Where's Zankel's stage door? I'm already 19 years late for my concert!

My friends Matt Marks and Brian Sacawa have been kicking out articles over the past few days in response to a fairly contentious piece on eighth blackbird’s blog. Topics under discussion include:

1. Is classical music still “relevant?”
2. Is the new “alt-classical” movement a revolution or just a fad?

As with seemingly all art music vs. pop discussions, the participants neatly sort themselves into two camps: there are the High Art Purists, who see a great and necessary divide between (and I’m paraphrasing here) “the direct, communicative power of art music” and “the mob mentality behind all that drivel the kids listen to.” And then there are the Cultural Relativists, who talk about the depth, breadth and variety of their iPod playlists in the same entirely unironic sentence that they all talk about how much they like Radiohead, Björk and Sigur Rós.

What both parties seem to agree on, however, is how important things like “complexity” and “craft” and “classical rigor” are to making great music. Thank God they can at least agree on that, right?

Sorry, but no. Every argument here is jive because the discussion itself is jive. Let’s take a walk, shall we?:

Is classical music still “relevant?”

What does “relevant” even mean here? Relevant to whom? Relevant for what? I suspect that the people asking this question think that the word is somehow loaded with meaning (in the “nudge nudge wink wink” sense) but I honestly have no idea what’s being asked. Is a concert ticket that costs $50 relevant to a person who lives off of food stamps? Is a gig at a bar relevant to a kid who’s under 21? Of course, the answer is no. But is Mahler relevant to a person who loves Mahler? Of course, the answer is yes.

Maybe the question is about whether or not we have some sort of cultural obligation to preserve classical music, either through government funding or corporate sponsorship. If classical music is “relevant” to the greater good of the culture, then it’s easy to make a case that it deserves some kind of support. Suspiciously, the people who fight for this tend to have something to gain by having a wide array of grant applications at their disposal. But can we honestly make this argument in a cultural climate that can’t even recognize that health care is worth government support? Let’s get our priorities straight.

So, the answer to “is classical music still relevant” is “I don’t understand the question, but I suspect you have an agenda.”

Is the new “alt-classical” movement a revolution or just a fad?

First of all, If you love this music, you should work to keep the name “alternative” as far away from it as possible. Alternative used to mean Rage Against the Machine. Later, it meant Limp Bizkit. Is that an admirable trajectory? Today, alt-classical means Alarm Will Sound. Tomorrow, will it mean Bond? It’s very easy (and often very profitable) to take something that gained credibility for being other and monetize it by taking things that are not other and dressing them up as other.

Secondly, here’s a relevant and timely quote on the issue:

The traditional boundaries of genre, intended audience, “culture,” have been so thoroughly crossed that even when you try it’s impossible to take a cohesive stand toward any particular piece of music.

It’s relevant because it was written by Evan Ziporyn, who’s certainly one of the major players in this music. It’s timely because it was written about the current state of affairs. Oh, wait. It was written in 1991.

[Update: Evan has now entered the discussion himself on his own blog.]

There’s nothing new about alt-classical. (There, I used it myself. See what you made me do?) Bang on a Can has been playing this music for more than twenty years. The 90s “Downtown” scene was all about classically-trained cats letting their pop music upbringing come out in their music, and throwing off the shackles of their “Uptown” training. What’s suspicious is that the people who keep asking questions about the “new alt-classical” are well aware of this recent history. What’s the motivation here?

(By the way, do student composers in 2010 seriously still need to defend their pop music influences to their professors? I would suggest that any student in this position needs to consider finding a different professor. There’s nothing pedagogically sound in telling young composers to ignore what inspires them.)

Finally, and perhaps most contentiously, I take issue with the one thing that the High Art Purists and Cultural Relativists agree upon: the sanctity of “classical rigor.”

Like polyrhythms or fluttertonguing, the decision to compose structurally is a stylistic technique. It’s not an a priori foundation for quality. I’ve seen otherwise enlightened composers give lectures in which they defend their pop culture influence by an appeal to “craft.” Who cares? Does it sound good? Then you did it right. Does it sound bad? Then all the craft in the world won’t save you.

The only thing that’s ever mattered about any piece of music, ever, is what it sounds like. Martin Bresnick used to talk about how a good piece of music should make you check for your wallet; you should feel like you got your ass kicked after listening to it.

How it got made only matters if what got made matters. No one gives a shit about your craft if your music sucks. Likewise, there’s plenty of music that makes you check for your wallet, even if it doesn’t hold up to analysis.

So what makes music good? What makes music relevant?

The answer is, “who cares?” Figure out what you like to hear. Then go listen to it and make more.

Clip art question mark? That means I'm a professional.

No, these are things that are maybe worth a little more thought, and seem to be interesting enough to people that they keep coming up. Thus:

Q. Are you still writing concert music?
A. No, but this isn’t some kind of celibacy vow. I’m up for the right project.

Q. Why aren’t you writing concert music anymore?
A. The short answer is that the cost/benefit analysis just wasn’t working out. I found that I was spending far too long working on music I didn’t much care for.

The long answer involves a careful reassessment of the very first minute of my very first composition lesson. My teacher, Ramon Zupko, sat down at his desk, looked me straight in the eye and asked something to the effect of “Do you know what the job market is like for composers?” I said something like “I imagine it’s pretty bad.” He replied “There is no job market for composers. The only reason anyone should do this is because they can’t imagine not doing it.”

For years, I couldn’t imagine not doing it. Then, gradually, I realized that I could imagine it, and that there were other things I could imagine doing even more.

So now I do those things instead.

Q. When are you going to release another electronic record?
A. Well, “release” and “record” are kind of silly words in 2009, when all music is free and even when it isn’t, almost none of the money goes to the artists. My last two record contracts were basically just ignored by my labels after a while; they simply stopped paying me and eventually stopped replying to my emails. These days, I’m pretty happy doing things like remixes, where the money comes in advance and you never have to think about royalties.

That being said, I do plan to release more new music. But I’ll probably look for ways to do this myself, without having to worry about whether or not I’m going to get screwed by drug-addled label managers.

Q. You sound like a jaded, bitter little bitch.
A. That’s not a question.

Q. You sound like a jaded, bitter little bitch. Are you?
A. No, on the contrary. I’m happier than ever with the music I’m making, and I’m happier than ever with my career. Years ago, whenever anyone asked me what I wanted to do with my life, I told them “I want to make a living in music.” And that’s exactly what I’m doing. In fact, I’m involved with more music music now (and from more angles) than I ever was when I thought of myself principally as a composer.

Q. Why did you leave Alarm Will Sound?
A. I couldn’t figure out a way to balance the incredible time demands of practicing all of that hard music with my work at Ableton.

Q. Do you miss playing in Alarm Will Sound?
A. No. I miss the people, but I don’t miss the gig. Again, I just don’t particularly have a burning need to be part of the concert music scene. I guess I miss some of the music, but in the end I’d rather be listening to it than making it anyway.

Q. But don’t you miss performing?
A. No. I absolutely and unequivocally prefer making music in the studio over making music on stage.

Q. Ok, sure, concert music. But don’t you miss performing electronic music?
A. No.

Q. I don’t get it. That incredible moment at the end of a long breakdown, when the crowd is riding every fader and knob turn, their anticipation mounting to a frenzy…and finally, when the tension in the room has reached an unbearable peak, you finally bring the kick drum back in and are rewarded with a roar of approval, hundreds of sweating bodies fully engaged in a quasi-religious frenzy…you don’t miss that?
A. Ketamine is a tranquilizer for horses.

Q. Boy, you sure are a grumpy grandpa, huh?
A. No.

Q. Why did you quit teaching?
A. I teach pretty much all day every day. True, I don’t do it in front of a chalkboard, but I see my job at Ableton as primarily educational. My short stint in academia was pretty fun, but the Ableton opportunity was simply too good to pass up.

Q. Hey, I really like [insert name of track you like]. Can I send you some of my music?
A. Of course, I’d love to hear it. But please understand that there is almost certainly nothing I can do to help your career. I don’t run a label and even if I did, most labels won’t do much for you these days anyway (see above.) Just keep working on it, keep learning your tools, and keep ripping off good ideas from other music.

Q. Would you like room for milk?
A. Yes, please.

Autechre will beat you up and steal your lunch money.

A few years ago, I had the pleasure of arranging Autechre’s “Cfern” for Alarm Will Sound. Doing an arrangement requires you to listen over and over again to little bits of a piece at a time, which is an entirely weird sort of listening experience and allows you to hear all kinds of stuff that you might otherwise miss.

As I listened, I realized that there’s something that happens in the form of a whole bunch of Autechre tracks that’s pretty bizarre. In “Cfern” it’s subtle, but in other tracks (such as “LCC” from the album Untilted) it’s much easier to hear.

An oversimplified formal diagram might look like this:

Form in Autechre's “LCC”

A = OH GOD MY MIND IS MELTING! BUSLOADS OF NUNS AND PUPPIES ARE FALLING OFF A BRIDGE! TOO MUCH INFORMATION!

B = calm down

Two-part forms are common. What’s uncommon is the huge disparity between the information density in the first half versus the second half; the first three minutes are clenched-teeth frenetic insanity, while the final four are like a warm bath.

Even more interesting, however, is that it isn’t just the macro-level that’s “front-loaded” like this. It happens at the micro-level as well.

Here’s a transcription of the basic two-bar pattern that repeats through the A section:

Here at the phrase level, we see the information density is again much higher in the first half than in the second; like a fractal, the large-scale form is represented at the small-scale.

I hear this kind of structure over and over again in Autechre’s music. I’m not sure if this is something that they’re doing intentionally, but it’s definitely a characteristic part of their sound.

When I’m not busy spraying milk out of my nose because of something Sarah Palin said, this is the sort of crap I think about.

(Aside: I found a review of Untilted that discusses form in “LCC” as well. Or at least it uses the word “form” over and over again. As far as I can tell this is just hipster word salad with a side order of pretentious.)

Come see Alarm Will Sound play my arrangement of “Cfern,” along with a bunch of other crazy stuff, at Le Poisson Rouge on July 22.