looking for sympathy from my fellow whistlers!=)

the_instrument_player · Fri Oct 04, 2002 6:08 am

Help! I'm going through IrTrad withdraw!! I have a music history test coming up, so ALL I've been listening too--- I mean DAY IN AND DAY OUT is Haydn and Mozart, and a little opera..... AHHHHHHHHHH!!! While I LOVE that music with all my heart, I am really starting to go through Irish music withdraw. Caught a few minutes this morning to get some relief and listen to about 10 min of Trad and read chiff and fipple. Thank you Chiff and Fipple, for being my connection to the Irish music/whistle world!

sweetone · Post by **sweetone** » Fri Oct 04, 2002 6:46 am

Same here, for my profession I'm into classical music day in day out, but always very glad to return to my whistles, pipes, cd's and this lovely site.
cheers

Byll · Post by **Byll** » Fri Oct 04, 2002 9:08 am

I have been involved with the teaching of courses ranging from the Sociology of Music, through Music Theory and Composition, to Sound Recording Technology, for 30 years - from Middle School through University levels. My working world is filled with music...As I write this, I will be teaching in 16 minutes...

I still feel the happiest and most musically fulfilled when playing hammer dulcimer and whistle. Who'd of ever thunk it?
Best.
Byll

whistlingfiddler · Post by **whistlingfiddler** » Fri Oct 04, 2002 9:16 am

I go to a performing arts high school, and we have "Celtic Ensemble" twice a week, with one day of individual practice. That's not enough. Every other day is classical, classical, classical, and I really don't like it. It's not that I despise the music, but the classical musicians have this really arrogant attitude about them. I play fiddle and they're making me go to this string ensemble on Mondays for an hour. That's a whole hour I could be spending on trad music. Music that I actually love...the classical musicians are especially arrogant because they believe that you have to start with classical music before "moving on to other things." Did Joanie Madden take classical whistle lessons? We have a music history class, and all we listen to for 30 minutes is Mahler. It's very boring. We're actually going to be tested on his symphonies. The teacher will play the recording and we have to identify the symphony! I really can't believe they'd do that...

steve · Post by **steve** » Fri Oct 04, 2002 11:21 am

Well with Mahler, 30 minutes is about 1/2 of one movement. So you shouldn't have any problem with identification.

hmartley · Post by **hmartley** » Fri Oct 04, 2002 12:04 pm

I adore Mahler!

But I feel for you. Sneak out to a pub or someone's house after hours with your pals and play tunes. Play everything! Hear everything!

Heather (not all classical musicians are arrogant snobs) M.

Wombat · Post by **Wombat** » Fri Oct 04, 2002 12:42 pm

On 2002-10-04 11:16, whistlingfiddler wrote:
..the classical musicians are especially arrogant because they believe that you have to start with classical music before "moving on to other things."

Not only arrogant but deeply ignorant of the skill it takes to play other styles really well. There were some very funny remarks on another thread recently about misconceptions about what it takes to be good at Irish music.

In the '30's one of the top European concert pianists (whose name escapes me) who was visiting America heard a concert by the jazz great Art Tatum. He asked to meet Tatum. When they met, he played a piece for Tatum which the humble pianist said he liked very much—certainly sincerely. Then Tatum improvised on Tea for Two (something like that) for half an hour. When he was finished the concert virtuoso was astounded. 'That's amazing, where can I get the sheet music to that?' 'You can't' replied Tatum, 'it hasn't been notated'. 'Well when did you compose it.' 'Just now.' No arrogance here but astounding ignorance. Not after that meeting though.

JohnPalmer · Post by **JohnPalmer** » Fri Oct 04, 2002 10:25 pm

When I was in college, I was taking a music history final, which had around 250 questions. We could use our notes from the listening lab, but we weren't allowed to write down any melodies. Our prof. would purposely try to trip us up, like playing a Hindemith section that sounded like Beethoven, and vice versa. Anyway, he played a section from the second movement of a symphony, I can't remember which, but I couldn't identify it, until someone whistled E a b e, which was the main theme from the first movement, of which I had written down in my notes. The prof. didn't know who whistled it, but I think I got it right.

JP

[ This Message was edited by: JohnPalmer on 2002-10-05 00:26 ]

sweetone · Post by **sweetone** » Sat Oct 05, 2002 5:27 am

[/quote]

Not only arrogant but deeply ignorant of the skill it takes to play other styles really well.

If I was arrogant and ignorant, I wouldn't be here at all, neighter would other classical musicians who happen to play also other styles of music.

Zubivka · Post by **Zubivka** » Sat Oct 05, 2002 6:42 am

On 2002-10-05 07:27, sweetone wrote:

If I was arrogant and ignorant, I wouldn't be here at all, neighter would other classical musicians who happen to play also other styles of music.

No one in this thread seemed to mean you were arrogant. It is just that it appears as if too many musicians who superficially studied "classical", and I'd better say "academic", music are frighteningly unaware of anything else than post-Bach, tonal, Tempered (?), Western-European music.
But these are not only arrogant and superficial, they also backwards. They skipped a whole century (XX-th) of "classical" music altogether. There is something called Dodecaphony theorized at it's very beginning. Those who studied it appear much more open at other musical forms.
Also the Conservatories of Music as we know them in provincial towns of Europe (I'd bet my Sweet-one US is the same) seem to teach a limited approach to instrumentists, and only Harmony students go beyond these.
Now it's hard to explain to some of those those--undesrtandably the squarest--who studied only some classic basics, that they didn't learn it all, that there can be a difference between a C# and a Db, that ornamentations are not--and should not be--written, that there are at least 4 understandings of what "minor" mode is, etc.
Out of these provincial sanctuaries, there are only two ways to approach mediaeval, trad or simply Renaissance musics : unlearn all you thought you knew... or learn it fully.

[ This Message was edited by: Zubivka on 2002-10-05 08:45 ]

sweetone · Post by **sweetone** » Sat Oct 05, 2002 7:11 am

On 2002-10-05 08:42, Zubivka wrote:
On 2002-10-05 07:27, sweetone wrote:

If I was arrogant and ignorant, I wouldn't be here at all, neighter would other classical musicians who happen to play also other styles of music.
No one in this thread seemed to mean you were arrogant. It is just that it appears as if too many musicians who superficially studied "classical", and I'd better say "academic", music are frighteningly unaware of anything else than post-Bach, tonal, Tempered (?), Western-European music.
But these are not only arrogant and superficial, they also backwards. They skipped a whole century (XX-th) of "classical" music altogether. There is something called Dodecaphony theorized at it's very beginning. Those who studied it appear much more open at other musical forms.
Also the Conservatories of Music as we know them in provincial towns of Europe (I'd bet my Sweet-one US is the same) seem to teach a limited approach to instrumentists, and only Harmony students go beyond these.
Now it's hard to explain to some of those those--undesrtandably the squarest--who studied only some classic basics, that they didn't learn it all, that there can be a difference between a C# and a Db, that ornamentations are not--and should not be--written, that there are at least 4 understandings of what "minor" mode is, etc.
Out of these provincial sanctuaries, there are only two ways to approach mediaeval, trad or simply Renaissance musics : unlearn all you thought you knew... or learn it fully.

[ This Message was edited by: Zubivka on 2002-10-05 08:45 ]

If you're talking about mediaval and renaissance music, of course in those days they couldn't possibly know how music was going to change in the future, so please don't unlearn what you thought you knew (post Bach and further as you put it),just learn everything more you didn't already know.

sweetone · Post by **sweetone** » Sat Oct 05, 2002 7:15 am

PS to whistlingfiddler, Mahler used quite an amount of folktunes in his symphonies.

madguy · Post by **madguy** » Sat Oct 05, 2002 8:07 am

Could we all just remember that we're here to have fun with fun music?

United we stand!!!!!

jim stone · Post by **jim stone** » Sat Oct 05, 2002 8:34 am

I will confess that for me the
most beautiful music on earth
is Bach played on the piano
by Glenn Gould. Much classical
music is pretty uninteresting
to my ear, but if I could only
listen to one sort of music
that would be it. Of course
there is no possiblity
of my playing it--well,
a little on the whistle,
but that's hardly playing it.
It's utterly divine, it never
seems to get old, it
never sounds dated....

madguy · Post by **madguy** » Sat Oct 05, 2002 8:39 am

My startings as a "musician" began at the tender age of 8 when my mother's father died and willed me a piano ( he being a classically trained singer and pianist). My teacher had no intention of my learning classical music.... but, though I cannot play it I love to listen to it!!!