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Reiner Torheit
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« Reply #30 on: 11:29:20, 12-04-2007 » |
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although the kind of orientalism is hugely complicated by the fact that countries like Poland were themselves occidentalised by a colonial Russia I would be interested to know what examples could be given of this so-called "occidentalism", and what you believe its musical manifestations to be? |
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"I was, for several months, mutely in love with a coloratura soprano, who seemed to me to have wafted straight from Paradise to the stage of the Odessa Opera-House"
- Leon Trotsky, "My Life"
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TimR-J
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« Reply #31 on: 11:55:10, 12-04-2007 » |
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I think it's possible to point to lots of examples, great and small, Reiner, but I suppose the classic example is the Russian characterisation of Catholic Poland employed at various times throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
As for musical examples, the use of Polish dances throughout Glinka's Life for the Tsar might be one (see Halina Goldberg: 'Appropriating Poland: Glinka Polish Dance, and Russian National Identity', Polish Encounters, Russian Identity (Indian University Press, 2005)), in which Glinka uses these dances to characterise the "Polish menace" that had only recently been defeated by the Russian military in the 1831 uprising.
Of course, as with any examples of this type with regard to music, it's extremely difficult to pin down exact meanings, and still less to make accusations based upon them - I wouldn't wish to, either.
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ahinton
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« Reply #32 on: 11:59:50, 12-04-2007 » |
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It may now be clear that the "orientalism" of many composers in the 19th and early 20th century arose from a "colonialist" attitude towards the cultures they were appropriating, and I do think it's as well to note that on the whole such strategies would now be rightly considered unacceptably patronising if not insulting, but we would also do well to look at how those composers themselves thought about it, as well as the fact that they would have taken the relationships involved in colonialism for granted just like everyone in that society did, with the exception of a small minority of advanced political thinkers - among whom it has never been usual (even now, as we can easily see) to count very many musicians, who can't reasonably be held to "higher" standards than the communities they lived and worked in, unless one is of the opinion that being an artist ought to confer some kind of angelic aura on a person.
I'm not sure that this is quite correct in all cases; "composers and other lunatics" (as Sorabji used to say, with quite abit of his tongue fairly firmly in both cheeks, of course) might - or at least ought - more often than not be relied upon to have a rather wider and more flexible view of world affairs in general and so I wonder if the "colonialist" reference is, in general terms, more relevant and ascribable to the listeners and their responses than to the composers and their intentions. In other words we can criticise whatever use of "orientalising" tendencies in music of the past from our present standpoint, such that we would look askance at any composer writing a piece called "Impressions de l'orient" or whatever in 2007 but applying the same standards to a composer writing in 1907 is in a sense to deny the historical changes which have occurred in the meantime. Our consciousness has been shaped by the collapse of the old colonial empires and indeed by the liberation movements which were instrumental in bringing it about, while to understand the music of the past one always has to some extent to put oneself into a different frame of mind: the St Matthew Passion is pretty incomprehensible unless you have some idea of 18th century Lutheran Christianity (which is why the Bach specialist Masaaki Suzuki regularly accompanies his concerts in Japan with lectures about it). The late 19th/early 20th century composer is likely to have thought not much more than "here's some interesting and strange material, let's see what we can do with it" rather than examining the wider historical/social/political implications of doing so. Should the music be censored for that reason? I once read an article by John Potter suggesting that anti-Semitic references in the texts of Bach cantatas be removed and replaced, which struck me as being a more insulting thing to do than leaving them in.
Agreed in all particulars - and where the question of our understanding of past musics is concerned, it might also be salutary to remember Robert Simpson's remarks anent the period performance practice movements which centred around the inherent limitations of the results, in that one can no longer listen to Bach performed in any way at all (i.e. "authentically" or otherwise in terms of playing styles and instruments used) as people in Bach's day did, because our ears are accustomed also to Xenakis - in other words, our listening experiences of past musics are inevitably coloured to some extent by the fact of our listening experiences of more recent musics. Best, Alistair |
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George Garnett
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« Reply #33 on: 12:10:32, 12-04-2007 » |
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I wonder if the "colonialist" reference is, in general terms, more relevant and ascribable to the listeners and their responses than to the composers and their intentions.
I thought it might end up being our fault  |
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roslynmuse
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« Reply #34 on: 12:30:41, 12-04-2007 » |
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Just a thought - I wonder how many composers use(d) particular sounds, timbres, chords, melodic shapes, rhythms etc etc (even titles) simply (and I mean simply) because they liked the sound they made?
As I say, just a thought, but not unconnected, I think to the fact that most listeners will listen to things they like because they like the sound they make first and foremost. Some of us then, of course, go on to justify/ intellectualise/ rationalise/ psychoanalyse our likes (and dislikes)... but it gets dangerous when one tries to apply this approach too dogmatically to long-dead (or even not-so-long dead) composers.
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ahinton
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« Reply #35 on: 13:12:13, 12-04-2007 » |
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I wonder if the "colonialist" reference is, in general terms, more relevant and ascribable to the listeners and their responses than to the composers and their intentions.
I thought it might end up being our fault I didn't and don't say that - and, indeed, my reference to the term was in specific response to Richard's earlier reference thereto. Best, Alistair |
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George Garnett
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« Reply #36 on: 13:25:08, 12-04-2007 » |
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I didn't and don't say that - and, indeed, my reference to the term was in specific response to Richard's earlier reference thereto.
I do realise that, Alistair, hence the ' '. But I think I do nonetheless disagree with the suggestion that there's any reason to think composers, or artists generally, are any more advanced or sounder in their political views than anyone else. There's no reason in principle why this should be so and the evidence seems to be be pretty clear that they are as much of a rag-bag as the rest of us in that respect. |
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increpatio
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« Reply #37 on: 13:38:19, 12-04-2007 » |
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'No one appears yet to have mentioned that there is comparatively little "occidentalism" in the music of Eastern composers'
Of course, the impact on musical traditions can be quite hefty; especially, say, regarding the homogenization of their scales and rhythms when the pop music industry begins to take hold of the folk music tradition. (I have heard people muttering of such issues before, but I do not know any legitimate sources to cite on this matter).
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increpatio
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« Reply #38 on: 13:48:26, 12-04-2007 » |
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Just a thought - I wonder how many composers use(d) particular sounds, timbres, chords, melodic shapes, rhythms etc etc (even titles) simply (and I mean simply) because they liked the sound they made?
Heaven forbid!  A main issue might be how well they incorporate this new external musical material into their own styles, I'd say; it's possibly the same with composers who come off as sounding like weak imitations of other composers - the music can not sound convincingly like a sincere personal expression. |
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richard barrett
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« Reply #39 on: 13:52:33, 12-04-2007 » |
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Just a thought - I wonder how many composers use(d) particular sounds, timbres, chords, melodic shapes, rhythms etc etc (even titles) simply (and I mean simply) because they liked the sound they made?
As I say, just a thought, but not unconnected, I think to the fact that most listeners will listen to things they like because they like the sound they make first and foremost. Some of us then, of course, go on to justify/ intellectualise/ rationalise/ psychoanalyse our likes (and dislikes)... but it gets dangerous when one tries to apply this approach too dogmatically to long-dead (or even not-so-long dead) composers.
But... it could also be said that there's no such thing as "simply because they liked the sound they made", since all of our likes and dislikes are conditioned (I don't say precisely determined, but certainly strongly affected) by our circumstances, and as such ought to be open to question. Speaking for myself, I don't think it's enough to say I did things in such a way because I simply liked the sound - there ought to be something immanent in the music which says something about why I liked it; otherwise it's just a symptom of its time and place (as opposed to being a response to them). |
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richard barrett
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« Reply #40 on: 14:20:25, 12-04-2007 » |
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'No one appears yet to have mentioned that there is comparatively little "occidentalism" in the music of Eastern composers'
Of course, the impact on musical traditions can be quite hefty; especially, say, regarding the homogenization of their scales and rhythms when the pop music industry begins to take hold of the folk music tradition. (I have heard people muttering of such issues before, but I do not know any legitimate sources to cite on this matter).
I've done quite a bit of muttering on this point myself, as it happens, though not (yet?) in published form. Firstly, until the second half of the twentieth century, there were very few "Eastern composers" in the "Western sense" (which would normally mean "trained in Western conservatories or in Eastern institutions set up in imitation of them"), and their "occidentalism" is in fact all-pervading (including anything written for symphony orchestra, or piano, for example). There are isolated examples of Western colonial music being taken up by local musicians before this, for example in the tanjidor ensembles of northern Java (the musical descendants of slave ensembles maintained by wealthy landowners in the colonial period) which combine Western brass instruments with Javanese percussion. |
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Ian Pace
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« Reply #41 on: 17:24:40, 12-04-2007 » |
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Just in response to George's longer post: I'm actually much more sympathetic to what you say than you might imagine, and think that the dogmatic, uncritical invocation of Said at every opportunity has been quite a destructive force. Said made a few important points, but was so set on writing an attention-seeking polemic that he was happy to make blanket claims about any evocation of 'the East' as being imperialist by definition, indeed every Westerner as being utterly consumed by such values. Even in the revised editions of Orientalism, he never retracted these claims. The problem is that some of his antagonists have been of the genuinely neo-imperialist and neo-conservative schools of thought, in particular Bernard Lewis. I've said so on the old boards, but will repeat here: I think there are much more intelligent writers on the subject of Orientalism than Said, in particular the French writer Maxime Rodinson; also Aijaz Ahmad's critiques of Said are very important. The last thing I want to do is condemn 19th or early 20th century composers for not living up to 21st century standards of enlightenment; nonetheless I think the 'orientalist' codes were very clear in their work at the time and were frequently understood as such by listeners. And for that reason, we can gain a deeper understanding of the music and its historical meanings by examining this (and there's been some excellent research into the subject). I mostly take exception when today some repeat the same tired old platitudes about 'the East' when discussing this music (being 'timeless', 'sensual', and so on); just think that nowadays we should be able to approach this work with a greater degree of maturity and intelligence. Many of the works on the big list I gave interest me a great deal, though I wouldn't deny that some degree of colonialist values informed their composition.
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'These acts of keeping politics out of music, however, do not prevent musicology from being a political act . . .they assure that every apolitical act assumes a greater political immediacy' - Philip Bohlman, 'Musicology as a Political Act'
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Ian Pace
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« Reply #42 on: 17:32:12, 12-04-2007 » |
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Agreed in all particulars - and where the question of our understanding of past musics is concerned, it might also be salutary to remember Robert Simpson's remarks anent the period performance practice movements which centred around the inherent limitations of the results, in that one can no longer listen to Bach performed in any way at all (i.e. "authentically" or otherwise in terms of playing styles and instruments used) as people in Bach's day did, because our ears are accustomed also to Xenakis - in other words, our listening experiences of past musics are inevitably coloured to some extent by the fact of our listening experiences of more recent musics.
I doubt if there's a singular practitioner of historically-informed performance who would disagree with your last clause, nor that hardly any would talk or think about 'authenticity' these days. But you could equally make an argument for altering the harmonies and everything else in Bach in line with more recent music. There was a perception that timbre was essentially unimportant until about the late-nineteenth century. I don't accept that at all, and think that by using different timbres we are fundamentally altering the music, as we would if we changed the harmonies. Furthermore, not all developments in instruments have produced those that are simply 'better'; where some properties have been enhanced, others have been lost. A modern clarinet isn't simply a 'better chalumeau', for example, nor is everything about the use of the Tourte bow an unequivocal gain. |
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'These acts of keeping politics out of music, however, do not prevent musicology from being a political act . . .they assure that every apolitical act assumes a greater political immediacy' - Philip Bohlman, 'Musicology as a Political Act'
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Ian Pace
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« Reply #43 on: 17:39:46, 12-04-2007 » |
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Just a thought - I wonder how many composers use(d) particular sounds, timbres, chords, melodic shapes, rhythms etc etc (even titles) simply (and I mean simply) because they liked the sound they made?
That possibility is invoked by Israeli musicologist Benjamin Perl in his review of Matthew Head's Orientalism, Masquerade and Mozart's Turkish Music (review in Music and Letters (2002: 83[3]), with respect to some of Mozart's 'Turkish music'. However, in the context of the opera in particular, there was such an intense appropriation of common stereotypes of the Turks (or at least the 'common Turks', as represented by Osmin, the higher class Pasha is granted a more generous characterisation), as sadistically barbarous, lacivious, and so on, stereotypes that had particular meanings in Vienna (when the 1683 siege was still in people's minds), that it is hard to think that Mozart didn't know something of what he was doing and representing. |
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'These acts of keeping politics out of music, however, do not prevent musicology from being a political act . . .they assure that every apolitical act assumes a greater political immediacy' - Philip Bohlman, 'Musicology as a Political Act'
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Ian Pace
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« Reply #44 on: 17:59:39, 12-04-2007 » |
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Our consciousness has been shaped by the collapse of the old colonial empires and indeed by the liberation movements which were instrumental in bringing it about, while to understand the music of the past one always has to some extent to put oneself into a different frame of mind: the St Matthew Passion is pretty incomprehensible unless you have some idea of 18th century Lutheran Christianity (which is why the Bach specialist Masaaki Suzuki regularly accompanies his concerts in Japan with lectures about it). The late 19th/early 20th century composer is likely to have thought not much more than "here's some interesting and strange material, let's see what we can do with it" rather than examining the wider historical/social/political implications of doing so. Should the music be censored for that reason? I once read an article by John Potter suggesting that anti-Semitic references in the texts of Bach cantatas be removed and replaced, which struck me as being a more insulting thing to do than leaving them in.
Richard Taruskin makes the same argument with respect to the few anti-semitic passages in works of Stravinsky as well  . Bach possibly never knew a Jewish person, and was simply reiterating standard Lutheran teachings; it would be ridiculous to hold him to account for that, in particular to associate that sort of tacit anti-semitism with the murderous variety of the twentieth century (not that murderous anti-semitism isn't a major feature of earlier eras as well, but I don't see that the St John Passion could really be said to incite or advocate that, by any means). Understanding (critically) 18th century Lutheran doctrine is important in viewing Bach's works in a wider context (though there have been strong arguments made that the centrality of such doctrines to his compositional approach has been overestimated); I suppose I see ideologies bequeathed by colonial eras in the same way in the context of orientalist works. |
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'These acts of keeping politics out of music, however, do not prevent musicology from being a political act . . .they assure that every apolitical act assumes a greater political immediacy' - Philip Bohlman, 'Musicology as a Political Act'
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