Monday, December 19, 2005
"Too much Mozart makes you sick"
Remember that article that I posted yesterday about the failings of modern literary criticism, that it did not consider questions of our reaction to art, to beauty?
Well, here's an example of similar critical failings: this article fails to consider questions involving aesthetics as it denounces Mozart as historically insignificant, lacking any real political or philisophical motivations behind his music, and as having written only sickly sweet music.
Apparently writing music that sounds good (and by good I mean composed in the classical form os his period music that is unrivaled by his contemporaries) isn't good enough for that author. By no means is Mozart the greatest composer of them all. But he's definately one of the top 5 (I like to list my top five as Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms, and Mendelsohn [although I'm always arguing about who the fifth should be other than M]), I'd say, because he was a genius.
Even though he didn't advance the genre like perhaps he could have given his talent (although maybe he would have if he had lived longer, his later work is definately much more brooding than his earlier stuff), who else had such technical competence in composing as he did in his time? I'm sure other composer would have liked to compose as well as he did, but they didn't have the ability to do so. There is genius in his ability to put together such technically perfect compositions.
But I won't go on. Mozart wrote great music. By no means the best, but also it can't be overlooked like this author thinks it should (overlooked for Shostakovich--ehhh, don't get me started on why most modern music is horid--just because it's intellectual doesn't mean it's good either)
Sheesh. I feel sorry for that poor guy, not liking Mozart. That's like looking at a rose, a simple object of beauty, and not liking it because it has no greater purpose or meaning...
Well, here's an example of similar critical failings: this article fails to consider questions involving aesthetics as it denounces Mozart as historically insignificant, lacking any real political or philisophical motivations behind his music, and as having written only sickly sweet music.
Apparently writing music that sounds good (and by good I mean composed in the classical form os his period music that is unrivaled by his contemporaries) isn't good enough for that author. By no means is Mozart the greatest composer of them all. But he's definately one of the top 5 (I like to list my top five as Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms, and Mendelsohn [although I'm always arguing about who the fifth should be other than M]), I'd say, because he was a genius.
Even though he didn't advance the genre like perhaps he could have given his talent (although maybe he would have if he had lived longer, his later work is definately much more brooding than his earlier stuff), who else had such technical competence in composing as he did in his time? I'm sure other composer would have liked to compose as well as he did, but they didn't have the ability to do so. There is genius in his ability to put together such technically perfect compositions.
But I won't go on. Mozart wrote great music. By no means the best, but also it can't be overlooked like this author thinks it should (overlooked for Shostakovich--ehhh, don't get me started on why most modern music is horid--just because it's intellectual doesn't mean it's good either)
Sheesh. I feel sorry for that poor guy, not liking Mozart. That's like looking at a rose, a simple object of beauty, and not liking it because it has no greater purpose or meaning...
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