Baroque Composing in the Modern Era

During your studies you even risk spending a considerably larger chunk of your time studying the works of Beethoven and Wagner. I know, I've done it... and now I teach it.

Or Haydn... that seems to be all they teach over here!

I actually have to disagree with Matt on certain views (while I must say I'm impressed with your knowledge on the technical aspect of the Baroque - I know only of the compositions and their aesthetic appearance). The reason I write primarily in Baroque is not because I want to - it's because the way I write is automatically Baroque for an odd reason. I have a feeling that this may have been caused by my upbringing always focused on Baroque, but it could be for other reasons.

I have attempted to write in the more modern, non-traditional style of music, but this is almost an impossibility for me now. Perhaps when I one day feel the need to restart such a project such as the score I was writing for a Jimmy Neutron movie two years ago (yes, being a 12-year-old music prodigy at the time does not exclude you from doing idiotic things) I can restart writing in that style. For now, however, my writing limits have somehow been placed in the Baroque.

Also, I fully realise that the last two centuries of music have existed and have proven to be an excellent example of progress in music - afterall, it was within these 200 years that Bach's writing was finally looked at and his writing techniques put into practise as what we now call music theory. :)

I was not able to write in a modern style until I started studying at the university and was exposed to so much modern music that was actually culturally relevant.

You write Baroque music because that is what is musically and culturally relevant for you. How much non-Baroque music do you listen to? How much do you analyze?

Personally, I love the Baroque era; I really do. Though I often come under great fire for saying so, I really do think that the Classical Era (until Beethoven's heroic stage or even late Beethoven) was a step backwards in musical evolution. It's more a matter of taste than it is anything else, so don't expect me to get into it or to try to stand my ground. Bach was a synthesizer of music and musical ideas unmatched by any of his contemporaries or even by those that followed. I do understand; however, that to try to immerse myself in this culture is like trying to live in a vacuum; it's foolish and possibly even dangerous.

Also, M.C: Our supreme dislike for parallel fifths comes from the Renaissance and their rejection of the organum that came before them in the Middle Ages, which was based on parallel fifths. Personally, I love them. If you get two people singing parallel fifths (true fifths, not keyboard fifths) in a stairwell or somewhere else with good ambiance... ooh. It's almost sinful how wonderful it can be.

Here's my (perhaps insane) thought:

The music composers write reflects the mood of the time and period they were/are writing in.

What do you think?

Definitely. That's not insane at all.

Why did Classical music (initially) reject the counterpoint and harmonic complexity of the Baroque? Why did music around the World Wars become so dissonant? Why did romantics like Dvor

Our supreme dislike for parallel fifths comes from the Renaissance and their rejection of the organum that came before them in the Middle Ages, which was based on parallel fifths.

This is not exactly true. We dislike parallel octaves and parallel fifths because they sound perfect (2nd and 3rd harmonics of the sound) and therefore kill the necessasry feeling of independance between two voices. This is what I've been taught at the conservatory.

Raphael

But where does our necessary dependence on independence come from? Years of conditioning. Look at the writing of Pythagoras. He doesn't write about thirds or seconds. He writes about the octave, the fifth, and the inverted fifth (the fourth). Organum, for a long period of time, used only these perfect intervals in parallel (or similar) motion. I agree that we feel that the voices should feel independent, but I also feel like this comes more from years of conditioning, and not so much from an internal need for independence.

Yes, I'm totally aware there is a cultural aspect to this dislike of perfect intervals in succession. To me, things started to change when counterpoint was "invented" to make music from the superposition of independent lines:

To be certain a listener would be able to hear the different motives among voices, it was necessary to show clearly that the voices were independent.

Or peharps things started to evolve when composers added dissonances to their work? A succcession of perfect intervals cannot create the feeling of tension / release which is necessary to make the listener perceive a sense of movement in the piece?

Let's be perfectly clear here: the caveat against using parallel 5ths and 8ves is ONLY applicable to writing music in four parts, in common practice harmony.

It is FAR from being a "cultural" dislike. We have become quite used to the sounds of parallel 5ths through the music of Debussy.