Talk:Neoclassicism (music)
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[edit] Table
Stravinsky and Craft (1968) give the following table of thirteen differences [TABLE INCOMPLETE]:
| Stravinsky | Schoenberg |
| Reaction against "German music" or "German romanticism." No "Sehnsucht," no "ausdrucksvoll." | "Today I have discovered something which will assure the supremacy of German music for the hundred years." Schoenberg, July 1921. |
| Fox (eclectic and abundant variety). (Aron) | Hedgehog. (Moses) |
| "Music is powerless to express anything at all." | "Music expresses all that dwells in us..." |
| Chief production is of ballets | "Ballet is not a musical form" |
| Learns from others, a lifelong need for constant outside nourishment and a constant confluence with new influences. Never a teacher. No writing about musical theory. | An autodidact. After the early works, no influence from other composers. Also a teacher. Large amount of writing on musical theory. His philosophy of teaching is "Genius learns only from itself; talent from others. Genius learns from its own nature; talent from art." |
- [TABLE INCOMPLETE]
Which they then describe as, "A parlour game, no more, and in any case the parallelisms are more intersting. For example:
- The common belief in Divine Authority, the Hebrew God and Biblical mythology, Catholic culture.
- The success obstacle of the first pieces, Verklärte Nacht and The Firebird, which remained the most popular of all our works, all our lives and after.
- The common exile to the same alien culture, in which we wrote some of our best works (his Fourth Quartet, my Abraham and Isaac) and in which we are still played far less than in the Europe that exiled us.
- Both family men and fathers of several children, both hypochondriac, both deeply superstitious.
- For both of us, numbers are things.
- Both of us were devoted to The Word, and each wrote some of his own librettos (Moses und Aron, Die glückliche Hand, Jacobsleiter, Les Noces, Renard).
- Each of us composed for concrete sounds, unlike the later Webern, in which choice of sound is a final stage.
- For both of us, the row is thematic and we are ultimately less interested in the construction of the row, per se, than is Webern.
Is there an appropriate space for this (neoclassicism, expressionism, modern music, 20th century music, Stravinsky, or Schoenberg article)? Hyacinth 04:15, 31 Jul 2004 (UTC)
[edit] more recent use
This article describes a particular genre known as "neoclassical", mostly in the early 20th century and situated within the concert-music tradition. There's another, more recent genre also known as "neoclassical", starting mainly since the 1990s and situated in a non-academic tradition, related in some ways to neofolk, post-industrial, martial, and dark ambient music. This newer genre is neoclassical in that it uses might be called classical orchestration—cellos, violins, pianos, etc., rather than electric guitars or synthesizers—has an orchestral rather than a song sort of feel, and also has a strong sense of neoclassicism in subject matter and aesthetic. Examples include HERR, A Challenge of Honour, Arditi, Triarii, Dernière Volonté, etc. How should this be resolved? Should we have a separate article, and if so what should be the disambiguator? I must confess I have no good ?? to make a new Neoclassicism (??) with. --Delirium 08:18, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
- I think a new article should be made for this other musical genre, since they clearly are different. How about using Neoclassical_(music) for that one? Then there can be crosslinks on top of both the articles in the same was as on Neoclassicism. What do you think about this? /Goblim 19:24, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
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- I'm not opposed to a move, but there is a softer solution that would have pretty much the same result: just edit the crosslink template Template:Classicism to do [[Neoclassicism (music)|Neoclassical music]] instead. - Rainwarrior 19:35, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Neoclassicist composers?
Since when are Copland, Harris, Shostakovich, Britten, Holst and Rachmaninov neoclassical? Also, the case for Busoni is tenuous at best- just because they harkened back to music of the past doesn't mean its classical; Busoni used baroque and romantic themes in direct opposition to classical ideas. I advocate highly trimming the list because not every non-serialist composer was a neoclassicist.Anderfreude 03:24, 12 March 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Schoenberg as a neoclassical composer
The case for including Schoenberg in the list is, in my opinion, very weak. Firstly, yes, he continued adhering to some classical movement forms even while writing serialist works, but this is an incredibly loose definition that would allow the inclusion of countless modernistic composers that shouldn't be on the list. Secondly, Schoenberg himself loathed neoclassicism, as witnessed by the poem Der neue Klassizismus. If he even is to be described as a neo-anything, "neo-romantic" would be a better term, since he viewed his music as a logical extension of German romanticism. Virgil Thomson, who is also found on the list, would be equally better suited for the neo-romantic label, especially since he gave himself this description, as well as clearly separating himself from neo-classical ideas. EdwardTattsyrup 23:02, 23 June 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Sloppy Definition of Neoclassicism
I have never liked this term at all. Neoclassicism refers to a desired or imagined return to ancient Greece and Rome. It implies harmony, balance, and an ideal of perfection. Check out David: Oath of the Horatii. In 20th Century music, people use it to describe anything old-fashioned, however sentimental or romantic it be. I supposed it is used by those who want atonality, and want to say that this music is not modern, or those who reject atonality. Some, like Hindemith, just wanted to attenuate it. And his return was not to classicism, but to the baroque. His return to tonality didn't really change him that much.
Modern music is classical in its essence. It rejects the sentimental. It strives to abstract concepts of beauty, such 12-tone music. It is very reserved in expression. I could go on here, but won't. Neoclassicism can't be a rejection of modernism because that's what modernism is. Including composers like de Falla shows the sloppiness I am talking about. The list also has "early Stravinsky." This is cute. He was more responsible for the invention modernism than any other composer. Apparently he returned to classicism before he really started modernism. He reacted to himself before he had anything to react to. It reminds me of a play based on the Upanishads I saw on TV once. Someone was having a conversation with his own reincarnation. Nice trick.
Another problem with the list is that it includes all the important composers of the 20th Cent: Bartók, Stravinsky, Shostakovich, Hindemith, Ravel, Britten, Copland. I guess that was just a classical century.
Neoclassicacicm (music) is just a spurious term after all.
Cellorando (talk) 19:19, 8 June 2008 (UTC)
