Quote:
|
They had no interest in new works, they had no interest in pushing music forward...
|
flint, I'm sure a symphony orchestra would play a new work if whomever made the decisions thought it was a good piece of music. The decision makers aren't necassarily going to have good taste however..!
For the time, Mars the Bringer of war might have seemed very contempary and new, but it got played. Nothing to do with it sounding old, more to do with it sounding good. If you want something played it's in your interest to make it accessible. Accessible doesn't have to mean boring either.
As for musicians not wanting to push music forward, they would rather it be pushed in a direction that resulted in them making more money. I.e by playing music that the general public will want to go and see. 'Innaccessible' music is not profitable for musicians in the grand scheme of things, and I guarantee they'd rather play a new piece of music that, rather than isolating composers and musicians from the audience, inspires an entire generation to go and see more classical works.
More performances means more money for musicians. Tschaikovsky's piano concerto no.1 is a widely loved piece of music, which will inevitably still get performed a fair bit. Whether or not you think Boulez' piano sonata is moving music in the right direction is irrelevent, because a piece like that generally makes people think that composers and musicians have simply lost touch with their audience. They would rather listen to Elgar's Cello Concerto again than listen to a new piece of avante garde music, and I personally would too.