if they heard it live or in a good sound system. Its just pure textural sophistication  done with incredible control and mastery which I for one do not have and would like to learn in my lifetime. Thats all I care about, technique, not philosophy.  

Afterall we are all using orchestral samples, so the more sophisticated our knowledge, the more efficient and sophisticated our use of these samples and the more scope for this technology to expand and grow into the future right? Thats one justification I can provide for why this thread fits in this forum category.

But sadly the personal chocies of musicians is so deeply entrenched and I didnt expect to start personal wars. I still do not see anything bad, just muscians being crazy about what they love to do. Its natural we all take our music and ourselves seriously. We are not doing music because of a boring desk job but because we love it.   

Nevertheless there have been some very interesting discussions in this thread that will take me time to digest, partly because I dont do music full time.

Best

Anand

 

@Acclarion said:

No, Mr. Fahl.  There is no greater collection of sample based recordings of classical music anywhere in the world. 

Oh that is really a pitty. You do also not no any, But guess what I am very optimistic. I still keep my hope that one day  I would find someone working like me, and until that moment I'll better keep my question open.

Perhaps one day soneone reads it who knows more than I and you actually know to answer that question.

So stay positive Maestro 😃 ( I hope I am allowed to call you so if you are yourself doing that - no insult intended 😉)

 

Keeping this quote up, as it sheds light much more effectively on our recent exchange than anything I could say to defend myself.  To the rest of you, I sincerely apologize for hijacking this thread; back to the discussion!

Again Anand

There is nothing wrong with the question of this thread. It is interesting and we have had of course interesting participations in this thread. As far some controverses are well founded in the very subject of the thread (and not becomes personal and offtopic in any way) we must not be afraid of dissens and controverse discussion.

The opposite is true. If we might overcome theoretical oppositions a bit by realising that the real musical situations include always aspects of both only seemingly opposite conceptions and understandings, than it would be in my eyes worth to have discussed this subject intensively.

Only while we discuss we still keep the chance for understanding each others. how difficult ever this might be for the different participants. 😉

Ok the aggressive hijackers are gone,

Now we can discuss the subject in peace and constructive 😃

fahl, 

I meant that I was the hijacker :)

Anyways welcome to keep the discussion going. Maybe Sibelius will calm everyone down...surely is helping me work better!

Best

Anand

@agitato said:

fahl, 

I meant that I was the hijacker 😊

Anyways welcome to keep the discussion going. Maybe Sibelius will calm everyone down...surely is helping me work better!

Best

Anand

Of course not!

You started the thread , and set his very interesting theme. And in this long discussion there have been many interesting dialogs just about the subject you started. (No just go back 4 Posts above and you find an answer who himself admitted for instance to be one who "hijacked" this thread with completly off topic "conversations".)

No you know I am not the only who estimated the subject you choose and large interesting parts of the discussion it raises.

@mh-7635 said:

 

My intention was to understand how others here felt about high quality and genuine 20th century music. I felt that such a discussion is important besides making music, since it provides us a larger perspective.

It is a worthy discussion Anand, especially amongst those of us who actually know about it, practise it, or at the very least like music in our time - music written by great, discerning composers, often with a compelling voice that has complete mastery of the language and technique of music allied to invention, imagination and expressive power all of which is equal to any period in music. Art for our time.

I agree with Fahl - no need to be sad whatsoever and keep your erudite observations coming.

Forum threads have way of taking their own directions, but if we focus on your intent of the thread, since you started it, here are the following 20th-21st century pieces I highly recommend and value, in no particular order:

1.  String Quartet in F Major by Maurice Ravel

2.  Samuel Barber Piano Concerto

3.  Prokofieff's 5th symphony

4.  Shostokovich's 10th symphony

5.  Any symphony by Mahler (especially 6-8)

6.  Copland's 3rd symphony

7.  Symphonies #4 & 5 by Carl Nielsen

8. Stravinsky's ballets

9.  Octet by Igor Stravinsky

10. Vaughn Williams Symphony #5

11. Steve Reich, Octet  (living)

12.  Lera Auerbach (living)

Just chiming in (and right out)...

Again having scanned fast what's been said, I'd just like to say that Williams has in fact composed a symphony, and, well, it is not that great... I don't know why he hasn't tried his hand at it again - maybe he is not that interested / not getting commissioned for one, he has a big catalogue of concerti, people must have concluded that his strength is concertante music.

However the real reason for my posting, is that I see here parroted what we repeatedly were spoon-fed at university (at gunpoint), namely regarding the so-called "bravery" and "courage" of the avant-gardists against "ignorance" and "opposition" (actually they were happily disregarded). Don't make me laugh and cry:

Off hand I cannot think of one avant-gardist who "bravely" abandoned a highly profitable and musical career (ex. the Berlin Phil. and Furtwangler begging for their work, audiences wailing outside their front door for more works, etc.), in order to investigate and penetrate those misty, higher planes of atonality/microtonality/concretality/what have you.

Rather the contrary! When atonalists finally conquered academia (and therefore controlled higher music education) in the late 40s early 50s, they became totalitarian and for decades "nobody" could get a degree composing even chromatically. If they did, they were derided, and forced into propriety (modernism). It was actually courageous and brave to rebel against such blinkered, dead-ended boundaries, at a time when Sibelius, Strauss, Shostakovich, Prokofiev, Britten, Copland, and even Stravinsky (before 1951), were considered irrelevant and/or passé! Whereas Messiaen (barely), Varèse, Boulez, Stockausen, and Nono were the torch-bearers of musical composition... Yeah, right... Experimentation, "breaking the barriers", whatever you wish to call it, is brave only when you have abandoned actual gains from the alternative. Schoenberg was a bottom-third / fourth rate tonal composer for example, and he knew it! His enormous ego propelled him psychologically to heights unattainable to him in the traditional way, and I believe that all-powerful need for acknowledgment and compositional status was at least part of what led him to originality and dodecaphony. Yes, the same for his students; great musicians, not as great composers (not compared to Strauss, Mahler, Sibelius, Rachmaninov, Prokofiev, etc.)

I also disagree that atonality was the natural extension/evolution of tonality even though Schoenberg tried to pass it off as such. I am in the minority on this one too, as composition faculties around the globe will tell you otherwise. To me, there is a great difference between bending something (no matter how stretched or distorted) and breaking it - or in this case breaking away from it. I might discuss the ridiculousness of dodecaphony as equality (Schoenberg, etc.), or bolshevistic equality (Adorno, etc.) amongst music pitches another time.

Suffice to say that Schoenberg will in the near future be proven correct (if egomaniacally so, but justifiably), that his compositional method would have ensured German musical dominance for 100 years. He didn't foresee the globalizing influence of his style (or didn't say if he did).

Are there interesting, compelling atonalists? Yes (for me Ligeti, Xenakis, Crumb, among others). Are there wrist-slashingly tedious hacks in tonal music? Oh baby! 

But that's in the past. Crumb is alive but he's past. For me music is going nowhere and fast in the 21st century, and it is not an argument against this that people today can compose any damn way they please... That doesn't mean that music is going anywhere. The difference, in my view, of today to the past (say 1970s and before), is that the "leading" names in 'serious' composition (not soundtracks), are minor figures, without the personality to generate titanic stylistic currents, or any landmark works (to my knowledge). And I'm referring to the last 30 years+ so enough time has elapsed for any such work to have shone.

In one of my radio productions in 2014, as part of the station's WWI referential broadcasts, I enumerated some of the musical works that were composed during that World War decade: Petrouchka, Rite of Spring, Jeux, Daphnis and Chloe, The Planets, Prometheus, Symphony no.5 (Sibelius), An Alpine Symphony, The Three-Cornered Hat, Piano Concerto no.2 and Violin Concerto n.1 (Prokofiev), The Wooden Prince, etc., and these are just examples of some of the orchestral music during that decade! Should I move to chamber and solo works? (Pierrot Lunaire, L'Histoire du Soldat, String Quartet no. 2 - Bartok, Debussy's sonatas and preludes, etc.), or opera? And then compare all that to this decade we are proudly (and relatively peacefully - should I say numbly?) traversing?..

Yeah, that's what I thought...

Errikos

Thanks for a wonderful post with so much historical info. It Will take me time to decipher all your points. I see where you are coming from, this is sort of what Paul was also mentioning...the influence of academicians who pushed atonal music against anything else, to the point that it became a fad.

But I was confused by one of your remarks. Schoenberg as a fourth rate tonal composer? hmm not sure if I read that right.

I dont know how anyone who wrote a piece like this: 

 could be called a fourth rate tonal composer.

This beautiful piece seems to foreshadow Prokofiev and Bartok by several decades. So I am not sure if his atonal expeditions were merely driven by his ego and need for recognition because he wasnt a good tonal composer. (at least thats the way I read your post)

Reading his Harmonielehre (my favorite book on tonal harmony) I only see him as a driven by pure curiosity and thoroughness in everything he did. 

Best

Anand

@Errikos said:

Just chiming in (and right out)...

Again having scanned fast what's been said, I'd just like to say that Williams has in fact composed a symphony, and, well, it is not that great... I don't know why he hasn't tried his hand at it again - maybe he is not that interested / not getting commissioned for one, he has a big catalogue of concerti, people must have concluded that his strength is concertante music.

However the real reason for my posting, is that I see here parroted what we repeatedly were spoon-fed at university (at gunpoint), namely regarding the so-called "bravery" and "courage" of the avant-gardists against "ignorance" and "opposition" (actually they were happily disregarded). Don't make me laugh and cry:

Off hand I cannot think of one avant-gardist who "bravely" abandoned a highly profitable and musical career (ex. the Berlin Phil. and Furtwangler begging for their work, audiences wailing outside their front door for more works, etc.), in order to investigate and penetrate those misty, higher planes of atonality/microtonality/concretality/what have you.

Rather the contrary! When atonalists finally conquered academia (and therefore controlled higher music education) in the late 40s early 50s, they became totalitarian and for decades "nobody" could get a degree composing even chromatically. If they did, they were derided, and forced into propriety (modernism). It was actually courageous and brave to rebel against such blinkered, dead-ended boundaries, at a time when Sibelius, Strauss, Shostakovich, Prokofiev, Britten, Copland, and even Stravinsky (before 1951), were considered irrelevant and/or passé! Whereas Messiaen (barely), Varèse, Boulez, Stockausen, and Nono were the torch-bearers of musical composition... Yeah, right... Experimentation, "breaking the barriers", whatever you wish to call it, is brave only when you have to gain from the alternative. Schoenberg was a bottom-third / fourth rate tonal composer for example, and he knew it! His enormous ego propelled him psychologically to heights unattainable to him in the traditional way, and I believe that all-powerful need for acknowledgment and compositional status was at least part of what led him to originality and dodecaphony. Yes, the same for his students; great musicians, not as great composers (not compared to Strauss, Mahler, Sibelius, Rachmaninov, Prokofiev, etc.)

I also disagree that atonality was the natural extension/evolution of tonality even though Schoenberg tried to pass it as such. I am in the minority on this one too, as composition faculties around the globe will tell you otherwise. To me, there is a great difference between bending something (no matter how stretched or distorted) and breaking it - or in this case breaking away from it. I might discuss the ridiculousness of dodecaphony as equality (Schoenberg, etc.), or bolshevistic equality (Adorno, etc.) amongst music pitches another time.

Suffice to say that Schoenberg will in the near future be proven correct (if egomaniacally so, but justifiably), that his compositional method would have ensured German musical dominance for 100 years. He didn't foresee the globalizing influence of his style (or didn't say if he did).

Are there interesting, compelling atonalists? Yes (for me Ligeti, Xenakis, Crumb, among others). Are there wrist-slashingly tedious hacks in tonal music? Oh baby! 

But that's in the past. Crumb is alive but he's past. For me music is going nowhere and fast in the 21st century, and it is not an argument against this that people today can compose any damn way they please... That doesn't mean that music is going anywhere. The difference, in my view, of today to the past (say 1970s and before), is that the "leading" names in 'serious' composition (not soundtracks), are minor figures, without the personality to generate titanic stylistic currents, or any landmark works (to my knowledge). And I'm referring to the last 30 years+ so enough time has elapsed for any such work to have shone.

In one of my radio productions in 2014, as part of the station's WWI referential broadcasts, I enumerated some of the musical works that were composed during that World War decade: Petrouchka, Rite of Spring, Jeux, Daphnis and Chloe, The Planets, Prometheus, Symphony no.5 (Sibelius), An Alpine Symphony, The Three-Cornered Hat, Piano Concerto no.2 and Violin Concerto n.1 (Prokofiev), The Wooden Prince, etc., and these are just examples of some of the orchestral music during that decade! Should I move to chamber and solo works? (Pierrot Lunaire, L'Histoire du Soldat, String Quartet no. 2 - Bartok, Debussy's sonatas and preludes, etc.), or opera? And then compare all that to this decade we are proudly (and relatively peacefully - should I say numbly?) traversing?..

Yeah, that's what I thought...

Hi Errikos,

Thank you for this excellent post. Your description of the tyranny of the atonalist, avant-garde in academia matches my personal experience. In fact I would agree with almost everything in your post. The list of compositions from the WWI decade is quite striking and brings into sharp focus just how baren our landscape of worthwhile new music has become. I place the blame squarely on the shoulds of the atonalist avant-garde. 

In the past, audiences for concert music seem to have been built by new composers. The excitement of a new creation of great music kept concert music exciting and fresh. The lack of great yet accessible new concert music has taken a terrible toll. Orchestras all over the USA are struggling to bring in audiences and stay financially solvent. It seems the only real excitement is generated when a new concert centers around film music. 

Paul

Errikos,

As you know, Schoenberg did write Gurrelieder and Verklate Nacht, not exactly third/fourth  rate music in a technical sense at least - subjectively his music is what one makes of it and I can also see you are not that enamoured with the 2nd Vienese school, which is fair enough. Yeah....academia has a lot to answer for.

I'm not entirely convinced in your reasoning and condemnation of  atonality being a complete break from tonality, this surely depends on how it is applied technically and in what context. For me, it is an expansion of resource and a logical one that does not necessarily need equivalence (especially in the constant employment, or generation of all 12 tones!),  to be the central paradigm. Granted that in Schoenbergs' definition of the Method, equivalence to all intent and purpose  wiped out any lingering intimation to gravity, but depending on ones' ears at the time and how used one was to chromaticism, that may have been somewhat moot anyway.

There are great works being written right now, I mean why would there not be? The high standard of composer technique has not disappeared (despite the hands down brigade) and might arguably be even more sophisticated than the early to middle 20thC. Some of us may not like what is being written but I do not believe fate has  somehow conspired to relieve us of any potent voice in our lifetime. However, given the context in which you say as such, here's a thought - Perhaps music does not actually need to go anywhere for a while given the huge resources and a more tolerant, relaxed aesthetic available to composers.

There is of course more to be said in C major and undoubtedly a great deal more to be said everywhere else in the electromagnetic spectrum, we are all spoilt for choice.

One more thought, it strikes me that this thread originally asked where music is going and I take it to be in the abstract sense,  but the spat here between atonal and tonal seems to sometimes lurch into a debate predicated on atonalities' appeal to popular culture (quite apart from suffering from loose definitions based on some participants knowledge),  rather than its' potential power as a way forward in a creative sense. In other words it is being judged and often condemned by a common denominator of popular cultural consent namely appeal - a quality most of the greats of music in the last 100 years have been deeply suspicious of..............😈

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.

Hi Mike (mh-7635)

The fact that other people such as myself do not agree with or use your definitions of terms does not indicate a lack of knowledge, experience or discernment. The very thinly veiled insulting attitude towards those such as myself who despise the stink of atonality does not win any arguments or friends. To this you will reply that I am using inflamatory language about atonality. However, atonality is not a person. The only person I have insulted is John Cage, and he deserves it. 

Since you are defending so vigorously the current achievements in orchestral composition, I request examples. My patience and time are limited, so I am not requesting an exhaustive list. Perhaps if you could suggest three orchestral compositions completed within this decade, that demonstrate greatness comparable to The Planets or a Sibelius Symphony, we can all listen and make our own judgements. I look forward to being proved wrong.

Paul (McGraw)

The very fact that you are asking for recommendations as well as citing Howard Shore earlier tells me all I need to know.

Still, in the spirit of wild hope that you might overcome your prejudice (whilst acknowledging your request).....and whilst realising that a demonstrable comparison of greatness between 2 differing styles of music from 2 different eras is absurd given the subjectivity, I offer these pieces with no more comment. You will get them or not, it is up to you, although a snap judgement on one hearing with closed ears is pointless, and when allied to your vehement intransigence, it make the whole exercise somewhat redundant I feel. Still.....in no particular order and plucked almost randomly from a vast sea of music......

The Shadow of Time

Songline

Matthews symphony.no8

I agree with Errikos about the tyranny of the atonalists in academia.  Also, I remember becoming enraged at Pierre Boulez, who was making scornful statements about nearly every great composer of the past including Tchaikovsky, Mozart, even Bach.  He was arrogantly, belligerently placing himself over composers who wrote individual compositions that dwarf all of his lifetime output.  There has been a snobbish attitude of many atonalists and their tiny - very tiny - audience that has always been much like the Emperor's New Clothes.  People in their narrow circle have been terrified of not seeing (or hearing in this case) how magnificent the non-existent art is.  Not to agree on the genius of these works would essentially be to admit being stupid or dull in perception.  

However, this is not to say that all atonalism/ avant garde music is worthless.  Some composers like Ligeti, Penderecki,  and Varese (sorry Errikos!) created music that is fascinating and powerful.  I have a collection of Ligeti's orchestral works and listening to them is like entering an unknown universe - fantastic sounds and textures and moods.   So it is the old story:  most of any art is mediocrity.  One has to sift through a lot of junk to find treasures. 

Also, there is also an idea that never seems to be questioned which I find absolutely idiotic:  that only the most technically advanced, only the music that is at the farthest limits of crazed disconnection from anything comprehensible, can possibly be of value.   If you look at the mathematical possibilities of combinations of notes, rhythms, instrumentation, counterpoint inherent within for example Post-Romantic harmonic practice - which is after all extremely complex though tonal -  there is no way that all music which could be written in that style has been in fact written.  The idea is absurd.  And this applies to almost every style. And yet the assumption among the atonalist circles has been "No!  Only the most unknown and previously unheard new style can possibly be accepted.  We've heard all the rest of it before!"  No they haven't. 

One other thing:  in these discussions I find it interesting how no one mentions where music has ACTUALLY gone today - so far beyond the cloistered, dry little worlds of academic atonalists with their sycophantic audience of professors and graduate students:  JAZZ AND ROCK.  

These forms of music - and their many derivations and complications - are the real modern music.  They took the elements of musical composition and performance into areas utterly unknown and new -  even inconceivable to people of the past - and yet PEOPLE LIKED IT!  What a concept!  They don't run from conceert halls with their hands over their ears - they come to listen!  The musical complexity of jazz like Charlie Parker - where composing and performing is unified into a single moment of genius; the raw power of the blues - where intense emotion is translated with the simplest means into perfection of expression; or the indelible, prolific melodic invention of a group like the Beatles - where the simple form of a short binary song is gradually transformed into a complex exploration of moods, thoughts, observations, satirical statements - all of this huge world of truly new yet vibrantly alive and ACCEPTED INSTEAD OF HATED music has been created right under the noses of the atonalists.  There is something hilarious about that.  

And of course I didn't even mention film music - but that is another whole story.