...We have been listening to his work for piano and electronics entitled "How Time Alters Matter" - very philosophical no doubt - but found most of its twenty-nine minutes unconsciously comic. It begins with a loud chord on the piano. For the following fifteen seconds nothing else happens; then the loud chord is repeated. We are supposed to savour the decay no doubt; for for the following twenty seconds nothing else happens; then the loud chord is repeated again. The first minute and a half contain in all only three isolated chords so it gets off to a terrible start! Except in the final five minutes when all of a sudden itturns into Rachmaninoff in the style of Stockhausen (or vice versa) the work is pretty much like that all the way through and we regret that we cannot possibly recommend it to Members. Does any one else know it?
No - I do not. Perhaps he should be advised that when composing it is advisable to lower the spectacles in front of the eyes, and also to adopt a more critical inner ear (preferably one more finely attuned to the moment-by-moment effect created by his notes).
Baz
I realise that whatever I say is very unlikely to convince Messrs Baz and Grew, but I regard Asbjørn Schaathun as one of the more interesting composers active today, producing work of consistently high quality and originality (and, as perspicacious Members will no doubt already have suspected, sounding nothing like either Stockhausen or Rackmarninoff) regardless of the tilt of his spectacles.
I have not the slightest doubt that he is an interesting composer, but I thought the gist of Member Grew's message concerned his music rather than his personality and status.
Baz
I have not the slightest doubt that he is an interesting composer, but I thought the gist of Member Grew's message concerned his music rather than his personality and status.
Don't be obtuse, Baz, I meant he is a composer of interesting music, though, as I say, I doubt that you would agree.
(
adj) A term of abuse sometimes used by modern composers when describing listeners who express boredom and disdain for music that consists only in long silences punctuated by the same loud chords hammered out on the pianoforte.
