Beethoven’s Music was Simple, Rhythmic Modes, Automorphs and Middle Eastern Music

Originally Posted by Seraphim

In fact, anyone who listens carefully can easily hear the compositional struggles of Beethoven in his music when played on the same program with Mozart. I once had the opportunity to hear Beethoven's 7th played (by the superb Boston Baroque) immediately after an unplanned performance of Mozart's 29th (which substituted an aria when singer had called off at the last minute) and the contrast in quality was incredible. I'm not saying Mozart's 29th is better music (it's certainly less ambitious) but it certainly had a level of polish and cohesiveness that Beethoven's 7th lacked in comparison. It was like stepping out of a Rolls Royce and into a rickshaw.

You have an overly active imagination.

You are letting your personal bias show.
Which of course, removes a great deal of crediblility from your stance on this whole discussion.

Simply because you are unable to appreciate the Beethoven for what it is, a masterpiece, and have the perfectly subjective notion that the Mozart is "more polished", will not make it an objective comparison nor material to support a stance like the one you've been promoting in this thread.

All that to say that, basically, you have just proven yourself wrong with a single phrase.

Originally Posted by Seraphim

Reaching a bit aren't we? Where did I call all these composers geniuses?

Point taken, I thought that was what you implied. Apparently not.

The composers I listed aren't necessarily all outright geniuses but because, as I mentioned in an earlier post, at least as hard working, better trained, and far more accomplished than anyone one this forum they are better placed to judge the geniuses than any of us.

Hard working? Beethoven certainly worked hard, but so did thousands of others.

Better trained? I think you depreciated the expertise of musicologists a couple of posts ago, saying that training alone doesn't qualify for anything. "Musicologists who cannot compose music as sophisticated as that of Brahms or Beethoven will not be able to understand Mozart and Bach as well as Brahms and Beethoven no matter how many facts and theories they have accumulated. It takes a genius to truly understand one."-> See, that's why I assumed you were talking about geniuses to judge other geniuses. Since according to you they're the only ones who can truly judge other geniuses. But SSC has already pointed out that composers of the last centuries inherently were less trained in certain musical aspects than we are today. Not only had they no clue about all the musical developments that happened after their time until today, they usually also had a very limited knowledge of music history and knew next to nothing about music in other cultures. Not even to mention the lack of knowledge about acoustics. Their knowledge might have been excellent in their particular musical field, but it was a specialised and narrow knowledge in comparison to what is expected from the average musicologist and musician today.

Far more accomplished? What does that mean? Famous? Able? If you mean the latter, we're already back in the realm of the undefineable.

You haven't named any real criterion why Brahms and Beethoven should be better suited at judging "geniuses" than less famous people. Or are you just going to give us a list of people who are in your opinion able to classify others as geniuses? And what if they disagree with each other?

Sorry, but I just find it a bit naive to think famous composers automatically have a perfect ability to judge themselves and others accurately. They are subjective individuals too, born into a certain culture, grown up with certain music and certain teachers, with individual characters and tastes (and not even just musically: just see how Mendelssohn's Judaism made Wagner depreciate his music). There's no "supreme council of composers" who all share the same musical ability and are able to judge who's a good composer and who isn't. It's a lot of individuals, all with individual weaknesses and individual ideas about what music should be. Vincent d'Indy might have classified different composers as geniuses than Pierre Boulez, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, Jean Baptiste Lully or Leonin.

Originally Posted by Seraphim

You request a simplistic analysis of musical elements as if music is nothing more than a sewage diagram from the city planning office. In reality, the work of an artistic genius is much like porn ... you know it when you see it.

Hard work and training can only get one so far if they lack genius. Just look at poor Robert Levin who bravely put his music right in the middle of Mozart's Requiem. Can you, using your analytical methods identify which is the work of genius? If not, it's not because Levin is as capable as Mozart but because your analytical methods are lacking.

You really need to stop confusing products with people. Works of music are never themselves "genius" but when they are the product of a genius it's quite apparent. Someone with a good ear and mind upon hearing a similar work of Haydn and Mozart back to back would know which is Mozarts. There is a range of expression, a freedom and sophistication in the melody and counterpoint that is uniquely Mozart's. If you ever watched tennis, you can immediately identify who's got the most natural ability. Technique is great but there's no substitute for natural ability.

No work of art is a genius because only people can be geniuses. What you like or dont like is subjective. However it's perfectly easy to identify a piece of music or work of art as something only a genius could have produced.

As the final nail in this discussion's coffin, all that you're implying is that you can tell Mozart was (AS A PERSON) a genius only by listening to his music in comparison to Haydn and Beethoven.

That's so amazingly absurd I can't even begin to describe it. Nope, can't do it.

And you fall prey to your own argument; you're talking about characteristics in Mozart's music that identify it as "music written by a genius", yet you fail to specify what these characteristics mean.

What do you call "expression, a freedom and sophistication in the melody and counterpoint"??? If you're unable to provide real concrete substantial definitions for this, your argument is (once again) gone out the window.

And no, you can't just handwave it by saying "well you know when you see it." You're treating this as borderline magic by now and it's quite sad to see.

FURTHERMORE!

I'm not the one confusing "Products with people", you're the one doing it, as clearly evidenced below. Observe your quite-hilarious contradiction:

"You really need to stop confusing products with people. Works of music are never themselves "genius" but when they are the product of a genius it's quite apparent. Someone with a good ear and mind upon hearing a similar work of Haydn and Mozart back to back would know which is Mozarts. There is a range of expression, a freedom and sophistication in the melody and counterpoint that is uniquely Mozart's."

Did you catch it?

No?

OK, let's try again:

"You really need to stop confusing products with people. Works of music are never themselves "genius" but when they are the product of a genius it's quite apparent. Someone with a good ear and mind upon hearing a similar work of Haydn and Mozart back to back would know which is Mozarts. There is a range of expression, a freedom and sophistication in the melody and counterpoint that is uniquely Mozart's."

Now you see it? It's very funny that you're saying "WAIT, works of music are never themselves genius!" but you're using the work of music to DEFINE genius in favor of the composer! If Mozart had written NO MUSIC and was yet the same genius you claim he is, would you still be able to magically recognize it? NO.

Absolute and utter fail.

PS: And with that, I hope this discussion stops. There's really no point in any of this and by now you have absolutely no credibility in anything you say by virtue of all this crap. Nevermind that if you even resort to mocking when, indeed, your arguments are plain sad it doesn't invite further conversations with you.

Originally Posted by almacg

I don't see how you could say Mozart is a genius but Beethoven isn't. If the definition of musical genius is to be able to hold and improvise an entire orchestra in the mind (and it's up to you if you agree or disagree), then Beethoven was a genius. When he wrote his ninth symphony I believe he was deaf. How could he possibly write such a work without any external reference?

Also, the notion that Mozart's work was more polished than Beethoven's is subjective for one thing!

I never realized the relative lack of polish in Beethoven's music until i heard Mozart's 29th played just prior to it. That last minute change in the program ruined the rest of the concert for me.

As for genius, in my opinion (and that of countless other composers), Beethoven certainly was a genius (who has written anything of the same class since?), but there are degrees of genius. Beethoven's music was often powerful, beautiful, even sublime, but his struggle to remember and write down everything that he heard in his head is apparent (especially once you know that he admitted to this). He knew that the range and breadth of his imagination and creativity was second to none who was alive but he had to struggle to turn that into music. Yet what he did produce, even if not as good as what he knew it to be, influenced countless generations of musicians since, even modern musicians, who go to incredible lengths (like writing shockingly bad music) to try and be the next Beethoven.

In his final hours he revealed that it was Handel who he held above all others, even higher than Mozart. The following quote has been attributed to Beethoven:

"Handel was the greatest composer that ever lived. I would uncover my head, and kneel before his tomb." Supposedly he also said that if there was a doctor who can help him "his name would be Wonderful."

Interestingly, both Beethoven and Mozart seem to have been similarly inspired by Handel, and the Messiah in particular. Mozart even took Handel on directly, using the subject from the fugue "and with his stripes" (Messiah) to forge his own double fugue in the Requiem and then expressing a dramatic range and language beyond that of the original. Yet don't his aria's pale in comparison to Handel's?

YouTube - Serse: Ombra mai fu

Perhaps Handel, really was the greatest of them all.

Originally Posted by SSC

As the final nail in this discussion's coffin, all that you're implying is that you can tell Mozart was (AS A PERSON) a genius only by listening to his music in comparison to Haydn and Beethoven.

That's so amazingly absurd I can't even begin to describe it. Nope, can't do it.

And you fall prey to your own argument; you're talking about characteristics in Mozart's music that identify it as "music written by a genius", yet you fail to specify what these characteristics mean.

What do you call "expression, a freedom and sophistication in the melody and counterpoint"??? If you're unable to provide real concrete substantial definitions for this, your argument is (once again) gone out the window.

And no, you can't just handwave it by saying "well you know when you see it." You're treating this as borderline magic by now and it's quite sad to see.

FURTHERMORE!

I'm not the one confusing "Products with people", you're the one doing it, as clearly evidenced below. Observe your quite-hilarious contradiction:

"You really need to stop confusing products with people. Works of music are never themselves "genius" but when they are the product of a genius it's quite apparent. Someone with a good ear and mind upon hearing a similar work of Haydn and Mozart back to back would know which is Mozarts. There is a range of expression, a freedom and sophistication in the melody and counterpoint that is uniquely Mozart's."

Did you catch it?

No?

OK, let's try again:

"You really need to stop confusing products with people. Works of music are never themselves "genius" but when they are the product of a genius it's quite apparent. Someone with a good ear and mind upon hearing a similar work of Haydn and Mozart back to back would know which is Mozarts. There is a range of expression, a freedom and sophistication in the melody and counterpoint that is uniquely Mozart's."

Now you see it? It's very funny that you're saying "WAIT, works of music are never themselves genius!" but you're using the work of music to DEFINE genius in favor of the composer! If Mozart had written NO MUSIC and was yet the same genius you claim he is, would you still be able to magically recognize it? NO.

Absolute and utter fail.

PS: And with that, I hope this discussion stops. There's really no point in any of this and by now you have absolutely no credibility in anything you say by virtue of all this crap. Nevermind that if you even resort to mocking when, indeed, your arguments are plain sad it doesn't invite further conversations with you.

1) Your analytical ability is clearly limited by your imagination
2) You are making a fool of yourself by comparing yourself to these composers
3) Some of the things you say simply make no sense whatsoever. It's like your just lashing out wildly.

"If Mozart had written NO MUSIC and was yet the same genius you claim he is, would you still be able to magically recognize it? NO. "

Take a deep breath, say the following 20 times over, then have a delicious, moist chocolate chip cookie with a glass of milk (Lactaid brand if you're lactose intollerent). Hopefully you'll feel better thereafter.

"It's ok that I have the talent of Mozart's toenail clippings and being resentful and rude won't change that"

Originally Posted by Gardener

]

Better trained? I think you depreciated the expertise of musicologists a couple of posts ago, saying that training alone doesn't qualify for anything. "Musicologists who cannot compose music as sophisticated as that of Brahms or Beethoven will not be able to understand Mozart and Bach as well as Brahms and Beethoven no matter how many facts and theories they have accumulated. It takes a genius to truly understand one."-> See, that's why I assumed you were talking about geniuses to judge other geniuses. Since according to you they're the only ones who can truly judge other geniuses. But SSC has already pointed out that composers of the last centuries inherently were less trained in certain musical aspects than we are today. Not only had they no clue about all the musical developments that happened after their time until today, they usually also had a very limited knowledge of music history and knew next to nothing about music in other cultures. Not even to mention the lack of knowledge about acoustics. Their knowledge might have been excellent in their particular musical field, but it was a specialised and narrow knowledge in comparison to what is expected from the average musicologist and musician today.

Far more accomplished? What does that mean? Famous? Able? If you mean the latter, we're already back in the realm of the undefineable.

You haven't named any real criterion why Brahms and Beethoven should be better suited at judging "geniuses" than less famous people. Or are you just going to give us a list of people who are in your opinion able to classify others as geniuses? And what if they disagree with each other?

Sorry, but I just find it a bit naive to think famous composers automatically have a perfect ability to judge themselves and others accurately. They are subjective individuals too, born into a certain culture, grown up with certain music and certain teachers, with individual characters and tastes (and not even just musically: just see how Mendelssohn's Judaism made Wagner depreciate his music). There's no "supreme council of composers" who all share the same musical ability and are able to judge who's a good composer and who isn't. It's a lot of individuals, all with individual weaknesses and individual ideas about what music should be. Vincent d'Indy might have classified different composers as geniuses than Pierre Boulez, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, Jean Baptiste Lully or Leonin.

This entire post is based on the confusion of style with substance. To understand the difference between the two (by taking style out of the comparison), listen to the Robert Levin completion of Mozart's requiem.

Originally Posted by QcCowboy

You have an overly active imagination.

You are letting your personal bias show.
Which of course, removes a great deal of crediblility from your stance on this whole discussion.

Simply because you are unable to appreciate the Beethoven for what it is, a masterpiece, and have the perfectly subjective notion that the Mozart is "more polished", will not make it an objective comparison nor material to support a stance like the one you've been promoting in this thread.

All that to say that, basically, you have just proven yourself wrong with a single phrase.

According to you, saying Mozart's 29th is more polished than Beethoven's 7th means:

1) that I am not capable of appreciating the 7th as a masterpiece
2) that since you believe otherwise that everything I've said is wrong
3) that I am somehow biased against Beethoven (or at least towards Mozart, I'm no relation, I promise)
4) that since I do not subscribe to your limited idea of what makes an "objective comparison" that I have not provided evidence for my stance

What it really shows is that you didn't read my post before attempting to discredit my stance.

Here's what I actually said:

"I'm not saying Mozart's 29th is better music (it's certainly less ambitious)"

Which means:

1) Mozarts 29th isn't necessarily a better piece of music
2) That it clearly isn't as ambitious as the Beethoven's 7th

I respect your musical knowledge but in a discussion like this it really is important to read carefully before jumping to conclusions.

This thread has survived considerably past its usefullness... and will now be closed.

I suggest to some of the participants that they learn how to discuss matters without resorting to name-calling or insults, and to others to be careful about circular reasoning and "absolute declarations" regarding music.

Thread now closed.