I will ask a simple question: which era in musical history is
the greatest? Now hold on! Before you say the baroque era
was the greatest, let's examine what we are judging these
eras on.
I think there are two key factors in this comparison.
Intellect and emotion. Now, which is the greater of the two?
Is one really greater than the other? Those of you who are
mathematicians would probably say intellect is greater.
However, I will leave this be, since I do not really have the
answer. Christ said to open our hearts instead of our minds,
but I 'm sure I can think of thousands of quotes from the
Bible and writings of the saints that would lean in favor of
the intellect (what the conditions are for either one
presiding, I do not know). So I will let more knowledgeable
people than I answer that.
What I will do is analyze the musical eras. For the sake of
simplicity I will say there are six eras. The Baroque, the
Classical, the Romantic, the Impressionistic, the Contemporary,
and the Modern eras.
The Baroque
The land of fugues and cantatas. Some of the most intellectual
music was written during this period, and the intellect was
usually of higher priority than emotion. Music was considered
more of a science then. So (in my opinion. Feel free to offer
alternate opinions), I would say on a scale of 1-10, that the
intellect would number 8, and the emotion 2.
The Classical
Here comes the symphony!!! Music was still very intellectual,
but emotion was beginning to be applied within the rules.
Music was still a science however.
Intellect: 7
Emotion: 3
The Romantic
Opera was in full force by this time, at least in Italy. It's hard
to define when the Romantic period first began. Many people
think it started with Beethoven, but I'm not sure when it ended.
Music was still somewhat of a science, but many composers
began to compose with feeling instead of following the rules exactly.
Intellect: 5
Emotion: 5
The Impressionistic
Emotion was pretty much all out in this period. It's true that
there were new ideas and rules that were followed, but
emotion was at it's height.
Intellect: 2
Emotion: 8
The Contemporary
The contemporary period presents us with an unbalance.
Perhaps music was very intellectual, or maybe not. Emotion
might not seem to be a part of the music, but it could very
easily be. The contemporary period was more of a radical
conversion of the Baroque period, so it strikes me as martian
music. :-)
Intellect: 7
Emotion: 1
The Modern
Here we come to film music, jazz, Broadway, pop, folk, and
many other different styles (including rock, but I won't
analyze that). Much of this music (depending on the style of
course) seems to have returned to the essential roots of
music (believe it or not). The hardcore rules are used extensively.
But emotion is now a top priority because music is no
longer enriched scientifically (to a certain extent).
Intellect: 6
Emotion: 9
So which is the greatest? Is it the period that is perfectly
balanced? And who is to be the judge of that? Learned scholars?
Experienced musicians? Knowledgeable professors? God is of
course the ultimate judge. So, which era would He pick?
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8 comments:
I have a few issues with this, as usual, but they are not the same sorts of issues I had before.
1. You left out the Renaissance and Mideval and Ancient periods! I would rate them thus:
Renaissance:
Intellect: 7 Expression: 2
The Renaissance, however, has the advantage of having the best music (besides chant, of course) for use in the Liturgy, as well as the best application of the philosophical principles concerning the essence of music (and there is more to music than its essence).
Mideval and ancient:
Intellect: 5, expression: 1
Not to say that some of these pieces would not have been moving for their audiences...but that was not the point at all. They did not care about that (and if you really are an Ancient Greek Philosopher, you wouldn't either :).
2. I would give the Baroque a higher expression rating (probably at least a 5). They had a dual ideal of maximum control and maximum emotion. However, the cult of SELF-expression had not yet been invented. Unfortunately, their music is not very moving to modern audiences who have been desensitized by Romanticism etc. This is the problem with classifying emotional value, o psychologist: it changes from time to time.
3. I would probably increase the ratings of Classical to 7/4 becasue of opera, a genere that is melodramatically expressive.
4. I would increase the expression rating of Romanticism to at least a 7 because it was the invention of the cult of self-expression and much of its music was made primarily to move (and still does).
5. The contemporary period saw ultimate self-expression meet with ultimate intellectualism in Schonberg. And because neither of these things are fundamentally ultimate, they died in him. His followers (and this does not include all contemporary compsers at all, but I'm guessing you were reducing contemporary music, rightly including Jen Kuang-Chang to his followers) I would rate thus:
Intellectual: 0
Expression: 1
Faux intellectualism: 10
Self expression only: 10
This period does have the advantage of having a lot of variety.
I also think you got Contemporary and Modern mixed up. The period we are in now is known as postmodern, but could be called contemporary.
6. Except for your label, I think your last category analysis is pretty accurate, though I wouldn't say that pop music gets a 6 in intellectualism. The 9 in expression is also a little high.
Certainly, that is what the pop composers want, but I do not think they succeed (except in rap, but those emotions are best experienced infrequently). I don't think, from what I saw last night, that the art composers want it... though many pieces were programmatic, I don't think they were meant to be deeply moving. I wouldn't put it higher than an 8.
7: Your analysis forgets that there are elemetns to music besides those two. There is no room, for example, for the elegance and grace of the classical period, the skill of many great composers in composing music that, while conservative, does not sound cookie-cut (Vivaldi does not have this skill at all), or the special felicity of Mozart for composing happy music.
Yes, I'm afraid I did leave those
periods out. I have quite a few as
it is!
I kind of felt that the Baroque
era had a little more expression
than I gave it credit for, but
what I was trying to do (up to
Impressionistic) was to balance
it so each one equaled ten, because
I think music before then was much
more balanced.
It was hard not to introduce other
factors! But I had to have factors
that would relate to every
catagory so I could compare them
all to each other. There are
definitely sub-categories to
intellect and emotion, but it would
have made this post way to long.
Oh yes, I had difficulty
determining what ratings the last
category would get as well. Since
there are so many different types
of music there I couldn't list
every single one of course. So I
just took the general motives of
many of these styles and based
my calculation on them.
The Romantic Era! =) That's just because I like to play it the best.
And you left out non-European music. The modern era in Latin Music is simply booming, and interestingly has had a comeback of the "rules" into music. For example, every reggeaton song must, by definition, contain the Dem Bow beat. However, they are VERY creative with how to work it into the music. =)
8/2 is not balanced.
Hmmm... Latin music? I'm afraid I
haven't kept up with other types
of music, such as Arabic and
Oriental. :-) Besides, like I told
Old Fashioned Liberal, this post
is already pretty long!!!
What is the "Dem Bow" beat?
I haven't figured out why the margins on here hate me so much.
They always cut my sentences in
half and move them down!!! Any idea why it does that?
Or it does that.
Okay, enough joking for me.
I meant "balanced" as in
I (intellect) + E (emotion or
expression) = 10. Even I think math
has it's uses sometime. :-)
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