| Recently I read an interesting article on the topic | | | | gives a listener the impression of a symphony? |
| of the modern symphony. However, it left me | | | | Let's say that you turn on a radio in the middle of |
| wondering. The author spoke of titans of | | | | a piece you never heard before. If it's a |
| symphony in the twentieth century, yet | | | | symphony, there's a very good chance that you |
| Prokofiev, Honegger, and Shostakovich completely | | | | will recognize it as such. But how do you know? |
| escaped his attention. Was this an accident? It | | | | Is it by the sound of a large orchestra? Then |
| seems like the mighty stream of modern | | | | what about symphonies with smaller orchestras? |
| symphonic music of these composers has not | | | | Is it by its monumental way of expression? Then |
| been appreciated enough in the critical literature of | | | | what about lyrical and intimate kinds of |
| European music. More appreciation of the atonal | | | | symphony? It seems that these features of the |
| avant-garde and dodecaphony (Schoenberg's | | | | symphonic genre still do not define it. |
| music and the Second Viennese School, and late | | | | It seems that the scope of what symphony can |
| works of Stravinsky), but less of the tonal and | | | | possibly encompass is incredibly wide. Of course, |
| traditionally melodic approach. | | | | there are basic similarities of musical form. For a |
| Another question: Should we write symphonies | | | | very long time the most distinctive characteristic |
| for the public, or only for an elite audience? Is it | | | | of symphony as a music genre was the sonata |
| possible that New Age composers have a historic | | | | form in the first movement. But like everything |
| mission to foster the public's experience of the | | | | else, genres evolve and our perceptions do too. |
| highest music genre - to share it with people "not | | | | Shouldn't we start searching deeper? Really, an |
| trained," or "unprepared" for a professional music | | | | average person wouldn't appreciate how thesis, |
| experience? Where else in music today does the | | | | antithesis, development and synthesis can create |
| public have a such a chance to submerge itself in | | | | a music form ( and even these are not |
| the ocean of orchestral sound without fear of | | | | necessarily all a part of symphony anymore ). Still |
| being lost, and to actually emotionally enjoy it? | | | | all human beings seem to appreciate symphonic |
| The answer is New Age! And of course, in the | | | | music on its different levels. So, is there |
| music of cinematography. But soundtracks | | | | something else, something global, rooted in our |
| shouldn't count because they are not free from | | | | human sensibilities by which we recognize a |
| visual images, and so they can't be experienced in | | | | symphony, as if by a certain language or code? |
| the same purely musical way. | | | | Was it invented, or just discovered, at a certain |
| The electronic era has created possibilities beyond | | | | level of civilization? Could it be like recollecting |
| imagination. We can experience sounds remotely | | | | something you knew before, but have forgotten |
| recognized as orchestral, or something absolutely | | | | from not using it, so it feels more like an essential |
| new with no connection to anything we have | | | | part of our reflection? Does it have to do with |
| heard before. Symphonies written with this new | | | | how we feel TIME? Because basically, symphony |
| kind of sound - is it something yet to come? | | | | as a form very much depends on how it comes |
| Next question: Is there anything common among | | | | into existence, changes, develops, and transforms |
| all the symphonies ever written, starting with the | | | | in TIME. That's probably why we can relate to |
| era of classicism? Considering the differences of | | | | symphonic music - as a reflection of our own |
| the centuries - artistic styles, ethnic or class-based | | | | traveling through life. If this is an answer, then |
| bonds, religious or cultural priorities, and | | | | classification of a symphony as a complex musical |
| personalities of composers - is there anything that | | | | composition for an orchestra usually composed in |
| unites all the symphonies, not only on the level of | | | | four movements, at least one of which is in |
| the definition of the symphony as a music genre | | | | sonata form, is outdated, isn't it? |
| or form, but fundamentally deeper? | | | | Lots of questions! |
| Another way to ask the question is this: What | | | | |