My point was only that there wasn't enough of that type of thing to make the term "serious" a misnomer, as you suggested earlier (see quote below). Also, in my experience, anything more than the briefest of discussions of a piece will mention such borrowings. (Can't speak for whatever mus app courses you took, though.)
Brahms was know to use tavern pieces as well as some other composers and some composers are known for using folk songs. This is stuff you don't often get in music appreciation classes though I would think it would make them more interesting. It the music history profs that teach it and sometimes you get it from symphony conductors who know the "inside stories." Yes, I agree, we shouldn't do this more often. -- Emperor Snot DoctorDumbass, just to make a point here: the distinction you imagined was not the one I was making when I used the term "serious music." If you hadn't been so snotty about it, I would have explained that the counterpart of "serious" music isn't "not-serious music" but "popular music." "Classical" is an iffy term, as Bhairitu points out, because, strictly speaking, it's limited to a particular historical period. (Although not that many classical composers used tavern songs in their work.) Last night in NYC there was a concert performance of Alban Berg's opera Wozzeck, written around 1920. The music is atonal, very far from "classical," but it's certainly not "popular" either. I don't know any term other than "serious" that covers that whole range of music. So if you had the idea that my use of "serious" was intended as a putdown of Neil Young, you own it, not me. fuck, yeah. Music is an art form and it will take many forms of expression. The arts in their nature are spiritual in that they have a powerful ability to shift consciousness and emotions. Musicians struggle with the terms for the public for musical pieces (or in some cases sound pastiches). "Serious" seems a bit too serious if you consider that many of the famous orchestral composers stole tunes from their local tavern. "Classical" refer to a period in music and the arts, just as there are "impressionist" and "romanticist" periods too. Best not to be bothered by such labels and enjoy freedom of expression while we still have it. On 03/02/2014 06:30 AM, doctordumbass@... mailto:doctordumbass@... wrote: "Neal" Young plays very serious music - It is an interesting distinction that some people make, between serious, and 'not serious' music. Someone recently told me that electronic and/or sampled music, is not real music. On the one hand, I can see that musicians like Neil Young, do not try to master the classical works, or play music with a lot of tradition behind it. On the other, I've been a fan of his sound, since, "After the Gold Rush". He has inspired me in a lot of ways - far more than any classical music. Music is said to be the most abstract of the arts. I find it amusing that someone who diligently copies Mozart, for example, is hailed as a prodigy, yet someone doing the same thing with a Rembrandt, is labeled a forger. ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com mailto:FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <authfriend@...> mailto:authfriend@... wrote: Yeah, not quite the same thing. I'm talking about serious music and highly trained singers. Justin Timberlake, for one, sings in a much higher voice than his regular voice. Same for Neal Young I believe. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TSVHoHyErBQ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TSVHoHyErBQ ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com mailto:FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <authfriend@...> mailto:authfriend@... wrote: I'm not a big fan of countertenors myself; the voices always sound a little strained to me. But this dude is special, not just the voice but the musicality. The ear is more important than any musical knowledge (for the listener, at any rate). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XmyLkjxKCNo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XmyLkjxKCNo Phew! And this is not generally my kind of "thing" but it certainly evokes all sorts of primal, albeit refined primal, sensations. His voice and those instruments and the light and the setting and the crystal hanging from the ceiling. All of these things transported me to a long-ago time. Thank you for that. I am an ignoramus when it comes to knowing about music but my ear seems to make up for what I lack in theoretical musical knowledge.
