Can any composer equal Bach?

Post by tim333 » Sun, Mar 11, 2018, 3:10 PM UTC

jinfiesto wrote: post #85

stochastic_monk wrote: post #8

A careful analysis of Beethoven's later works shows him to be a worthy contender. In particular, the Große Fugue [0] and the Op. 106 Hammerklavier sonata [1] (ironically so nicknamed, because at Op. 101, Beethoven directed that all sonatas from that time on be named Große Sonate für das Hammerklavier, and the nickname only stuck to this) show a profoundly advanced sense of counterpoint and structure. In addition to a…

Agree on Hammerklavier. I have a pet theory that Große Fugue is an elaborate troll on Beethoven's part. I kind of think that it was constructed in such a way to be as analytically rich as possible while being horrible to listen to. I have to wonder if it wasn't deliberately constructed by Beethoven to con future generations into listening to awful music. Where Brahms is concerned, very few composers matched his maste…

Post by username223 » Sun, Mar 11, 2018, 5:40 PM UTC

DubiousPusher wrote: post #11

I first should admit that I'm a 100% self taught appreciator of classical music. I don't have any formal musical education. Nor any formal history of music education. I'm the only person of my family and friends that seeks out and listens to classical music. So, my knowledge is very uneven and I'm a total pedestrian in this realm. Over the years, I've found music by references from fiction, films and criticism. I've…

Post by Synaesthesia » Sun, Mar 11, 2018, 6:42 PM UTC

username223 wrote: post #121

bratsche wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Incidentally one of his lute suites is the same as the c minor cello suite. Except I think on lute it's in either a or e minor, I forget now. I don't know whether the cello suite came first or the lute suite though. But as a violist I found this interesting. I like to play his violin sonatas and partitas but on viola but people have discouraged me from this because it means changing the key and everyone insists that…

G minor, I believe. I personally think it works better on the guitar, and can't imagine trying to do justice to polyphonic music on an instrument where it seems hard to play more than one string at a time. Sort of like the Paganini caprices -- I first heard them played by Eliot Fisk on the guitar, and even if he is sloppy sometimes, it sounds better than any violin recording I've heard.

Post by 8bitsrule » Mon, Mar 12, 2018, 12:50 AM UTC

archagon wrote: post #90

8bitsrule wrote: post #53

Bach is the 'ultimate composer' in the same sense that Pleistocene Ogg is the ultimate tool-maker, Robert Goddard the ultimate rocket-maker. Bach did many wondrous things, added a lot to the vocabulary, staked a viable claim on a couple of mother lodes. But this sort of argument (though eternally engaged in) is futile. While classical is a favorite of many (including me), music has moved far, far onward.

Onward, but not forward. Counterpoint is still depressingly underused in modern music (save for the occasional duet), and it can say so much with so little material. (Heck, the majority modern music barely even changes chords , let let alone key or anything beyond.) These tools are not antiquated; they are not buried in the sediment. They are still perfectly useful and there for our taking, if only we would dust them…

Post by imcoconut » Mon, Mar 12, 2018, 8:21 AM UTC

palimpsests wrote: post #148

ken wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not the same person, but I feel similarly -- though I come from a classical family. My preferences run to Mahler, Tchaikovsky, Dvorak, Brahms, and Wagner. Classical music generally got better as time went on. I mentally group Bach with other 'early music', and as with any art form, I recognize that the early steps were historically significant, but that's about it. I can appreciate the importance of the silent fi…

That's why, when I perform Bach's cello suite, I change the rhythms, sometimes quite a bit. I see it as a great sketch in melody and harmony, a springboard to experiment with some more rhythmically sophisticated ideas. It's so fascinating to me that we've fallen under the very real illusion in these modern times that "classical" music has virtually no concept of improvisation, that most of the primary elements of mus…