I want to talk here of the difference between being deeply moved and being deeply delighted. Haydn engages my soul every time, but always the part of my soul that experiences delight—no dark brooding romantic passion, not even in the Sturm und Drang works. He sounds to me the ultimate Enlightenment composer. As I continue my third traversal of his 104-odd symphonies in the cycle recorded by Antal Doráti and the Philharmonia Hungarica, I consistently feel as I did when I stood in the rotunda of the Jefferson Memorial on a bright, brisk day in spring: musical thoughts wafting in and out like light and air moving through open colonnades of elegant form. Those architectures of marble and of sound strike me as ideal embodiments of and metaphors for the opened mind. Again, a purely personal response, but it is from Mozart's music that I often feel so oddly detached. In comparison to Haydn, Mozart's undeniable quality of awesome perfection seems self-regarding, even smug: a smooth, unmarred sphere, completely self-contained. It does not need me, and I find no way in to its cold, clear heart. I cannot gain a purchase on its polished surface, and so cannot move it, nor it move me.
But these days, I find that music almost never moves me in an emotionally deep or passionate way—not as it did in my teens or twenties or even my forties. For a long while, this ever-recovering romantic considered that a loss, but I no longer do. Now, regardless of the tone or ostensible "mood" of a piece I am listening to, my positive response, when I have one, is almost always one of delight: shallow, middling, deep, or profound, but always somewhere in the well of delight—even with so (apparently) anguished a work as the Adagio of Bruckner's Symphony 9. I just sit there and grin, marveling at how astonishing it is, that it makes the sense it does in the way it does—that it makes sense at all. I feel a fellow craftsman's joy in working his craft. I suspect that mine is a very simple soul.
In my freshman year in college, during my single semester as a Music History major in the fall of 1968, I often sat in my dorm room, listening through headphones to Mahler's Symphony 9 (Georg Solti's first recording, with the London Symphony), sometimes with score in hand. Once, as I listened to the final movement, I read D.T. Suzuki's classic An Introduction to Zen Buddhism, and realized that the music I was hearing embodied the state of mind Suzuki wrote of: awakenedness, satori, enlightenment, call it what you will. More than an intellectual realization, it was a genuine spiritual opening that I have never forgotten. A hole in reality seemed to have opened around me, and I fell into a vast, eternal now in which everything was perfect, precisely as it was, even as it eternally became something else. Others will have had similar experiences with other music, books, drugs, moments, but this was mine. At the time, a lot of this was going around. (A few months later, a friend insisted I listen to The Beatles (White Album). It was the first pop or rock album I had ever heard. For a long time after that, my listening life was very different from what it had been.)
It's one thing to have such a singular breakthrough experience, as I did at 17 with Suzuki and Mahler. It's another to want to repeat that experience over and over. It's actually not possible. It's like trying to open an already opened door, a doorway passed through long ago. Whatever it was that was broken through that first time can be broken through only once, and perhaps only at a certain time in life. After that, it can never again be as wholly new and unprecedented, even shocking, as it was that first time—and almost certainly it will not be triggered by what triggered it the first time. It's like the second beer of the evening: I never want a second beer; what I actually want is to repeat the experience of drinking that evening's first beer. But it's not possible: the first beer has already done its work.
Now, half a century later, when I listen again to Mahler's Ninth (still my favorite work of his, and the only one I ever want to hear again), after having heard it so many times, I come to it with ears and a sensibility of soul that have, to some degree, already been shaped or molded by Mahler's Ninth. The symphony has made in my psyche a complementary shape or impression of itself that is now permanently there to receive it, and into which it perfectly fits—because, to some degree, there it meets itself.
Perhaps this is easier to think about in terms of pop music. Throughout the late 1960s and into the '70s, many wondered who "the next Bob Dylan" or "the next Beatles" might turn out to be. After a while, this began to make as much sense to me as looking for lost keys only where the light is good. The very fact that those two pop cataclysms so profoundly affected everything and everyone who followed them was precisely what made it impossible for anyone ever to do it again, at least for a very long time. Those of us who hoped or wondered or wished for such breakthroughs to happen "again" posited a paradox: Living in a world, and having selves, shaped to considerable degrees by Dylan and the Beatles, we wondered what could grow from within those selves and that world that would utterly transcend them in some new and unexpected way. But nothing can. Breakthroughs of such magnitude will happen again—they always do—but by definition, they will never happen when or where, or in any form or genre, that they are expected to. That would be expected, even foreseeable, and such breakthroughs are, by definition, shockingly neither.
In audio as in music as in life: Do we spend ever more on audio gear, and on constant upgrades, in an attempt to re-enact a breakthrough first made while listening to a car radio or a primitive dorm-room system? If so, it's important to remember that it certainly wasn't the quality of the gear that made that breakthrough possible. It was something in the music, in ourselves, in the times. It couldn't have happened without the sound, and the quality of that sound was not important. I'm not saying that such breakthroughs can never happen again—they can. But none of us is now the same person he or she was then, and they won't happen because we're listening to better gear than we were last year. They'll happen because we've opened our hearts, and the heart cannot be forced open by the will. As Sergiù Celibidache said of conducting the music of Bruckner: "You don't do anything—you let it evolve." And when that is allowed to happen, it can make of life—and listening—a delight.—Richard Lehnert
COMMENTS
Fabulously thought provoking piece. I really identified with the aspect of not being emotionally moved by music to the extent I was in my teens and 20's (42 now). I still love listening to music, but the guys in the band aren't my best friends anymore.
Getting older makes a difference most of us probably don't expect. Youthful hormones create a traffic jam in the brain that clogs the pathways to appreciating the more refined music.
The only way to properly discuss music is in terms of the music itself, not mushy, subjective impressions, such as those elaborated above by Mr. Lehnert. What is it specifically that merits mention about Mahler? Is it his use of the orchestra as his pallet? Is it his fondness for 4ths?
As an example of the proper and intelligent way to discuss music, I include the following YouTube link, which is Rosalyn Tureck making the argument, with specific musical examples, that Bach was the original 12-tone composer:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E4Gqbb_idx8&list=FL3zqn5t5o86JSakYq1pfY7w&index=19
Anything less than this level of discourse is a waste of time.
Anything less than this level of discourse is a waste of time.
With all due respect, you seemed to have missed the point of this essay.
John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile
I, as well as any number of people, could write an article, just like the one above, about our personal musical experiences and evolution, but who cares and why bother? This is self-indulgent mush, of no general use whatsoever.
I expect to learn something new about whatever subject I read about, whether it be music or raising bees. I expect the writer to know more about his subject than I do and to share that knowledge with me, the reader.
There are 3 levels of discourse, which are, from lowest to highest:
1. people
2. things
3. ideas
Mr. Lehnert's article falls into the first category, a subjective, personal reminiscence. It may be of interest to the author's personal acquaintances, but not to a general audience.
In contrast, pianist Rosalyn Tureck, in the YouTube video linked to above, discusses ideas, fascinating, original ideas, each supported with specific musical examples. Her ideas, in fact, fly in the face of conventional wisdom, as evidenced by the controversy expressed in the comments to her video.
I, as well as any number of people, could write an article, just like the one above, about our personal musical experiences and evolution, but who cares and why bother? This is self-indulgent mush, of no general use whatsoever.
And again, you have missed the point about this article. It makes a general point that is relevant to all music lovers and audiophiles, that we all are trying and failing to repeat that magic first experience of something new. In the case of audiophiles, we spend a life spending increasingly large sums of money in that pursuit.
But thanks for the Rosalyn Tureck link. I have her recording of the Goldberg Variations and enjoy it, though ultimately I prefer the 1955 Glenn Gould recording.
John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile
Ah, so it's supposed to be a Proustian reminiscence about lost youth? Somehow Dylan and the Beatles seem quotidian by comparison.
May I recommend Tureck's Well Tempered Clavier, Books I & II, recorded for Decca in the 1960s and currently available on CD on DGG? It is by far my favorite recording of this historically giant work, despite the tape hiss. Technical considerations aside, she alone seems to penetrate to the musical heart of most of the pieces. Her Bach is the one I feel in my bones, the one I instinctively "know" to be right. Her other recordings, imo, don't compare to this one.
I, too, like Glenn Gould, but find him at times brittle and overly structural, not to mention his infernal humming. I particularly like his performance of Bach's Two and Three-Part Inventions, BWV 772-801 (Sony CD).
Great article- I concur w/ dalethorn as above.
10 years ago I was struck by the Jazz bug and fell in love immediately. I still enjoy Jazz and look forward everyday in discovering its treasured past (and future). Before 2005, I rather enjoyed Hard Rock and Metal music. I will always have a deep respect for The Beatles, as for me, this is my #1 forever.
Jazz music, on the other side of the coin, offers a deeper connection and completely satisfies.
Spot on on so many accounts! Thanks!
I often have the same reaction to familiar music as Mr. Lehnert but there is always the rare exception, especially after I make a crucial upgrade to my primary hi-fi. Those "moving" moments seem to be fewer in number than the "delightful" ones. It is difficult to be moved twice, most likely due to the intensity of that emotion, but something that can put a smile on your face, something like a previously-hidden viola or a newly-discovered brush stroke on a cymbal? Those are limitless.
I find that I still love the same music I did as a small small child, in the same way, for example, Ray Charles, What'd I Say, I & II (the first record I ever owned); Fendermen, Mule Skinner Blues; Mar-Keys, Last Night, etc. Now, as then, audio quality is a distant, if not irrelevant, consideration.
Yes, I too get some pleasure out of those oldies as well, but other than my two guilty pleasures (Southern blues-rock and English prog-rock), my tastes have changed since those days. But whatever is on offer, I need my equipment to be the best that I can sensibly afford! And that's why I identified the "moved" vs. the "delighted" as Mr. Lehnert pointed out.
"to the musical heart of most of the pieces. Her Bach is the one I feel in my bones, the one I instinctively "know" to be right. Her other recordings, imo, don't compare to this one.
I, too, like Glenn Gould, but find him at times brittle and overly structural, not to mention his infernal humming."
Oh - i see that when it comes to subjective mush, there is a sliding scale as to whose bears more importance.
The "sense of rightness" is central to aesthetics. It guides the aesthetic choices of the creator and responses of the audience. It is objective, not mushy subjectivity, in that there is remarkable agreement about it. The fact that Rosalyn Tureck's 1960s recordings of the Well Tempered Clavier are still made widely available in a variety of formats by a major classical label is proof of their "rightness." One can even buy them on iTunes and listen to them on Spotify. I am certainly not alone in appreciating their "rightness."
Thought you'd be used to being the butt of a joke or two by now Osgoad, the way you disparage the honest (and yes, subjective) viewpoints of dedicated writers in this magazine.
I’m concerned your platitudes seem anti-social and angry, more about elevating yourself than having a dialogue with anyone. You seem miserable. I'm sorry. Perhaps there is a support group for folks who try to feel better by denigrating others in public. Unfortunately, that forum is not here.
What in the world are your musical credentials that you feel entitled to lecture the staff and readership of Stereophile by the way? Are you a famous musician or conductor under a nom de guerre? You Tube watcher with a B.A. hardly separate you from the peloton. Perhaps one day you could start a publication and try to foster a readership with your own strict views of proper discourse. It’s intriguing why you attempt to backseat the editorial policy of this publication with such an intolerant viewpoint.
Couching worn "opinions" on the right side of history is the safe haven of the weak and shallow, no matter how cleverly you paraphrase them as your own. Do you think you're the first to complain about Gould's humming or celebrate Rosalyn Tureck on Bach? Those could have been wonderful ideas to express in a discussion, but I see the point of it is lost on you.
By the way, do you have anything to say on music after the Baroque? Its structure seems to fit you. Would be fun to hear your favorites on Strauss or Les Six..
You accuse ME of malice? You spent 266 words impugning my character and YOU are the "normal" one? Your rant, btw, is off topic (which I'm sure Atkinson will not challenge, in that it vociferously supports his and his magazine's mediocrity).
What interests do you have in this magazine? Are your opinions entirely disinterested, or are you in some way affiliated with this publication?
And, finally, yes, I am entitled to express my opinions ... you are free to either challenge my opinions or ignore them.
What interests do you have in this magazine? Are your opinions entirely disinterested, or are you in some way affiliated with this publication?
Other than being a reader, the poster has no connection with Stereophile. He is using this space to express his opinions just as you are doing.
You accuse ME of malice? You spent 266 words impugning my character and YOU are the "normal" one?
The poster did not "impugn your character," he disagreed with you. Other than this one, I have started deleting your flames - something I dislike having to do - but if you continue to react to criticisms of your views with flames and personal attacks, I shall have no recourse but to prevent you from posting to this site.
John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile
For a wonderful essay, thoughtful writing on this hobby is much appreciated and very hard to find. i really commend Stereophile and John Atkinson for the quality of words written here and for the depth of the articles.
I'd second that. So many times you see comments that say "It's about the music, not the sound quality or the perfection of the playback gear" - and a thousand variations of that statement. But those are inextricably bound together in Stereophile, and where an analysis of just one of those is offered, the other is always there in the background.
on a perceptive peice, but not only did Bach write some very funny pieces, e.g., the Coffee and Peasant Cantatas, he seems to have had a fine, dry sense of humor in real life, one that sometimes got him into trouble.
BTW, I too have noticed that I react with less emotional intensity to music than I did when I was younger. But this appears to be a consequence of familiarity rather than of advancing decrepitude, since I can still be strongly moved on the rare occasions when I discover a great work with which I'm not familiar.
Word on the street (heh) is that Bach and other great composers would walk the streets occasionally and listen to the street musicians, to glean ideas for new melodies and techniques. The great Passacaglia and Fugue in C minor BWV 582 is one such example.
I did know that Bach noticed that a certain beggar would change the pitch of his whine as a coin got closer, and that he could "play" the beggar by moving the coin to and fro -- which was one of the episodes I had in mind when I said he had a sense of humor!
I always wondered if those, like the author, who consider Mozart music as "detached" or "so perfect it does not need me" etc etc ever listened to "Don Giovanni" (or Idomeneo, Figaro, Cosi', Zauberflote,...). I find more emotion and humanity in there than in any of Haydn's works (except perhaps his late Masses)
The Academy of Ancient Music does some interesting pieces by Handel and Haydn on CD, and the Handel and Haydn Society in Boston, ditto on their performances.
I am repeatedly bemused by comments like that of the curmudgeonly Mr. Crinkly--the essence of which is, "this was not that, and therefore cannot be of any value."
It would suggest that perhaps expectations and preconceptions are the death of most of life's lessons and joy. This is what it is, and was excellent in its own right.
I'm looking for a few Haydn recordings that bring a subtle kind of joy or inner meaning, but perhaps the music distributors are listening to their cranky customers and are making the 'perfect' collection difficult to find for Haydn neophytes. That's always been the problem for me - finding material without wasting years of my life and all my money looking and sampling in vain. There was one bright spot 15 years ago - Napster - not for freebies as the industry claimed, but because you could track a gem or two to passionate owners and then sample the rest of their material. Nothing else has come near to that for finding new material.
. . . for your comments, and for reading my editorial in the first place.
Re. the several responses to my remarks about Mozart, as I state in the piece itself, mine is purely a personal and subjective response that I don't assume will be shared or agreed with. It was offered as an example of just how difficult or impossible it is to assess or evaluate music or one's response to it. I am in awe of Mozart's accomplishments. It's just that I so seldom respond to his work with the sort of deep feeling or intense delight that I much more often experience with the music of other composers.
Ultimately, such a response, or lack of it, can't really be explained, I think, though of course it's fun to try, as I found in writing this piece. But the fact that it continues to puzzle me was one of the many reasons I wrote the piece in the first place.
I have indeed heard all of the Mozart works listed by calaf, and I am glad he finds in them more than I do. I, like him, think they are great and masterful works, though my response to them is more one of deep respect than of love. The fact that calaf does find so much in them seems to support one of the too many things that I was trying to say in too small a space: that personal responses to music -- to anything -- are infinitely variable, and ultimately not really comparable.
As for humor in J.S. Bach, I didn't say that there was none, only that I find Bach's jokes to be relatively few compared with, say, Haydn's. Again, an entirely personal response, and not everyone values humor in music as much as I do -- yet another matter of personal preference and taste.
Osgood Crinkly III said, in his first response, "The only way to properly discuss music is in terms of the music itself . . ." I have two responses to this. First, in my piece I do not discuss music, but my and others' responses to music, as I made clear from the outset. Second, I think, at the very minimum, that there must be between six and seven billion different ways to discuss music -- as many as there are people on the planet -- and no doubt billions more, as each of those people may find a different way to discuss music on each day of his or her life. It is my experience that life is far more richly complicated than can ever be subsumed under a single answer to anything.
Again, thank you, all, for reading and commenting.
Dear all,
I was opening the site, reading the article and thought while
ending it, that it is saying something, yes, but my feeling was
that the picture and introduction raised high expectations
while the content really was a bit thin.
Then I read the comments of Osgood Crinkly III and also
the reaction of an internal editor, which I find not adequade for
a open minded stereo magazine.
Why do you react like a beaten child when somebody writes about his
perception while in the article somebody is more or less doing
the same.
What should I derive out of this ?
Sorry, I think, too, that the article and some comments were a
waist of time (my perceiption).
I will try to avoid to come back to read and rather listen to my
beloved Haydn collection instead. All the best to you all.
Commenters are a clique, timid, aging boomers. This is group think. Sycophants chime in, thanking the author. Anything resembling a challenge is promptly slapped down with an iron fist by Mr. Atkinson. O, of course, I missed the point of the article, Mr. Atkinson, and must be set right. Note how carefully I walk on egg shells and skirt the issue, lest he delete my posts.
More importantly, most importantly, it alerts the reader to who is writing Stereophile articles. Can one trust their judgement, their evaluation of esoteric, expensive audio gear? The alert reader will get this.
You needn't equate lack of openmindedness to the discrimination between honest critique and a constant negativity that drives readers away.
It doesn't seem that I drive readers away. Every time I post, the number of comments on this dead site increase dramatically -- they should hire me. Your knee jerk reflex would be to accuse me of being a troll. That's the common defence of the status quo and stupidity on the net. But my posts are impersonal and inoffensive, and usually backed up by evidence, like a link or quote. That they occasionally evoke emotional responses from other commenters is due to their intolerance and intemperance. For instance, you didn't have to respond to my post. You didn't have to call me negative. You could have ignored it. But you chose not to. You chose to confront me and engage in conflict. That says everything one needs to know about who YOU are. I suggest you look in the mirror before accusing anyone of being negative.
I specifically avoided you and replied to the other person, so you need to rein in your paranoia.
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