So I spent most of mother’s day reading papers on Hip Hop in Gbip. Not too much fun. There were some good papers though–especially the American Indian “Rez” Hip Hop. I particularly loved the fact that I got two well argued papers that made the exact opposite points: “Canadian Hip Hop is great because it’s so Authentic” vs. “Canadian Hip Hop sucks because it is completely inauthentic.” I also learned that “spit” is an “insider term,” not slang, not a colloquialism–you live, you learn.

Alice is doing great, growing and learning every day. Got a couple of lines on jobs, but they aren’t very promising. Soon. Anyway, I promise to write more soon.

It’s been a busy couple of weeks, (aren’t they all?). I’ve neglected you and I feel terrible. Up on the Hill we are deep into theRomantic Era–Chopin tomorrow. I need to explain Schubert/Schumann’s lyricism as the reason that their symphonies never really outshadow Beethoven’s. Arrghh. The students all just had their quitillion and they will be distracted…. The school got some attention on the Today show “You know, one of those performing arts schools….” so much for excellence and individuality. Six academic teachers quit last year, I doubt I’ll be going back.

In GHH things are going well. The semester is finishing up and the students are working on their papers. Some of them are really excellent. I am particularly excited to read about “Rez Hip Hop” and Mexican Hip Hop. The course has been really good, I just sometimes wish we could have spent more time in a single place instead of moving so quickly from country to country and even continent to continent. I really don’t know of a section I would omit, and, obviously, it’s not my course.

Next year. Ah, what shall I do? There are thankfully a few more opportunities open to me than there were this year. None of them pay so well (except for the secret one I can’t even wish for outloud). In anycase, I think I will manage to get a raise of some sort by coming down off the hill and teaching elsewhere.

The dissertation is going well. I am keeping up (barely) with the revisions my advisor has been suggesting, but I am finding it really difficult to get time to finish this, the second to last chapter. Things go so darn slow. Oh well, I hope it all works out.

The pope is coming–I’d like to see him speak, I wonder if that’s possible? (How’s that for a random thought?) Well, no pics, no movies, no music, just a bunch of typing. Good Night.

Over at the AMS-LIST, folks are battling about Music and Religion-specifically whether or not applause etiquette evolved from the audience raising music’s place to the level of a musical experience. Occasionally, it is quite nice to watch a good topic develop into a debate–like the old days in seminar, but at other times I wonder what world they are (or I am) living in. It seems pretty obvious that for many 19th century artists/critics– Hoffmann, Wackenroder, Runge, Weber etc., a successful work of art either documented a religious experience or provided it–this is probably the source of the “Abbe” title given to artists, especially vituosi like Liszt or Vogler. And yet a theorist’s post argues that modern analysis can effectively remove the religious content by explaining the structural organization:

And many of us believe that what may have seemed ineffable to nineteenth-century thinkers is yielding to new critical methods, else–once again–why bother? (That’s right folks, we’re analyzing the eff out of it!) The sonic traces of performances can be dissected in exquisite detail. Their graphic forms as sets of performance directions (scores) invite fine-grained analysis. These works palpably “exist.” Belief in their greatness can be supported by pointing out concrete properties of their sonic incarnations and graphic traces, as well as by analyzing their aesthetic effects. None of this is analogous to belief in an alleged supreme being who by definition is beyond perception, let alone analysis or comprehension.

Great writing, but really? Every time I hear the opening of Beethoven’s Ninth, for instance, those open fifths/fourths are on par with a religious experience, and graphs or charts can only enhance that experience. But then, just when you thought it couldn’t get stranger, here comes another opinion:

 I’m going to stick my neck out a bit and suggest that underneath the discussions here is an unspoken subtext: a sense of embarrassment that the people of a time as advanced, and as close to the present, as the 19th century, still had the naivete to treat anything as an object of religious devotion. The discomfort, in other words, stems not so much from the fact that music was confused with “legitimate” expressions of religion, but rather from the fact that something was still needed to fill this role at all.

So, analyzing the “ef” out of music becomes religious denial? On the contrary, I like to think of analysis as an unending (and utterly Romantic) pursuit to explain the “ineffible”–the better the music, the more analysis that it can withstand. The more analysis that a music withstands, the more evidence of its “ineffibility,” in sum, the analyst is actually adding the “ineffibleness,” the religion! If the music is the object of devotion, analysis, is the act of devotion. Good, I like that, that’s why I’m here.In closing, check out Robert Plant’s descriptions of music as a semi-religious experience, that “cosmic energy.”

Well, I took the title from the weather man. Where I come from it’s supposed to be “in like a lion, out like a lamb.” Arrrgh. after my last rant I think I’ll try to be a little more positive.

I’ve been working on the overall structure of Oberon, not exactly the musical structure, I think I’ve got that figured out, but what does it mean? Schenker doesn’t apply, like Wagner (and probably any decent opera composer) Weber subordinated all of his compositional means to the dramatic content. Therefore, the “urlinie” simply doesn’t descend the way it’s supposed to. Linear counterpoint can provide some insight, but Weber’s chromatic transformations are not restrained to arpeggiations, they relate directly to the subjective content of each line.  For instance, in Sir Huon’s big aria, the E major key shifts to the mediant when he sings of his new love for Reiza:

Like Sir Huon’s newfound love, the Aria’s key is a result of his “Vision” of Reiza, also in E major, with its horn theme.  Ultimately, the organization all boils down to the depictions of Oberon crossing over from Fairyland–he is Goethe’s Daemon, or perhaps better to think of him as Frankenstein’s Daemon (no, he wasn’t a monster until later). Hmm… I should get back to it. Have a nice night!!!!

Spring Break on the Hill–Hoooray! Unfortunately, it’s still a little chilly up here near the North Pole. I miss spring, it feels like it’s been years since I’ve felt spring–oh, wait–it has been years. I hope in a year or two to get out of this depressing “elitist icebox.” I complain too much anyway. Speaking of complaining…

On the Hill, I sent them to break with Mozart’s K. 387 to analyze all four movments. I suppose two thirds of these kids will find it a relatively easy task, although they (for the most part) seem to hate anything even remotely challenging. It’s all about the grades and the competitions, and the conservatory they get into, without regard for learning to enjoy anything that takes effort. It is pretty similar to the fancy colleges around here–too much praising? Who knows, I remember grade-mongering, and registering for record-setting course loads myself, without regard to the fact that I learned less in every course because I took so darn many. I wish someone would have told me–in fact, I suppose they tried, and I just didn’t listen.

Meanwhile, virtuosic child-prodigies are steeped in a tremendous music education but those who aren’t prodigies are left with nothing. Unlike folks from an earlier generation who took a Music Appreciation course–once, and probably over thirty years ago, who tend to have a better understanding of Sonata form. They had their “Rock and Roll” or their “Crooners” or whatever, but they took the new (to them) music seriously and learned. These people now have an “appreciation” for classical music that enables them to discuss and enjoy it at level that is fulfilling and allows them to engage in something that has proven worthwhile to adults for most of their lives. Alas, I think that is just about gone.

Instead, the strategy seems to be to try to trick the non-prodigy students. Let’s teach them the “History of Rock and Roll” (a fancy title to drive enrollment) and then show them interesting sociological or historical perspectives on it–instead of challenging their assumptions about the things they know nothing about, we praise them further by teaching them that “youth culture” is “vital” and will be fulfilling to study for the rest of their lives. In fact, today in discussion I asked if Hip Hop isn’t just another form of Rock and Roll (hoping to elicit a passionate response) and the only one I got was “Yea, but only if you define both in terms of youth culture and rebellion.” Do they think they will never get old? Do they think “Sexy Can I” will be any less embarassing than this, or this? Who knows. So few of them have had any basic music (Um, do you know what a measure is? Common time? A back beat?) This certainly isn’t their fault. Bill Gate’s Job Training Program just keeps widdling away the humanities with the shrill cry of MATH AND SCIENCE! Meanwhile, the folks over at the American Musicological Society are doing everything they can to preserve their field.

Here is a recent post to the AMS E-List:

“I wonder what the logic is behind not clapping after the scherzo of the Pathetique Symphony.  It seems to me that the disappointment expressed in the Finale can actually be heightened by wild audience applause.  And the expectation of no applause actually diminishes the effect of the work.”

Wow! how vital! how interesting! Why is it that the increasingly aging (r.e. dying off) classical music audience claps only after complete movements? Arrgh, we need to fight for these kids and stop being so selfish! OKAY, rant over.

Now this is authentic: