Oh yes, so there is.

Going back a message or two to Ron's last point: if there is an increasing distance between composers and listeners (I'm not saying there is, at least not more so than at numerous other points in history), there are a few factors one could mention which contribute to this situation: (a) the increasing confinement of contemporary composition to "festivals" thereof, which often, rather than being as celebratory as their name might imply, end up looking more like desperate acts of defence against a hostile cultural environment, (b) the easy way out taken by the music institutions (broadcasters, CD labels, broadcasters etc.) by latching on to a handful of "star names" to the exclusion of everything else, (c) the contraction of the CD industry leading the larger (and still merging) companies to concentrate only on releases for which they can clock up massive sales, and (d) possibly most pertinently for these boards, the gradual abandonment by noncommercial broadcasters like the BBC of a commitment to inform and enthuse the public about music they might not hear any other way.

Nevertheless, despite all of these obstacles some of the music still manages to find its way to a few listeners, and, oddly, the music (and its composers) then seems to have to take the blame for not being better-known.

BBC four are gonna broadcast a documentary called 'Classical Britannia' in the summer. It will be interesting to see what they include and exclude.

hmm...well, most of the composers listed have some of their work on CD (some, both listed or not, have been completely ignored). The point about distance is a bit more valid when it comes to performances, (though I'm not sure there ws a time when performances for this music ws any more 'regular'), and broadcasts (and there is a need for repeated performances and discussion sometimes just so that it might 'click').

On the other hand, these days you have msg boards and more accessibility to information about new music. I  have a suspicion that it might've been a lot harder for me 20 years ago..

I hate to mention the word 'Stockhausen' again, Richard, but you do seem to be agreeing with me ...

The 'inclusivity' thing is very interesting. I actually think I wouldn't include McCartney, Jenkins, Carl Davis (and what about Andrew Davis while we're at it, or Barrington Pheloung, or Debbie Wiseman, all of them TV/film composers whose 'new sounds' reach the ears of the vast majority of the British public much more regularly than even Karl Jenkins et al). However, that wouldn't be because I don't think they're part of 'the scene', but because I don't think the sort of things they'd say in interview would best represent the role they fulfil in that scene. There's an established 'genre' of interviews with composers within which Ferneyhough, Barrett, Skempton, Anderson, Harvey and others know how to convey information that sheds light on their work. I'm not convinced that Paul McCartney would know what to do with an interview other than to treat it like a national newspaper or magazine's publicity interview. This isn't meant to be patronising or exclusive, just to say that the only reason for interviewing composers for a book at all is because there's a recognisable tradition of such books - Murray Schafer, Griffiths, also Andrew Ford's fascinating (and very inclusive) book of interviews with Australian composers from the mid-90s.

Of course, things have changed, and one of the things a new book should be able to do is register those changes. But if you start trying to reflect the changed nature of the scene to too great an extent, you have to begin to question whether such a book is still an appropriate medium for saying anything about the scene in the first place.

For the same reason, I entirely take Richard's point about including improvising and non-notating musicians, and can see how an appropriate interviewer might actually manage that inclusion successfully. But by the same logic why not include performers who don't compose at all or not very much but have been influential commissioners and collaborators on new works (indeed, how about Ian Pace?), arts administrators, ensemble founders, etc. etc.

All this would follow quite naturally from the composers - if Colin Matthews was going to talk about his role in founding NMC, or Oliver Knussen about his conducting advocacy of other composers, or Andrew Toovey or Roger Redgate or Joanna Baillie about their respective ensembles, then why not also allow people in similar positions who don't also happen to compose to have their say? But then it becomes a different - and somewhat unmanageable - book ...

I think that simply, if we have various non-'classical' composers, plus improvisers and performers, we're definitely going to need more than 24 names if we aren't going to have to limit the 'classical' contingent precisely to the 'star names' that Richard rightly points out are over-represented in festivals and so on.

This is not strictly relevant to the title of the thread, I know, but has to do with interviews - what does anyone think of Bernard Sherman's book of interviews with early music performers, Inside Early Music?

I don't think that's quite what I meant - I certainly wouldn't be expecting any of the composers included to be 'objective' or 'realistic' about their work, but to say something interesting which is unique enough to the context of a book of interviews that space in such a book is not being given over to things that could be covered just as well or better elsewhere.

I should add that I'd be tempted to use a similar argument to whittle down my list more generally - e.g. I'd think hard about whether Birtwistle would really have anything to say that I couldn't have guessed before reading the book - and I should also say that I'd be quite happy to interview McCartney, Jenkins or anyone else to see what did come up, but only if I could somehow do that without already being committed thereby to including them.

Hi Richard,

No, as Ollie said there are a couple of lists in the 21st century topic, though that was a 'young new music composers of the world' discussion. The one here, I think, is now British composers of all genres??


What is wide, the gap or the knowledge? 

Yes there is a gap. My attitudes to new music have softened a bit the last year, so I'm more receptive, mainly due to exchanges on this and the old forum, and my shock at how the MI issue was handled by the BBC.


Indeed I will do, but I expect that if I just listen to clips and read whatever might be on the webpages, I will not likely understand much 

John W