Dear David An absolutely superb post . Thank you so much. As a jazz musician from the UK who loves classical music & opera, African music, soul music, Jamaican music & much more besides- I can't agree with your sentiments more. As Duke Ellington said:" There are two types of music: good and bad."
Thanks so much for your insights! I was especially taken by what you said (and have said in other videos) about culture. We all seem to want to own culture, as if it's ours to own. There's so much political and tribal nonsense about this: "you can never understand MY culture!" and "I can never understand your culture, nor should I ever claim to." Etc. As if culture were a thing that one could ever possess. It isn't: it's an ongoing, living process of mixing. Every living culture thrives because it borrows and transforms. America, at least as an ideal, should exemplify this, though it hardly does today. I'm an art historian, and my expertise is pre-Modern China and Japan (though I'm teaching European art history these days), and one of the things I've learned over the years, is that there isn't anything that you can identify as essentially and unchangingly "Chinese" or "Japanese", though nationalist politics would vehemently argue otherwise. China became and becomes the China that exists today, through a long and ongoing history of cultural exchanges, borrowings from others and vice versa. Every culture works this way (unless it's dead). I remember a student I was advising who wanted to use a folding screen format for a painting she wanted to do. I encouraged her to go ahead. (I taught for many years at an art school). When she introduced her idea to her painting class, the teacher and classmates, who like her were white, criticized her for "appropriating" something that was not hers - the Japanese folding screen format. She came back to me, and I was furious. "What did the Asian students in your class say?" "Nothing in class, but after class, they said they liked the idea." I told her that her critics were being hypocritical. Why weren't they upset that Asian students were doing oil painting on rectangular canvases? After all, that's Western culture. Do we allow Japanese students to come here to learn oil painting out of the goodness of our hearts? No, it's because we assume oil painting is simply painting, whereas folding screens are "Japanese" painting. It's not a matter of left or right, both sides do this. The wisdom of your insights derives from your unstinting focus on doing justice to THE MUSIC, and not to personalities. I apologize to everyone for the long post - I'm a professor and that's what we do - talk endlessly.
I agree. I want to say more, but it is just too complicated a subject and needlessly so. And I hate that effing word appropriate. Maybe this is all about perceived power. The Germans always felt that they owned the symphony, and therefore, they had the power to determine what the course of symphonic writing should be. Now they are being eclipsed by outsiders like Sibelius. It seems to me as if the Japanese, if you don't mind my saying this, beat themselves up for borrowing from other cultures, when this is what all cultures do. On the other hand, borrowing from the Japanese has been a common occurrence since the middle of the nineteenth century, and every artist who has done so, from van Gogh to Coltrane, has been proud of it. It seems that only in recent times are we talking this "recontextualization" and "appropriation" horseshit, because we are suddenly supposed to feel guilty for what everyone on earth has always done. Somehow we now link multiculturalism to imperialism and hegemony, because secretly we only believe in power. But this power is imaginary, as it was for the German symphonists.
Really enjoyed this! I would be curious down the line if you would ever do a video of composers/ pieces or artists on whom your opinion has changed over time..if any :)
Moved to tears as I listened to her symphonies. The liner notes on the new excellent Philadelphia release say she presented herself at the New England Conservatory as of Mexican descent.
Thank-you for a very informative video. Coincidentally, I just started listening to her music yesterday after reading that the performance of her first and third symphonies by the Philadelphia Orchestra has been nominated for a Grammy award.
Well said! I had the privilege of leading the NY premiere performance of the Third at Buffalo State College, back in May 2017 - some 77 years after its first performances by the WPA Orchestra. In many ways, Price’s symphonic masterworks are a true realization of Dvorak’s (her ‘grand-teacher’) vision for American music. It is wonderful to see the increased attention to her work, as it’s exciting to see how and whether these works will enter the repertoire of fine orchestras. And thank you for the shout-out to the late Rae Linda Brown’s wonderful bio, “The Heart of a Woman.”
Bless me, someone actually took up Dvorak's famous suggestion! Pure, elevated Americana, long-neglected (Wikipedia says the 4th sym was found in an abandoned house) and now freshly unrolled by the yard, I am a happy boy. Thank you, Dave, and God bless you Mrs. Price.
Art and Science are constants in human civilization. They will always remain. They transcend. I love her works. The Juba does stand out. I wish her pieces were longer
Hannah Edgar's review of the Chicago Symphony performing Price's Andante Moderato put the composer on my radar, and I immediately streamed the Philadelphia recording of Symphonies 1 and 3. I loved them both. I have not heard a better third symphony from an American composer.
All extremely well put, Dave. Florence Price certainly is getting played in concert halls now for inclusivity reasons some will strongly disagree with - but what do I care? These works deserve to be heard regardless of the composer’s identity. I enjoy the music and anything that livens up tired, generic programs consisting wholly of old warhorses we’ve all heard a thousand times before. I really loved Price’s 1st Symphony, very approachable and entertaining, especially the later movements. I’ll look forward to taking in the 3rd as well, the excerpts you played are excellent.
Another outstanding video, thoughtful and thought-provoking. I heard some of Nezet-Seguin's reading of Price's 1st on our local classical station. It was memorable and striking--I assume this recording was streamed as the CD isn't due out until January. I hope you'll review that one soon.
Tp continue, I have the other Naxos recording, and Koch recording of the third symphony. The one you are reviewing I cannot find right now, but someone else said it's coming out in January.
Have pre-ordered the DG release of Symphonies 1 & 3 with Nezet-Seguin. Now hearing my Koch recording that is probably not as good as the DG and Naxos recordings.
Excellent video. Diversity can be a good idea but it has its drawbacks. An amusing case is that of the British Classic FM. They regularly produce lists of the top 10 in a particular field. The latest lists always include a token female. With this in mind they listed Nadia Boulanger as a leading 20th century composer. Obviously they had never heard of Florence Price.
@@jackdahlquist2977 Hildegard is unique, no other composer is also a saint of the Catholic Church and a significant spiritual writer. There is a Penguin Classic of selections from her writings, including an allegorical play, which she also wrote the music for. Her music is of high quality and she is one of the first named composers in the western tradition. Gothic Voices for Hyperion made a CD of her music entitled 'A Feather on the Breath of God' which was released in 1985, it became a best seller and remained available ever since.
Great points you make there about being American, cultural appropriation, etc. As our government continues spending trillions of dollars, a lot on foolish things, wouldn't it be nice if they could spend a paltry amount, maybe $15 million, and put together a professional orchestra in the old WPA model with one mission: rehearse and record the vast amount of music by American composers that has never had a chance. There must be hundreds of composers like Price whose music is unknown to us simply because our orchestras, no doubt catering to public taste, cannot or will not play it. Put 100 musicians to work and let's explore this forgotten legacy.
Smart commentary!👍And an important American composer. As if she hadn't enough to cope with, had she lived longer she would have been confronted with the intolerance so many composers of a tonal bent faced with the rigid hegemony and authoritarian orthodoxy of the serialist school. I assume Joseph Horowitz's new book, Dvorak's Prophecy, devotes sufficient attention to her.
To continue: the Koch recording is quite good. Like the Celeste in the slow movement. Who would you compare Price to? Can’t remember if you addressed this. Great review, by the way. The reviews make my day, even the Bach cantata survey.
Very fine and thank you. Since you mentioned Still, have you done a program on him? I am from AR and still live there. Didn't Jeter conduct the Fort Smith orchestra? I had some college mates that played in that group.
Dave, I just got through listening to Glenn Loury and John McWhorter's discussion of Florence Price and the presence of African-American artists in the world of classical music. I was already a big admirer of William Grant Still, so I was curious about Price. So, I just gave this DGG recording of the Third Symphony a patient hearing. It IS really nice. I had to play the adagio twice, it's that lovely. I wasn't forcing myself to admire this music because she was Black and female. That kind of virtue-signaling makes me nauseous. No, I definitely recommend giving this work a serious hearing on its merits.
This was wonderful, Dave! It made think, too, of some other composers of real quality who haven’t received anything like their due for the music they composed-great music that stands on its own terms, but which our cultural history has shunted into obscurity. When people talk about Scott Joplin, for example, it is always for his rags-as if Treemonisha, which is pretty damned extraordinary, simply didn’t exist. And while piano aficionados may know Cécile Chaminade, it is remarkable how little known she is outside those specialized circles. There are wonderful things by Kaija Saariaho, Sofia Gubaidulina, Unsuk Chin, Franghiz ali-Zadeh, and Jennifer Higdon that remain too little heard and known. The list goes on. None of these composers or any others would deserve consideration if their work were not well-made and powerful, but so much of it is. This chat, in short, is a real mitzvah.
@@peterweima4525 Absolutely! At least she’s had the advocacy of Kristian Zimerman somewhat recently, but right you are. I should have mentioned Galina Ustvolskaya, too….
Off topic. I got the latest release from the Cleveland Orchestra recording label. Prokofiev Sym2 snd Schnittke. Another uncompromising release. Not an easy listen
In the early 20th century, European classical composers appropriated jazz or other derivatives of African-American culture. You can accuse Milhaud, Ravel, Weill, and Schulhoff of cultural appropriation, or you can say what they did was legitimate on its own terms: just another way to be original within a European tradition. That's why I don't try to hear the "Blues" in Ravel's violin sonata as anything but another way for a composer to use an exotic surface for a way to be himself, no matter how much he loved hearing jazz performed in Paris or Harlem. Come to think of it, the same goes for quasi-Hungarian elements in the music of Haydn, Schubert, and Brahms. In Price, Still, and Dawson, there's a different relationship with the African-American foundational material, which is both musical personal--just as it was with different material for JS Bach. I agree that, when I was growing up in the US, assimilation was viewed in a more positive light and, it seemed in my world, more uniform. With a different perspective, W.E.B. Du Bois wrote about the split consciousness of African-Americans, partly caused by barriers to belonging and equality, the things we thought came automatically with assimilation. For Du Bois, the idea of a remedy was the ability of African Americans to make contributions that would be universally acknowledged. It's interesting to compare that with Mahler--an exponent of Middle European cultures who was acutely aware of his being culturally "homeless," and whose idea of musical mission was famously telegraphed as, "A symphony must be the world."
I think the whole idea of "appropriation" is incredibly stupid. No one owns a culture. People come from different backgrounds. Some are inherited, others acquired or consciously adoopted, and who cares which are which? It's all bullshit. In the process of artistic creation everyone has the absolute right to use whatever they want. Period.
@@DavesClassicalGuide If appropriation is just a superficial resemblance--a way of being derivative, it's bad. If appropriation helps composers discover themselves--a way of being original, it's good.
@@lovettboston And who are you to determine which is which? You are making meaningless distinctions. You can buy a car because you need transportation or because your happen to like the color. It's your choice, and no one has the right to tell you which reason is valid and which one is not. If the object is available, it's available, and that's all there is to it.
@@DavesClassicalGuide No argument here. My notion of good and bad is purely about musical preferences, and we all have a right to those. I was in a community orchestra that played a lot of works by Copland. That trained me to understand how, behind all the different guises of Rodeo, Appalachian Spring, El Salon Mexico, Four Piano Blues, you have a great individual talent, and not just another American guy who studied with Boulanger. I wouldn't cancel Copland any more than Charlie Parker's "Cherokee."
Important words from you, sir. I work in a highly woke Fortune 50 company who would put you in the closet force-feeding you banjo and bag pipe music for your sentiments about meritocracy in music. It is the content of your character or the music you create that matters NOT what genetics you were born with. I wish we could return to this thinking as well. Maybe we'd have more of a variety in the concert hall (which is a major reason I never go to live performances anymore of the 50,134 performance of the Beethoven 7th or Mozart 40th).
Well, I consider Gustav Mahler very German! So what about his religious heritage! The klezmer elements in his music are no more un-German than the gypsy elements in the music of Brahms or allusions to jazz in Hindemith.
What you consider him to be isn't the point. What matters is how these composers were viewed by their contemporaries and the effect this had on their careers and their music's reception during their lifetimes.
"Join the Haydn Symphony Crusade", Great, i love it! I must add, "and don't be trap inside the Bruckner cult!" I think with your verve the slogan possibilities are endless. "Because we Love Vibrato!", "How to prononce CLUYTENS, We don't care!"
She looks rather “white” to me. Bottom line is…is her music worthy? Yes…I think it is. At least as worthy as that of MacDowell. I’ll look for these works. Thank you for this review.
Ok Dave, you keep costing me money and shelf space while enlarging my musical depth. I will keep on listening. Thanks.
Dear David
An absolutely superb post . Thank you so much. As a jazz musician from the UK who loves classical music & opera, African music, soul music, Jamaican music & much more besides- I can't agree with your sentiments more.
As Duke Ellington said:" There are two types of music: good and bad."
Thank you.
Thanks so much for your insights! I was especially taken by what you said (and have said in other videos) about culture. We all seem to want to own culture, as if it's ours to own. There's so much political and tribal nonsense about this: "you can never understand MY culture!" and "I can never understand your culture, nor should I ever claim to." Etc. As if culture were a thing that one could ever possess. It isn't: it's an ongoing, living process of mixing. Every living culture thrives because it borrows and transforms. America, at least as an ideal, should exemplify this, though it hardly does today. I'm an art historian, and my expertise is pre-Modern China and Japan (though I'm teaching European art history these days), and one of the things I've learned over the years, is that there isn't anything that you can identify as essentially and unchangingly "Chinese" or "Japanese", though nationalist politics would vehemently argue otherwise. China became and becomes the China that exists today, through a long and ongoing history of cultural exchanges, borrowings from others and vice versa. Every culture works this way (unless it's dead). I remember a student I was advising who wanted to use a folding screen format for a painting she wanted to do. I encouraged her to go ahead. (I taught for many years at an art school). When she introduced her idea to her painting class, the teacher and classmates, who like her were white, criticized her for "appropriating" something that was not hers - the Japanese folding screen format. She came back to me, and I was furious. "What did the Asian students in your class say?" "Nothing in class, but after class, they said they liked the idea." I told her that her critics were being hypocritical. Why weren't they upset that Asian students were doing oil painting on rectangular canvases? After all, that's Western culture. Do we allow Japanese students to come here to learn oil painting out of the goodness of our hearts? No, it's because we assume oil painting is simply painting, whereas folding screens are "Japanese" painting. It's not a matter of left or right, both sides do this. The wisdom of your insights derives from your unstinting focus on doing justice to THE MUSIC, and not to personalities. I apologize to everyone for the long post - I'm a professor and that's what we do - talk endlessly.
Thank you for your input and insights. I found them fascinating.
I agree. I want to say more, but it is just too complicated a subject and needlessly so. And I hate that effing word appropriate. Maybe this is all about perceived power. The Germans always felt that they owned the symphony, and therefore, they had the power to determine what the course of symphonic writing should be. Now they are being eclipsed by outsiders like Sibelius.
It seems to me as if the Japanese, if you don't mind my saying this, beat themselves up for borrowing from other cultures, when this is what all cultures do. On the other hand, borrowing from the Japanese has been a common occurrence since the middle of the nineteenth century, and every artist who has done so, from van Gogh to Coltrane, has been proud of it. It seems that only in recent times are we talking this "recontextualization" and "appropriation" horseshit, because we are suddenly supposed to feel guilty for what everyone on earth has always done. Somehow we now link multiculturalism to imperialism and hegemony, because secretly we only believe in power. But this power is imaginary, as it was for the German symphonists.
@@theosalvucci8683 I couldn't agree more.
@@DavesClassicalGuide You the man, Hurwitz.
Good music, dave great sermon at the end . Happy Chanukah
Thank you, Dave, for your great common sense. The music world needs more people like you.
Really enjoyed this!
I would be curious down the line if you would ever do a video of composers/ pieces or artists on whom your opinion has changed over time..if any :)
Interesting idea!
Marvelous review plus excellent and timely social commentary!
Personal note: I, too, was born in Little Rock (1936), and my hometown symphony, Fort Smith SO, recorded the other Naxos CD of her music.
Yep! www.classicstoday.com/review/florence-price-two-symphonies/?search=1
I will be getting this! Her uniqueness and coherent expression is all that matters.
Moved to tears as I listened to her symphonies. The liner notes on the new excellent Philadelphia release say she presented herself at the New England Conservatory as of Mexican descent.
Wow, what a discovery
I was hoping you would do this. I have a strong suspicion that that very CD will be showing up in my mailbox soon!!
excellent show here
Thank-you for a very informative video. Coincidentally, I just started listening to her music yesterday after reading that the performance of her first and third symphonies by the Philadelphia Orchestra has been nominated for a Grammy award.
Big surprise. I wonder if anyone has actually hear it?
Well said! I had the privilege of leading the NY premiere performance of the Third at Buffalo State College, back in May 2017 - some 77 years after its first performances by the WPA Orchestra. In many ways, Price’s symphonic masterworks are a true realization of Dvorak’s (her ‘grand-teacher’) vision for American music. It is wonderful to see the increased attention to her work, as it’s exciting to see how and whether these works will enter the repertoire of fine orchestras. And thank you for the shout-out to the late Rae Linda Brown’s wonderful bio, “The Heart of a Woman.”
Bless me, someone actually took up Dvorak's famous suggestion! Pure, elevated Americana, long-neglected (Wikipedia says the 4th sym was found in an abandoned house) and now freshly unrolled by the yard, I am a happy boy. Thank you, Dave, and God bless you Mrs. Price.
BRAVO!!!
Well said, David 👍
Give the world Great music and Civics.
I think these CD's are going to be my Christmas present to myself 🙂
Great chat! I have her symphonies 1 and 3 with Little Rock. I like it.
So do I.
Art and Science are constants in human civilization. They will always remain. They transcend. I love her works. The Juba does stand out. I wish her pieces were longer
Hannah Edgar's review of the Chicago Symphony performing Price's Andante Moderato put the composer on my radar, and I immediately streamed the Philadelphia recording of Symphonies 1 and 3. I loved them both. I have not heard a better third symphony from an American composer.
NAXOS have under-rated recordings.
All extremely well put, Dave. Florence Price certainly is getting played in concert halls now for inclusivity reasons some will strongly disagree with - but what do I care? These works deserve to be heard regardless of the composer’s identity. I enjoy the music and anything that livens up tired, generic programs consisting wholly of old warhorses we’ve all heard a thousand times before. I really loved Price’s 1st Symphony, very approachable and entertaining, especially the later movements. I’ll look forward to taking in the 3rd as well, the excerpts you played are excellent.
Thanks for this, David
Another outstanding video, thoughtful and thought-provoking. I heard some of Nezet-Seguin's reading of Price's 1st on our local classical station. It was memorable and striking--I assume this recording was streamed as the CD isn't due out until January. I hope you'll review that one soon.
I will when I get it!
Tp continue, I have the other Naxos recording, and Koch recording of the third symphony. The one you are reviewing I cannot find right now, but someone else said it's coming out in January.
Have pre-ordered the DG release of Symphonies 1 & 3 with Nezet-Seguin. Now hearing my Koch recording that is probably not as good as the DG and Naxos recordings.
Excellent video.
Diversity can be a good idea but it has its drawbacks. An amusing case is that of the British Classic FM. They regularly produce lists of the top 10 in a particular field. The latest lists always include a token female. With this in mind they listed Nadia Boulanger as a leading 20th century composer. Obviously they had never heard of Florence Price.
They did the same with their list of the ten greatest opera composers, there were all the usual suspects and Ethel Smyth!
That's called "tokenism," and it's senseless to re-write history just to be politically correct.
@@patrickhows1482 I keep seeing Hildegard von Bingen listed with the all-time greats
@@jackdahlquist2977
Hildegard is unique, no other composer is also a saint of the Catholic Church and a significant spiritual writer. There is a Penguin Classic of selections from her writings, including an allegorical play, which she also wrote the music for. Her music is of high quality and she is one of the first named composers in the western tradition. Gothic Voices for Hyperion made a CD of her music entitled 'A Feather on the Breath of God' which was released in 1985, it became a best seller and remained available ever since.
Thank you for being open minded about a black women; she needs all the help available. All musical women composers need it.
Great points you make there about being American, cultural appropriation, etc. As our government continues spending trillions of dollars, a lot on foolish things, wouldn't it be nice if they could spend a paltry amount, maybe $15 million, and put together a professional orchestra in the old WPA model with one mission: rehearse and record the vast amount of music by American composers that has never had a chance. There must be hundreds of composers like Price whose music is unknown to us simply because our orchestras, no doubt catering to public taste, cannot or will not play it. Put 100 musicians to work and let's explore this forgotten legacy.
Smart commentary!👍And an important American composer. As if she hadn't enough to cope with, had she lived longer she would have been confronted with the intolerance so many composers of a tonal bent faced with the rigid hegemony and authoritarian orthodoxy of the serialist school. I assume Joseph Horowitz's new book, Dvorak's Prophecy, devotes sufficient attention to her.
Thanks for mentioning Joseph Horowitz' book - I just ordered it.
To continue: the Koch recording is quite good. Like the Celeste in the slow movement. Who would you compare Price to? Can’t remember if you addressed this. Great review, by the way. The reviews make my day, even the Bach cantata survey.
Look, no 'dislikes'! I want to hear that 'Ethopian Shadow' thing
Very fine and thank you. Since you mentioned Still, have you done a program on him? I am from AR and still live there. Didn't Jeter conduct the Fort Smith orchestra? I had some college mates that played in that group.
Yes, and I haven't done much Still yet.
Dave, I just got through listening to Glenn Loury and John McWhorter's discussion of Florence Price and the presence of African-American artists in the world of classical music. I was already a big admirer of William Grant Still, so I was curious about Price. So, I just gave this DGG recording of the Third Symphony a patient hearing. It IS really nice. I had to play the adagio twice, it's that lovely. I wasn't forcing myself to admire this music because she was Black and female. That kind of virtue-signaling makes me nauseous. No, I definitely recommend giving this work a serious hearing on its merits.
I can't wait for this to arrive! You can hear the influences in the samples you played for us, but you can also hear that Price has made them her own.
Happy Hanukkah, Dave. :)
Thank you. You too.
This was wonderful, Dave! It made think, too, of some other composers of real quality who haven’t received anything like their due for the music they composed-great music that stands on its own terms, but which our cultural history has shunted into obscurity. When people talk about Scott Joplin, for example, it is always for his rags-as if Treemonisha, which is pretty damned extraordinary, simply didn’t exist. And while piano aficionados may know Cécile Chaminade, it is remarkable how little known she is outside those specialized circles. There are wonderful things by Kaija Saariaho, Sofia Gubaidulina, Unsuk Chin, Franghiz ali-Zadeh, and Jennifer Higdon that remain too little heard and known. The list goes on. None of these composers or any others would deserve consideration if their work were not well-made and powerful, but so much of it is. This chat, in short, is a real mitzvah.
"The list goes on"... Grazyna Bacewicz!
@@peterweima4525 Absolutely! At least she’s had the advocacy of Kristian Zimerman somewhat recently, but right you are. I should have mentioned Galina Ustvolskaya, too….
What are the chances you can do Altenberg Lieder? The IPO are playing it next month and Berg is all greek to me.
Just go hear it. Lovely stuff.
@@DavesClassicalGuide thx!! Abbado-Price? Boulez-Norman? Ashkenazy-Balleys?
@@ngershon Take your pick.
@@ngershon Abbado-Price :-)
Off topic. I got the latest release from the Cleveland Orchestra recording label. Prokofiev Sym2 snd Schnittke. Another uncompromising release. Not an easy listen
But that is what The Cleveland Orchestra does.
In the early 20th century, European classical composers appropriated jazz or other derivatives of African-American culture. You can accuse Milhaud, Ravel, Weill, and Schulhoff of cultural appropriation, or you can say what they did was legitimate on its own terms: just another way to be original within a European tradition. That's why I don't try to hear the "Blues" in Ravel's violin sonata as anything but another way for a composer to use an exotic surface for a way to be himself, no matter how much he loved hearing jazz performed in Paris or Harlem. Come to think of it, the same goes for quasi-Hungarian elements in the music of Haydn, Schubert, and Brahms.
In Price, Still, and Dawson, there's a different relationship with the African-American foundational material, which is both musical personal--just as it was with different material for JS Bach.
I agree that, when I was growing up in the US, assimilation was viewed in a more positive light and, it seemed in my world, more uniform. With a different perspective, W.E.B. Du Bois wrote about the split consciousness of African-Americans, partly caused by barriers to belonging and equality, the things we thought came automatically with assimilation. For Du Bois, the idea of a remedy was the ability of African Americans to make contributions that would be universally acknowledged. It's interesting to compare that with Mahler--an exponent of Middle European cultures who was acutely aware of his being culturally "homeless," and whose idea of musical mission was famously telegraphed as, "A symphony must be the world."
I think the whole idea of "appropriation" is incredibly stupid. No one owns a culture. People come from different backgrounds. Some are inherited, others acquired or consciously adoopted, and who cares which are which? It's all bullshit. In the process of artistic creation everyone has the absolute right to use whatever they want. Period.
@@DavesClassicalGuide If appropriation is just a superficial resemblance--a way of being derivative, it's bad. If appropriation helps composers discover themselves--a way of being original, it's good.
@@lovettboston And who are you to determine which is which? You are making meaningless distinctions. You can buy a car because you need transportation or because your happen to like the color. It's your choice, and no one has the right to tell you which reason is valid and which one is not. If the object is available, it's available, and that's all there is to it.
@@DavesClassicalGuide No argument here. My notion of good and bad is purely about musical preferences, and we all have a right to those. I was in a community orchestra that played a lot of works by Copland. That trained me to understand how, behind all the different guises of Rodeo, Appalachian Spring, El Salon Mexico, Four Piano Blues, you have a great individual talent, and not just another American guy who studied with Boulanger. I wouldn't cancel Copland any more than Charlie Parker's "Cherokee."
Important words from you, sir. I work in a highly woke Fortune 50 company who would put you in the closet force-feeding you banjo and bag pipe music for your sentiments about meritocracy in music. It is the content of your character or the music you create that matters NOT what genetics you were born with. I wish we could return to this thinking as well. Maybe we'd have more of a variety in the concert hall (which is a major reason I never go to live performances anymore of the 50,134 performance of the Beethoven 7th or Mozart 40th).
Well, I consider Gustav Mahler very German! So what about his religious heritage! The klezmer elements in his music are no more un-German than the gypsy elements in the music of Brahms or allusions to jazz in Hindemith.
What you consider him to be isn't the point. What matters is how these composers were viewed by their contemporaries and the effect this had on their careers and their music's reception during their lifetimes.
@@DavesClassicalGuide Yes. It is worth remembering how critics long pooh-poohed Mendelssohn. What could that have been about?
"Join the Haydn Symphony Crusade", Great, i love it! I must add, "and don't be trap inside the Bruckner cult!" I think with your verve the slogan possibilities are endless. "Because we Love Vibrato!", "How to prononce CLUYTENS, We don't care!"
Love 'em!
She looks rather “white” to me. Bottom line is…is her music worthy? Yes…I think it is. At least as worthy as that of MacDowell. I’ll look for these works. Thank you for this review.
She was very light-skinned, and it mattered back then quite a lot, both within the Black community and without.
@@DavesClassicalGuide It really does not matter to me. My main concern is “is the music worthy”? You’ve convinced me that it is.
@@LyleFrancisDelp That IS the point!
@@DavesClassicalGuide Exactly.