Interesting conductor, powerful ambassador for modern music (the Parisian concert landscape for modern music wouldn't be what it is without him, and Mitterrand). Alas, his own works IMHO were rather impenetrable, nor did he himself care even the least bit whether they were liked or hated. He really didn't care about audiences [His comment when he was confronted with the fact of how Gorécki's Symphony of Sorrowful Songs was a runaway success with audiences, was: "I heard Gorécki was able to buy a Mercedes with the revenues") at all. He was a brilliant analytical mind, but a composer who rather exemplifies much of what drew audiences away from modern music after 1945.
Although I enjoy much of Olivier Messiaen's music - perhaps Boulez carries his music logic to its illogical extreme.
I was about to post a new topic when I saw yours. He was a huge and influential figure of 20th century music. He was close friends wih Maurice Jarre with whom he had earlier contributions at the Renaud/Barrault theatre in the late forties. He was associated with a few film, but his real impact was on contemporary music. RIP maestro
Sad news. I have several of his works on CD and find his compositions very intriguing and entertaining. Also, his series of Bartok recordings on Deutsche Grammophon are among my most prized CDs in our collection. RIP Maestro.
Great musician, always outspoken, always opinionated, but never dogmatic... great personality... I've seen him live in concert several times and even got to meet him some time in the 1990s.
A true world musical icon. For my money, his 1969 Cleveland Orchestra recording of "The Rite of Spring" remains the definitive reading of Stravinsky's groundbreaking work.
A true world musical icon. For my money, his 1969 Cleveland Orchestra recording of "The Rite of Spring" remains the definitive reading of Stravinsky's groundbreaking work.
As far as I know, Boulez himself was not particularly dogmatic, and he never had anything personally against either Philip Glass, or rock music (in fact, he's spoken fondly of some rock music), or even any "easy" or "accessible" music. He just did not believe that much of it had lasting value. Boulez' himself, in the word of Daniel Barenboim, was always attracted to complicated, difficult music.
Philip Glass once made a dismissive remark about the music of Boulez, Stockhausen, etc, and in this context Boulez made some remarks about "popular" classical music that I'm aware of.
He said:
'If you want a kind of supermarket esthetic, O.K., do that, nobody will be against it, but everybody will eventually forget it because each generation will create its own supermarket music - like produce that after eight days is rotten and you can't eat it anymore and have to toss it away.'
According to the article, Boulez himself finds nothing of interest in what he calls the 'direct approach to an audience,' which is 'usually an experience that the audience has already had but with a new coat of paint on it. . .'
"Lasting music" or not, but Boulez's works and those of other "Darmstadt composers" have been proudly emptying concert halls the world over for decades.
There are still some composers with us who've had a connection with the Darmstadt of the 1950s, namely Sylvano Bussotti (b. 1931) and Gilbert Amy (b. 1936)
"Lasting music" of not, but Boulez's works and those of other "Darmstadt composers" have been proudly emptying concert halls the world over for decades.
... but not emptying discs in my music collection. This illustrates how much audiences expect music to have something in it for them rather than be challenged and attempt to digest works demonstrating composers' innovations.
Great musician, always outspoken, always opinionated, but never dogmatic...
"[A]ny musician who has not experienced—I do not say understood, but truly experienced—the necessity of dodecaphonic music is USELESS. For his whole work is irrelevant to the needs of his epoch."
That sounds fairly dogmatic to me. It's from 1952, when Boulez was a Young Turk railing in against the establishment in the grand French tradition of the absolutist manifesto. But the man mellowed with age and made valuable musical contributions on so many levels. R.I.P. I recall a number of vivid, incisive performances at the Philharmonic (Prokofiev, Mahler, Ives, Liszt) but also also a weirdly desiccated Brahms Fourth.
As far as I know, Boulez himself was not particularly dogmatic, and he never had anything personally against either Philip Glass, or rock music . .'
Glass has told this story many times. HE and the ensemble were setting up their equipment in a concert hall in FRance. WHen Boulez saw all the electronic equipment required he screamed "get that 'rock' band out of here.."
SUrely, the use of the term 'rock' was pejorative AND reflected his disdain for Glass' music and/or style of music bruce
ps the autobio MUSIC BY PHILP GLASS is one source iirc
Great musician, always outspoken, always opinionated, but never dogmatic...
"[A]ny musician who has not experienced—I do not say understood, but truly experienced—the necessity of dodecaphonic music is USELESS. For his whole work is irrelevant to the needs of his epoch."
That sounds fairly dogmatic to me. It's from 1952, when Boulez was a Young Turk railing in against the establishment in the grand French tradition of the absolutist manifesto. But the man mellowed with age and made valuable musical contributions on so many levels. R.I.P. I recall a number of vivid, incisive performances at the Philharmonic (Prokofiev, Mahler, Ives, Liszt) but also also a weirdly desiccated Brahms Fourth.
Alright, I see how one can see this as a dogmatic statement. Likewise the Glass example. Yet the same person who said that all opera houses should be blown up (and was arrested for this years later in Switzerland) conducted Wagner at Bayreuth. The same person who may have wanted to get rid of Glass' "rock" ensemble collaborated with Frank Zappa.
So I see his statements along these lines more as dramatic punches stirring the pot rather than eternal dogmas. They are gauntlets thrown waiting for someone to pick them up. I view Boulez not as dogmatic, because what he said was reasoned, and reasoned well. You may disagree with all or some of what he said, but he was open to arguments, open to have his opinions (which were strong) challenged.
He had an interesting letter exchange with American composer John Cage, who was -- as far as classical music is concerned -- in many was the exact opposite of Boulez.
