"Minimalism" and Minimalism
Kyle Gann has an interesting riff going on about the usage of "minimalist" to describe the current music of Reich, Glass and Adams, diluting its applicability to the pattern music of the 60s and 70s (and following). It's kind of entertaining to see a notorious liberal do the Objectivist "words have meaning" thing (Hey, Kyle, I'll give you back "minimalist" if I can have "own"), but that doesn't make him less right. He accurately calls the disappearance of that music down the memory hole:
You could sense their relief when John Adams and Louis Andriessen started funnelling those repeated notes into big orchestral gestures, and breaking into actual melody. "Oh, thank god," all the classical mavens and music professors sighed in chorus, "we couldn't take another minute of those endless repetitions, those drones moving by infinitessimal degrees. Let's call this stuff minimalism, and hopefully everyone will forget about that old boring minimalism."
Except that people didn't really, so the ambiguity cuts both ways. Example: Joe Concertgoer's reaction to Glass. He's heard the joke:
"Knock knock" -- "Who's there?"
"Knock knock" -- "Who's there?"
"Knock knock" -- "Who's there?"
"Knock knock" -- "Who's there?"
"Phillip Glass"
So he won't listen to, say, the Violin Concerto. If that's Minimalist, then so is Vivaldi. But Joe will suck down the Four Sleazons for hours. And no musicologist ever discusses Vivaldi in terms of minimalism, and not just because it's an anachronistic concept.
Screw usage. Usage is wrong. We need a term for "Nonesuch minimalism". I'm all in favor of "pattern romanticism" myself. It's big enough to encompass the "holy minimalists" (who aren't and never were Gann minimalists), the Gorecki 3rd, parts of Vasks, maybe earlier Rouse. It's a big tent, because it's a loose concept. But minimalism was a tight concept: music that was process as opposed to music happening through process. Fight the good fight, Kyle; don't give up.
Comments
Posted by: rightwingprof
Posted on: August 30, 2007 01:51 PM
Thank God we didn't have to deal with that at IU, though we did have to put up with Orrego-Salas, since he was on the faculty. Orrego-Salas was just silly (we went to one of his operas called Natividad or something like that, with angels hopping off roofs). You don't know pain until you've sat through John Eaton. Fortunately, we got rid of him.
Posted by: Jeffrey Quick
Posted on: August 30, 2007 02:19 PM
I've sat through quite a bit of Eaton. Not a bad composer at all, though a bit crunchy for my taste. Like the microtonality, don't much like the expressionism. O-S is a name heard more than the music; don't know enough to have an opinion. David Baker? Shrug.
Posted by: jeffrey smith
Posted on: August 30, 2007 05:28 PM
The John Cage knock knock joke is of course:
Knock knock.
Who's there.
[4'33" of silence]
I have to be honest. "Patternism" (I'm not sure if it qualifies for romanticism) puts me to sleep. Which is an advance over serialism, which gives me headaches.