Thursday 11 October, 7.30pm until 9.00pm, Programmkino Tilsiter Lichtspiele, Richard-Sorge-Str. 25a 10249 Berlin, Germany
The debate will be in English.
Tickets: €4.50 payable on the door.
The discussion will be followed by a (15 minute) performance of four pieces by The City Substrings
For more information please call Novo Argumente +49 699 7206 701 or email johannes.richardt@novo-argumente.com.
Who’s better? Who’s best? Mozart or Madonna? Dvořák or Dizzee Rascal? Beethoven or the Beatles? Simply saying that classical music is the best can provoke a reaction denying that it makes sense to say any form of music is the best. A rejection of what appears to be an unjustifiably elitist claim, blind to the realities of contemporary music and its relative value. The fact that making judgments about the merits about various arts forms is considered to be invalid arrogance though may be telling in itself. After all, aesthetic theories have always tended to promote a certain ranking of the arts, to argue for a hierarchy and ranking of value. For existentialists theatre was the best. For Aristotle the tragic. For Plato music (good music at least) could bring a soul into harmony from discord. It can be argued that if we are to understand what is special about any particular art form we have to be open to the possibility that one form might be better than another.
Might classical music then be better than non-classical music? What would be involved in making such a claim? Few argue, for example, that music makes us better people or that it provokes any necessary emotional response in us. Nor does the superficial health of classical music in cities like Vienna, Berlin and Prague tell us much about whether or not it is a living and thriving tradition. After all, many of those listening to performances are the elderly or tourists brought in by young musicians dressed as period Mozarts. Do we even really understand what counts as ‘classical’ today? It can be hard to draw a line between Bach, Schoenberg and John Cage. Is classical music post-WWII the same thing as before? Still in the same tradition?
To take a different line, what do we make of contemporary claims that one does not need to read music to be a musician? That it might be just as easy, just as hard, to be a rock star as a concert pianist? Do both require as much work, training and discipline? Does it matter? Is pop just play and classical demand commitment? What would pop and rock and rap be without the vocals? Is pop ephemeral, the classical, well, classic? Does the relatively longer tradition of classical music represent just a quantitative or a qualitative difference? Might it be the case that contemporary music simply hasn’t been around long enough to build up the same tradition, the same critical appreciation, around it? But that it will overtime? After all, many musicians today are expert in a wide range of genres, mixing, sampling, and fusing them to create something new. Does classical music retain any claim to be simply the best? And, if it does, for how much longer?
Shirley Apthorp music critic, Financial Times | |
Ivan Hewett chief music critic, Daily Telegraph; professor, Royal College of Music; broadcaster; author, Music: healing the rift | |
Alan Miller chairman, Night Time Industries Association (NTIA) | |
Karl-Erik Norrman founder and secretary-general, European Cultural Parliament; former Swedish ambassador; author, The Gala Concert, Verdi/Wagner 200 years | |
Steven Walter artistic director, PODIUM Festival, Esslingen | |
Chair: | |
Sabine Beppler-Spahl
chair, Freiblickinstitut e.V; CEO, Sprachkunst36 |
The truth is that there is simply no need to go down the Classic Brit route. What you are in effect saying with this monstrous spectacle is that Joe Public is too uncultured, too dense, too stupid to deal with an unedited, beautifully played Chopin mazurka, Mendelssohn concerto or Beethoven sonata.
James Rhodes, Daily Telegraph, 8 October 2012Classical music is changing. There are operas in bars, Baroque bands in pubs, circus acrobats in concert halls. Rock stars compose. Classical clubbing is de rigeur. What is going on? In this series of articles, Paul Kilbey talks to some of the key figures making changes in classical music, and tries to make some sense of it all.
Paul Kilbey, bachtrack, 14 September 2012If you think classical music is snobbish, just take a look at indie culture.
En Liang Khong, New Statesman, 23 July 2012How we describe pop music proves that we find moral significance in music. How do we tell what music we should and should not encourage?
Roger Scruton, American, 28 February 2010The word 'music' in the early 21st century means many things. It means Mozart in the elevator, 50s pop songs on TV adverts, Finnish folk songs on Nokia 'phones. It means inflammatory Serbian nationalist song, ancient Coptic Church chant, Berlin electronica, Wynton Marsalis.
Ivan Hewett, Continuum, 17 March 2005