Classical Music: Why don't you listen?

[BlancoNino]

Originally posted by: DrPizza
Searching and searching online... I wish I had a collection of all these old cartoons. I'd just lock myself in the house for a weekend and watch them. In the middle of Bugs Bunny playing Hungarian Rhapsody... phone rings, interupts concert "Franz Liszt? Never heard of him."

I have all of them on either VHS or DVD, except for some of the banned ones.

They were written for adults (afterall, they were played as shorts before adult movies were shown at the theatre). I've grown to appreciate them.

"Pigs in a Polka" - Great cartoon. Based on 3 of Brahms' Hungarian Dances...really funny stuff.

 

[Descartes]

Originally posted by: Demon-Xanth
To me personally, I find classical music to be too busy and it lacks a good beat. The notes are usually either long and slow or very fast and sharp. They don't have a nice "thump" that you'd get from an instrument like a bass guitar or a drum.

I guess that's why I perfer muscle car engines to sports car engines.

Ever heard of a bass, a timpani, bassoon, etc.? Even the most famous symphony in the history of music, Beethoven's 5th, has a reasonable demonstration of "thump." Listen to his 9th for something more.

There are a multitude of pieces out there with plenty of demonstration of Beethoven'esque intensity, but most are not to be found before the 19th century.

 

[BlancoNino]

Originally posted by: Demon-Xanth
To me personally, I find classical music to be too busy and it lacks a good beat. The notes are usually either long and slow or very fast and sharp. They don't have a nice "thump" that you'd get from an instrument like a bass guitar or a drum.

I guess that's why I perfer muscle car engines to sports car engines.

You don't need drums to have a "beat".

 

[Deeko]

I find it uninteresting. Doesn't have a beat. Yes, I know it has other instruments capable of producing a bass line. No, it does not have a beat in the sense I'm saying.

I only really listen to it when I'm doing school work, because it is 'background music' that doesn't occupy my attention when its on.

 

[nageov3t]

90% of what gets me interested in a song are the lyrics.

 

[Descartes]

Originally posted by: Deeko
I find it uninteresting. Doesn't have a beat. Yes, I know it has other instruments capable of producing a bass line. No, it does not have a beat in the sense I'm saying.

I only really listen to it when I'm doing school work, because it is 'background music' that doesn't occupy my attention when its on.

What is the sense you're saying?

 

[Deeko]

What, do you think the beats in classical music are anything remotely like the beat in music I listen to, namely rap/hiphop/trance? Cuz they aren't.

 

[Goosemaster]

<--very good violinist and crappy saxophonists and listens to classical all teh time..I used to make thread too all the time


Sibelius, Rimsky-korsakov, and others are my favorites....


Obviosuly Beethoven is one of the kings, but you cna't listen to his stuff too often

 

[Goosemaster]

Originally posted by: Demon-Xanth
To me personally, I find classical music to be too busy and it lacks a good beat. The notes are usually either long and slow or very fast and sharp. They don't have a nice "thump" that you'd get from an instrument like a bass guitar or a drum.

I guess that's why I perfer muscle car engines to sports car engines.

dude....you need to get a better sound system


I guareente that lsitening to Bizet's "Carmen" on a worthy system will leave you speechless...

 

[Descartes]

Originally posted by: Deeko
What, do you think the beats in classical music are anything remotely like the beat in music I listen to, namely rap/hiphop/trance? Cuz they aren't.

How the hell would I know what you listen to? Do you think I follow your music preferences?

And you're right, classical music doesn't have "beats" like you have in the music you prefer. I consider this a very good thing.

 

[Goosemaster]

Originally posted by: Descartes

Originally posted by: Deeko
What, do you think the beats in classical music are anything remotely like the beat in music I listen to, namely rap/hiphop/trance? Cuz they aren't.

How the hell would I know what you listen to? Do you think I follow your music preferences?

And you're right, classical music doesn't have "beats." I consider this a very good thing.

:laugh:

 

[DrPizza]

Originally posted by: loki8481
90% of what gets me interested in a song are the lyrics.

One of my favorite classical pieces - Sonata Pathetique was put to music in the (early 80's?) and called "Midnight Blue" (Louise Tucker), complete with lyrics.

You'd probably be surprised at how many artists have borrowed from or been inspired by particular classical pieces. Beatles got a little help from Bach, Billy Joel also used Beethoven's Pathetique Sonata...

Others who have borrowed from classical include Sting, Beach Boys, Yes (one of the more musically talented groups, imho), Blues Traveler, and John Lennon used Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata - played backwards.

For those missing that "beat", in the (70's?) there was "A Fifth of Beethoven" based on Beethoven's 5th symphony, put to a bit of a boogie beat, and certainly danceable (especially in an era of disco). ELO later used the same symphony for "Roll over Beethoven"

Quite truthfully, given copyright limitations, you could probably make quite a bit of money by taking classical music, and putting it to a more modern beat or something. Don't forget to add lyrics, because for the past decade or so, very few instrumental songs have made it big. (cue "Popcorn")

 

[BlancoNino]

Originally posted by: Goosemaster

Originally posted by: Demon-Xanth
To me personally, I find classical music to be too busy and it lacks a good beat. The notes are usually either long and slow or very fast and sharp. They don't have a nice "thump" that you'd get from an instrument like a bass guitar or a drum.

I guess that's why I perfer muscle car engines to sports car engines.

dude....you need to get a better sound system


I guareente that lsitening to Bizet's "Carmen" on a worthy system will leave you speechless...

I just listened to the first movement of Sibelius' first symphony (By Philadelphia conducted by Eugene Ormandy) on a pair of $1,000 Kipsch speakers powered by an Onkyo amp. Wow...

 

[Goosemaster]

Originally posted by: DrPizza

Originally posted by: loki8481
90% of what gets me interested in a song are the lyrics.

One of my favorite classical pieces - Sonata Pathetique was put to music in the (early 80's?) and called "Midnight Blue" (Louise Tucker), complete with lyrics.

You'd probably be surprised at how many artists have borrowed from or been inspired by particular classical pieces. Beatles got a little help from Bach, Billy Joel also used Beethoven's Pathetique Sonata...

Others who have borrowed from classical include Sting, Beach Boys, Yes (one of the more musically talented groups, imho), Blues Traveler, and John Lennon used Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata - played backwards.

For those missing that "beat", in the (70's?) there was "A Fifth of Beethoven" based on Beethoven's 5th symphony, put to a bit of a boogie beat, and certainly danceable (especially in an era of disco). ELO later used the same symphony for "Roll over Beethoven"

Quite truthfully, given copyright limitations, you could probably make quite a bit of money by taking classical music, and putting it to a more modern beat or something. Don't forget to add lyrics, because for the past decade or so, very few instrumental songs have made it big. (cue "Popcorn")

That DJ's (forgot their name) techno rendition of 'Adgio for Strings' is excruciating to listen to

 

[Deeko]

Wonderful. So the question in this thread was "why don't you listen to classical". I answered it. I was then further questioned, probably by some arrogant prick who thinks he can try to talk his way around why people don't listen to their genre.

What is basically comes down to is music is 100% based on personal preferance, there is no good, there is no bad. Why is this so hard for music snobs to understand? Yes, there is more talent in classical music, no that doesn't not make it better.

 

[DrPizza]

Let's not forget "Rock Me Amadeus"
Inspired by one of the classical legends (Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart) which was later sampled by the Bloodhound Gang...


There! I've made the connection from classical to crap music

 

[Goosemaster]

Originally posted by: Deeko
Wonderful. So the question in this thread was "why don't you listen to classical". I answered it. I was then further questioned, probably by some arrogant prick who thinks he can try to talk his way around why people don't listen to their genre.

What is basically comes down to is music is 100% based on personal preferance, there is no good, there is no bad. Why is this so hard for music snobs to understand? Yes, there is more talent in classical music, no that doesn't not make it better.

It's not that classical music is the best.

It's that so much of what is now music is based off of it. The best classical is the perfect blend of emotoinal expression and systemmatic perfection.

Just because we promote it and you don't like it doesn't earn us the title of snobs.


I alternate between stuff from Sibelius, beethoven, Ohmega Watts, Notorious B.i.g, rage against the machine, rachmaninov, DJ shadow, RJD2, Soul Position, Wynton Larselis, COldplay. FOo fioghters, Goldfrapp, cafe tacuba, estopa, jaguares,Berlioz, A tribe called quest, mozrt, shubert, beastie boys, mos def, naughty by nature, ugly duckling, and more....

 

[Goosemaster]

Originally posted by: DrPizza
Let's not forget "Rock Me Amadeus"

:|

 

[notfred]

I haven't read the whole thread, but I hope JohnJohn320 is reading each post so he can reply to this, or at least get an idea as to where I'm coming from.

Anyway, I like some classical music, and some I don't care for. But with classical music, it's difficult to figure out what I might like. It's all grouped into one genre under the name "classical", I'm sure there are sub-genres that people who are really into classical music know, but Idon't know them. This makes it really hard ti find similar classical music. If you like Nirvana, it's easy to go look up "grunge" and find some other similar bands that you might like. You can't really do that with classical music. It's like looking up "rock" and getting everything from the beatles to metallica to depeche mode. I also have no idea what "in E minor" or anything like that means. I, like the average music listener, have no particular desire to know how the music I listen to was made, I simply want to listen to music that I like. Classical msuic is always labelled like "Tsaichovsky's 27th concierto in E flat performed by the Berlic Philharmonic Orchestra"

No one can remember that. Or you'll look it up and find the 27th symphony instead of the 27th concierto, and you have no idea if they're the same thing or not. Or you'll find the 27th concierto by a different orchestra, and it sounds totally different than the Berlin one that you liked, and you can't find the berlin one.

To make a computer analogy, popular music is like windows:
Nirvana = Windows
Nevermind = Windows 2000
In Utero = Windows XP

See, it's simple. there are a couple CDs, each with short distinctive names. There's only one version of each.

Classical music is like linux
Tsaichovsky = Linux

Now, I have no idea how these things are even classified, as there was no such thing as an album when a lot of this music was written. So how are various songs grouped together?
Buying a Tsaichovsky CD is like picking up a random linux distribution. To the average person, linux is linux, right? But there are like 3 billion different variations with redhat and suse and debian and thier derivatives, and there's a pretty good chance that if you pick one at random, it's not going to be the one you wanted.

Add into that the fact that classical music names have a tendancy to be really long and hard to rember, and it makes classical music pretty user-unfriendly.

 

[Goosemaster]

Originally posted by: BlancoNino

Originally posted by: Goosemaster

Originally posted by: Demon-Xanth
To me personally, I find classical music to be too busy and it lacks a good beat. The notes are usually either long and slow or very fast and sharp. They don't have a nice "thump" that you'd get from an instrument like a bass guitar or a drum.

I guess that's why I perfer muscle car engines to sports car engines.

dude....you need to get a better sound system


I guareente that lsitening to Bizet's "Carmen" on a worthy system will leave you speechless...

I just listened to the first movement of Sibelius' first symphony (By Philadelphia conducted by Eugene Ormandy) on a pair of $1,000 Kipsch speakers powered by an Onkyo amp. Wow...

<---$700 stereo + sub speaker setup and onkyo amp

 

[Descartes]

Originally posted by: notfred
I haven't read the whole thread, but I hope JohnJohn320 is reading each post so he can reply to this, or at least get an idea as to where I'm coming from.

Anyway, I like some classical music, and some I don't care for. But with classical music, it's difficult to figure out what I might like. It's all grouped into one genre under the name "classical", I'm sure there are sub-genres that people who are really into classical music know, but Idon't know them. This makes it really hard ti find similar classical music. If you like Nirvana, it's easy to go look up "grunge" and find some other similar bands that you might like. You can't really do that with classical music. It's like looking up "rock" and getting everything from the beatles to metallica to depeche mode. I also have no idea what "in E minor" or anything like that means. I, like the average music listener, have no particular desire to know how the music I listen to was made, I simply want to listen to music that I like. Classical msuic is always labelled like "Tsaichovsky's 27th concierto in E flat performed by the Berlic Philharmonic Orchestra"

No one can remember that. Or you'll look it up and find the 27th symphony instead of the 27th concierto, and you have no idea if they're the same thing or not. Or you'll find the 27th concierto by a different orchestra, and it sounds totally different than the Berlin one that you liked, and you can't find the berlin one.

To make a computer analogy, popular music is like windows:
Nirvana = Windows
Nevermind = Windows 2000
In Utero = Windows XP

See, it's simple. there are a couple CDs, each with short distinctive names. There's only one version of each.

Classical music is like linux
Tsaichovsky = Linux

Now, I have no idea how these things are even classified, as there was no such thing as an album when a lot of this music was written. So how are various songs grouped together?
Buying a Tsaichovsky CD is like picking up a random linux distribution. To the average person, linux is linux, right? But there are like 3 billion different variations with redhat and suse and debian and thier derivatives, and there's a pretty good chance that if you pick one at random, it's not going to be the one you wanted.

Add into that the fact that classical music names have a tendancy to be really long and hard to rember, and it makes classical music pretty user-unfriendly.

That's a good point actually, and it's further obfuscated with classification systems like the Koechel catalog for Mozart (e.g. you'll see Mozart Piano Sonata K545) or Bach's BWV catalog.

In all fairness, many of the composers were so prolific that that here to be some system to more efficiency track their works, but that adds very little value to the consumer trying to find areas of interest.

Also, there are genres in classical music as well. For example, the quartet, piano concerto, quintet, etc. are genres. Mozart excelled in the piano concerto genre (among others), Haydn the quartet (again, among many others), etc.

 

[dighn]

Originally posted by: notfred
I haven't read the whole thread, but I hope JohnJohn320 is reading each post so he can reply to this, or at least get an idea as to where I'm coming from.

Anyway, I like some classical music, and some I don't care for. But with classical music, it's difficult to figure out what I might like. It's all grouped into one genre under the name "classical", I'm sure there are sub-genres that people who are really into classical music know, but Idon't know them. This makes it really hard ti find similar classical music. If you like Nirvana, it's easy to go look up "grunge" and find some other similar bands that you might like. You can't really do that with classical music. It's like looking up "rock" and getting everything from the beatles to metallica to depeche mode. I also have no idea what "in E minor" or anything like that means. I, like the average music listener, have no particular desire to know how the music I listen to was made, I simply want to listen to music that I like. Classical msuic is always labelled like "Tsaichovsky's 27th concierto in E flat performed by the Berlic Philharmonic Orchestra"

No one can remember that. Or you'll look it up and find the 27th symphony instead of the 27th concierto, and you have no idea if they're the same thing or not. Or you'll find the 27th concierto by a different orchestra, and it sounds totally different than the Berlin one that you liked, and you can't find the berlin one.

...

Now, I have no idea how these things are even classified, as there was no such thing as an album when a lot of this music was written. So how are various songs grouped together?
Buying a Tsaichovsky CD is like picking up a random linux distribution. To the average person, linux is linux, right? But there are like 3 billion different variations with redhat and suse and debian and thier derivatives, and there's a pretty good chance that if you pick one at random, it's not going to be the one you wanted.

Add into that the fact that classical music names have a tendancy to be really long and hard to rember, and it makes classical music pretty user-unfriendly.

This is almost exactly how I feel about classical music. I love classical music, but there are very few pieces that I can name (though I remember and recognize the tunes easily), and it's very difficult to find new pieces of the type of classical music that I like. Though maybe it's just because I tend to not pay attention to names in general. Over the years I do have a decent collection of the pieces that I really like, but because of these reasons my collection grows very slowly. Most classical music is also very long in length so it is very time consuming to sample them to find what I like. For example there is this genre of classical music that I really hate because it's too repetitive and warm, but I have no idea what it's called so I can't selectively ignore this genre.

 

[veggz]

Originally posted by: notfred
I haven't read the whole thread, but I hope JohnJohn320 is reading each post so he can reply to this, or at least get an idea as to where I'm coming from.

Anyway, I like some classical music, and some I don't care for. But with classical music, it's difficult to figure out what I might like. It's all grouped into one genre under the name "classical", I'm sure there are sub-genres that people who are really into classical music know, but Idon't know them. This makes it really hard ti find similar classical music. If you like Nirvana, it's easy to go look up "grunge" and find some other similar bands that you might like. You can't really do that with classical music. It's like looking up "rock" and getting everything from the beatles to metallica to depeche mode. I also have no idea what "in E minor" or anything like that means. I, like the average music listener, have no particular desire to know how the music I listen to was made, I simply want to listen to music that I like. Classical msuic is always labelled like "Tsaichovsky's 27th concierto in E flat performed by the Berlic Philharmonic Orchestra"

No one can remember that. Or you'll look it up and find the 27th symphony instead of the 27th concierto, and you have no idea if they're the same thing or not. Or you'll find the 27th concierto by a different orchestra, and it sounds totally different than the Berlin one that you liked, and you can't find the berlin one.

To make a computer analogy, popular music is like windows:
Nirvana = Windows
Nevermind = Windows 2000
In Utero = Windows XP

See, it's simple. there are a couple CDs, each with short distinctive names. There's only one version of each.

Classical music is like linux
Tsaichovsky = Linux

Now, I have no idea how these things are even classified, as there was no such thing as an album when a lot of this music was written. So how are various songs grouped together?
Buying a Tsaichovsky CD is like picking up a random linux distribution. To the average person, linux is linux, right? But there are like 3 billion different variations with redhat and suse and debian and thier derivatives, and there's a pretty good chance that if you pick one at random, it's not going to be the one you wanted.

Add into that the fact that classical music names have a tendancy to be really long and hard to rember, and it makes classical music pretty user-unfriendly.

The classification of classical music is not as complex as one might think. Certainly not moreso than the classification of modern rock music, with the advent of "minimalist rock," retro, grunge, industrial, etc. Basically, classical music is divided into four main periods: the Baroque (includes composers such as Bach and Scarlatti, and Handel), followed by the Classical (characterized by Mozart, Haydn, and early Beethoveen), followed by the Romantic (late Beethoveen, Chopin, Mendelssohn, Wagner, Rachmoninov, etc.), followed by Modern (easily discerned from the other periods: Bartok, Ivans, etc.). Of course there are several sub-periods scattered throughout, but using these four main divisions of classical music you should be able to find composers that at least lived during the same time period.

However, one of the most appealing aspects of classical music as a whole is the incredible variety among composers even of the same time period. Of course there are certain elements that define the work as belonging to, say, the Romantic period (and you will be able to hear these), at the same time, once you have been exposed to a good deal of music, you will be able to discern the composer of a piece simply by listening, and this is one of the joys of listening to classical music to me.

 

[BurnItDwn]

Hmm ...
I would say that in general, classical just doesn't often suit my style (or perhays my lack of style when it comes to music.)
I like my music fast, heavy, and agressive. Usually those qualities are found in Metal, so usually that's what I listen to.

That being said, Beethoven's 9th just blows me away.

 

[notfred]

Originally posted by: veggz
The classification of classical music is not as complex as one might think. Certainly not moreso than the classification of modern rock music, with the advent of "minimalist rock," retro, grunge, industrial, etc. Basically, classical music is divided into four main periods: the Baroque (includes composers such as Bach and Scarlatti, and Handel), followed by the Classical (characterized by Mozart, Haydn, and early Beethoveen), followed by the Romantic (late Beethoveen, Chopin, Mendelssohn, Wagner, Rachmoninov, etc.), followed by Modern (easily discerned from the other periods: Bartok, Ivans, etc.). Of course there are several sub-periods scattered throughout, but using these four main divisions of classical music you should be able to find composers that at least lived during the same time period.

However, one of the most appealing aspects of classical music as a whole is the incredible variety among composers even of the same time period. Of course there are certain elements that define the work as belonging to, say, the Romantic period (and you will be able to hear these), at the same time, once you have been exposed to a good deal of music, you will be able to discern the composer of a piece simply by listening, and this is one of the joys of listening to classical music to me.

See, people don't look for music similarity by date, they look for it by sound.

People hear a song they like, and they say "I like this song - what else do you have that sounds similar?"

They don't say "I like this song - what else do you have that was recorded around the same time?"

Hence my original problem - finding other classical music that you like *to listen to* (as opposed to liking... the date is was composed, I guess), based on other songs that you like to listen to.