An observation about "Modern" classical music.


As I sat in my car, waiting for my wife as usual, I listened to a local classical music station which happened to be playing some "modern" music. I don't like it, being an old fart who likes Mozart and his ilk. But, as I had nothing else to do, I tried to appreciate what I heard. No luck, but I did notice something I have experienced before but never thought about. At the end, there was a dead silence of 3 to 5 seconds before audience applause. This never happens with, for example, Mozart where the final notes never get a chance to decay before the applause and Bravos. Obviously (IMHO) the music was so hard to "follow" that the audience were not sure it was over until nothing happened for a while.

I know that some guys like this music, but haven't you noticed this dead time? How do you explain it?
eldartford

Showing 5 responses by jsujo

I had a hard time with modern classical, but without even trying, I started feeling the music of Bartok and company....

Its all due to familiarity and patience,,,you cant sit and try to get it...slowly, even heard as background music is more helpful...
Rob, your post makes no sense...are you saying that then all modern composers should just take another job?
Why work hard understanding modern classical music when you could spend your whole life listening to baroque through to romantic (and some understandable modern music like Cage, etc.) and never run out of stuff to listen to?

Rob

Rob, that is the statement i was getting at....

But that could be a circular argument, and applied to many art forms. But I think its a bit of a musical isolationist point of view...

I think you can learn to appreciate the modern classical stuff without trying so hard.. Sometimes just occassional revisits thru some time does the trick...I started appreciating lots of it from buying LP's from a collector friend who has a classical radio show in Atlanta,,,as we listened to some of it, he gave me context for the music,,,although there is some music that even I cant get into (at least for now), especially some of the modern music put forth by the Nonesuch label..
Rob,,,i actually felt the same way about Woody Allen movies...I felt they were too much intellect and not enough emotion or candor.