| | Hi Michael and fellow SOLOists,
I'm picking up this discussion very late, and I hate to disagree with you on this, Michael, but I do think you're barking up some of the wrong trees on this one. Some, that is, not all. Let me comment somewhat at random at points in the discussion which caught my eye.
I loved your comments on your teacher so much I have to repeat it:
“When I was 18, I had a great art teacher/mentor, Edgar Ewing. He was about 65 at the time, beautiful, bright blue/gray eyes—that were loaded with wit, joy, quickness, and warmth. The first thing he told us was that “Art is like making love.” I hadn’t, yet, been in love but I knew about “love” for art. He went on to tell us to work at anything not art related to pay the bills and then paint just what we wanted to. It is advice I have followed…extremely difficult to maintain but worth it especially when a “click” of paint sends my soul through the rafters. That “click” feels, inside the chemistry of my brain, identical to having an orgasm with someone I love.
“Hold that thought.”
Speaking as an architect who does do work to order, that wonderful description of the 'click' as you react with your work happens just as readily with commissioned work as it does with more personal work - at least it does if you're doing it right - so I think perhaps this point is a red herring. (And the ex-architect was just doing a Stephen Mallory without the courage: “I don’t have the pretence to show people how to live.” What crap!)
Many SOLOists thought they understood this point, but the idea that some have expressed here that this 'click' is something not unique to art - is perhaps something one might feel when writing an article or a SOLO post - is just a complete misunderstanding of the nature of art. The two situations would appear at first sight to be commensurate in many ways, though perhaps not in degree; but it is the issue of degree that makes the two incommensurate - art encompasses such wide abstractions that the 'click' is not just an 'Uh huh, that works' moment but a 'Yes! That IS ME!' moment. There is a universe of difference
James Valliant began by making a good point, but then went on to lose the plot completely:
"There is no doubt that the most intense and emotionally satisfying musical experiences are ones that require an undivided attention and which engage both the mind and one's emotions at many levels. The "best" experiences, for me, involve being flat on my back, stretched-out, lights-out, eyes closed--under the piano itself, if possible--prepared to be transported by pure sound."
Great stuff, James. But then he continues:
"But these kind of experiences are not unique to operas or things in the sonata format. Chris is so right it is painful. Led Zep is just one example, and every bit as "intense" as Beethoven. Complexity and/or intensity is not unique to any particular genre."
Oh dear. Can I recommend this article to James on precisely this point? The issue is one of standards, and whether or not there are objective standards for music. Rand claimed that there were. I agree with her, so does Michael and Linz and Chris, and so does recent research. I point to the research and argue these points on my blog here and here.
But Lanza and Rosza are not examples of NOT meeting these standards. Rosza is not Beethoven, true, but as twentieth-century composers go he’s good – although not as good as Ellington. :-)
I suspect you chose those two to get a bite, but using those examples loses you the point. as you surely knew Linz would say, “integrity, including artistic integrity, is contextual. Mario Lanza had, it is true, the greatest operatic voice a male was ever born with.” It’s true. As he says, one can sometime lament what he did sing, but that lessens not a wit those moments when singing the very best music ever written in which he soars. Would you write off those moments altogether as being of no value? To do so would be entirely non-objective.
Michael ask:
"Why the hell would anyone hold a simple song against the sublimity of Beethoven’s 9th? But if you’re true to calling a spade a spade there is a significant difference."
There sure is, and in this sense there can be a ‘horses for courses’ approach: Sometimes your soul needs wings, sometime it needs a simple caress, and sometimes it needs being wrung out completely. Depends on the need; depends on the music. Our ‘internal iPod’ (which I mention in relation to the research in my blog post above) hopefully helps us to find the music that matters when we need it.
As George says about Coltrane: “But, I would say that as a writer/creator/performer of music, he is 'great' within his 'genre', but that that 'genre' is not the highest manifestation of art at its highest.” Quite true, and objectivity demands we recognise this, but it doesn’t mean we can’t still enjoy John Coltrane when our soul needs his caress.
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