The Intelligent Approach to Modern Classical Music

As we continue through what we like to call 'modern times', we realize that our perception, and that of those who compose it, of classical music is differing. We are so used to hearing the grand works of Beethoven, Brahms and Mozart that when we listen to anything that is more recent it is considered garbage. Our ears are not used to the atonality that modern composers are working more and more with. The jarring feelings associated with modern music are not something we are quite familiar with. This is why when you mention music that was written after the late 1800s, most classical music enthusiasts shiver.
If we think for a second about the repercussions of completely avoiding 20^th century music, we can start to imagine why there are less and less composers around today. Let us imagine for a second that we are all composers. We just finished writing a piece of music and have been working on it for the last two years. This wasn't something that we did in our spare time, but rather a career that we have taken up for ourselves as a way to not only get our names out in the classical world as respectable composers, but also to provide food in our households. As composers, we start to take our finished products around to various publishers and orchestras, trying to get the music out in the world and heard. Finally, after about three solid months of begging and being turned down, a local community orchestra begrudgingly agrees to showcase it in their next performance. The night of the performance, you sit in the back of the theater, watching people read your name in the program before the performance begins and ask their neighbors who on earth that could possibly be.

At least, the moment has come. The conductor introduces your piece with as much enthusiasm as a thirty-year old announcing the arrival of Barney to a roomful of toddlers, turns around and begins your piece with a less-than-perfect downbeat. At once, since it was the not the expected sounds of Dvorak or Britten, the audience visibly recoils. After the ten minutes of sounds are done being emitted from the community orchestra that you know in your heart really did not want to do something like this, the audience offers scattered, sporadic applause at best.

How would this make you feel? Two full blown years were spent on this. And all it received was scattered applause at best. Would this not damage your inspiration? Don't you just want to shrivel up somewhere and between an insurance adjuster somewhere? Anything that will hide who you are and what havoc you have wreaked upon the classical world, right?

In writing this piece, I will not be telling you how to listen to Modern Music, but rather offering some suggestions that might make the listening part a bit more bearable, and it would also please the composers of these pieces because you, as the intended audience, would be giving them and their music a chance. We give movies an opportunity to impress us before we judge, even books keep our attention until the last page has been turned. Then why is it that we can't sit down for ten minutes and let someone who has obviously worked on something for so long show us what they have done? Why do we sit up and let out exasperated sighs and roll our eyes?

Fear. We are so fearful of what these pieces of music will sound like that we are willing to completely rid our minds of them and denounce modern music right on the spot. From this fear comes the question that I have heard so many times, "If this is music, then what will become of Wagner, Mozart, Bach, and all of the other masters?" We are afraid that instead of adding this music to our extended repertoire of listening, we are going to have it replace what we are familiar with. Conformity is something that I am certainly afraid of. I like being myself and changing who I am mortifies me. I believe that we all fear that in some way. Along with this fear comes the phobia of this 'new music' replacing what the orchestras, instrumentalists, and vocalists perform from the classics with the 'new music'. Then we really would never be able to hear what we are used to. Some people can compare this to getting a new toy. We all had our one or two favorite toys when we were kids and whenever the holidays came around, we always got new ones, but we always reverted back to what we love the most. We were afraid that mom or dad would come in and take everything that was old and replace with the new. We can kind of associate that with classical music in the same way.

There is one major argument that I have come across from various authors who combat this fear, and I find it very true and agree with it completely. Think about the progression of classical music through the last four or five hundred years. Deems Taylor words it perfectly in his book, Of Men and Music: "Is Bach extinct because Strauss wrote Ein Heldenleben? Is Beethoven on the ash-heap because Stravinsky wrote The Rites of Spring? Is Wagner no longer heard because Debussy wrote Pelléas et Mélisande? Has Brahms been scrapped to make room for Shostakovich? If the history of the race tells us anything, it tells us that art is not a branch of the automobile industry or the millinery trade. This year's model does not render last year's model obsolete. The music you have always likes will continue to be played. There is no limit to the library of the world's music. There's plenty of room on its shelves for new scores, without throwing our any old ones." (pgs 100 - 101)

Another thing that will aid with the accommodation of modern classical music is the patronage that we owe to it. Whether we like it or not, this atonal, multi-faceted music is considered classical music. As classical music lovers, we owe it to ourselves and the composers to listen and learn something from the music. If not, then we cannot consider ourselves classical music lovers. And continuously broadening our horizons gives us the chance to keep music a living and growing art. This is like being an automobile fanatic and ignoring all of the other models other than the Mustang. Not giving attention to all of the major car models would denounce your position from a car fanatic to a Mustang fanatic.

What happens if you have given the piece some of your time and you still don't like it? Should you feel bad about that? I personally believe that you should not feel terrible about it. If you have honestly given the piece a chance and listened to it a couple of times (at least) and understand it enough to intelligently explain why the piece is undesirable, then it is perfectly acceptable to disagree with something artistically. Do not be afraid to say something, though. That is another thing that classical music lovers do constantly. They do not want to be looked down upon by their colleagues and so when they don't like something or disagree, they clam up and look the other way, hoping no one would notice. Again, this is not characteristic of a real classical music lover.

As stated before, this is not meant to be a guide on how to enjoy music. Rather, this is something to allow you to think about approaching modern music differently. Music is not meant to be enjoyed by everyone, especially modern music. Music is supposed to be something in which we can listen to and experience emotion. Liking everything for the sake of appearance does not emit emotion. Expressing distaste in something that you have listened to several times does. In fact, it inspires something more than emotion. It inspires discussion, which most composers would admit would be preferable to having 100% of the population enjoying what they wrote.