Primordial Musical Space

Primordial musical space is an idea that conveys a collection of perfect pieces. Classical music was a system of musicianship. Two principal parts consist this system: the performance practice – how the music is performed, and musical theory – artificial rules of how music is made. This music is either based on a few actual musical ideas that are than dully developed according to these artificial rules, or again are based on a few actual musical ideas that are than used inside some non-musical frame, such as following a dramatic story with music (opera etc), inside of which a composer can write a lot of bland and non-musical material (Wagner).

Classical pieces which posses the true perfection of form are far fewer than it was proclaimed during XX century, and before. If we say that a masterpiece is a piece which unites perfect form with some greater level of elaboration, number of masterpieces achieved through the history of music would come down to small numbers indeed. Even more, there is a lot of basically masterpieces but alas lagged with mistakes that are screaming for decades to be corrected, but instead hailed as already being perfect. This tradition of keeping silent about the truth was already quite developed inside classical culture. The best that humans did until now, is proclaimed into perfect. For generations, out of respect one does not dare to say that a Beethoven symphony can be bettered, probably in order to keep his reputation of a musical semi-god. So Johannes Brahms was advising this: “Never criticize music written by nobleman, because you never now whose it actually is”.

Despite these practices, the best classical composers managed to produce a number of impressive compositions and even a few symphonies that are not far away from being perfect music.

Today, technology allow us to come close to and intimize with pieces from the past, as Walter Benjamin writes:

Reproduction technology, we can generally formulate, takes away what is reproduced from the field of tradition. By multiplying reproduction, technology replaces unique appearance of a piece of art into mass appearance. And by allowing reproduction to come close to the one who receives, in all everyday situations of his, technology actualizes that which is reproduced. Both these processes powerfully unsettle of what is transmitted by tradition – and this unsettling is one side of todays crisis and regeneration of humanity.

As Benjamin says, today the whole history shows itself to us from a certain distance; we are free to explore it and analyze it and not half-consciously follow it and blindly hold on to it. That probably means we can see it more objectively and understand it better. “Actualization” of traditional musical heritage lies in divorcing it from historical context in which it originally appeared, and moving it into an unhistorical universal musical space. In this world, Arcadian world of Handelian opera is in a room next to Wagner's world of German mythology. Time becomes space, historical worlds are picked up from shelves, and links between them appear. Music is listened to in a cushioned world of sound that is put apart from the rest of our daily lives and that transcends human history, history being only another possible source of inspiration. We have seen this happening throughout XX century, musicians writing pieces which for the first time express through music subjects that historically belong to ancient times. Tradition was used as a raw material for making music on a more universal level then traditional. This also meant tries to better traditional pieces, offering them in more universal versions; a search for true, final sound of those pieces. The aim is Beethoven that is more Beethovenian than Beethoven. These bettered, universal versions of classical compositions would include more precise electronic arrangements. On the most literal level, this approach was already tried by so called electro-symphonists like Walter Carlos, with 1960s “Switched On Bach” among other. Theirs achievements were somewhat admired in the period, but those works were not sounding like better, more timeless versions of classical scores. They sounded somewhat mechanic and cold. Technology can be used to better a piece, but also to damage it. Therefore a few criteria concerning this universal musical space are important.

World of Pieces Stripped to Their’s Original Core

One of the consequences of elemental laws of beauty, is absence of what we recognize as cliché. If a piece follows these laws, only singular ideas which naturally belongs to it are found, without clichés couching them for the sake of “development”, “correct structure” or whatever. Development and correctness should be achieved on an equally natural way as the basic idea. Every idea should be developed completely true to itself, should generate from oneself, freed from outer clichés of a genre, or a form; there is no filling in of a symphony, or a sonata etc. There is no deviation from the main line of composition; no mixing of other things, especially not features which are fashionable at the time. Idea is developed in its uniqueness. Every piece is a particular, unique combination, although it can be compared on this or that way with pieces similar to it.

During classical times, people were existentially much less comfortable than today. Fewer people were listening to music; those who did, could hear it much less often than we today can. They couldn’t know it so well. Also, during classical times people were just discovering the higher musical language. Like Latin essayists who were simply toying with words enjoying theirs just discovered literacy, classical musicians were to a degree doing the same with musical language. Precision was sacrificed for bulkiness and evolvedness.

Finished Product vs Work-in-progress

Being able to tell when the work is really finished is no small art. Let’s on the beginning use a comparison. One aesthetic surgeon, very skilled, worked on a girls face but didn’t finish his work. Another, much less skilled surgeon, just made a few corrections on her and made her face beautiful. It is his work that resulted in beauty.

In tradition, there is no notion of “work in progress”, with great parts and weaker parts, and “finished work”. This notion did exist in the heads of composers thought, so Stravinsky revised his “Rite of Spring” several times after its premiere on 1913 until he thought it’s finished – and who knows if it really was.

This lack of respect for finished quality of a work can also be seen from a tendention among professionals to give advantage to crafty “work in progress”, over a simple but finished and beautiful piece. Striving to achieve something is respected, rather then fully achieving something.

… but on the whole he was more admired by professionals than by public. For professionals respond to craft; and Hindemith was one of the century’s greatest craftsmen and most learned musicians. From “The Lives of Great Composers” by Harold C. Schoenberg

Now, nothing is wrong with these practices, but only as long as we keep in mind what is the difference between such music “from the factory”, and the final result, music completely ready for listening. Written down compositions, that are passed from generation to generation of listeners, should have higher level of exactness, which is one critical point of classical music. Many classical compositions in this respect don’t deserve to be on the shelves of music lovers in theirs original shape, but in historical archives. In this respect, pop music scene is above classical musical scene, since level of musical exactness of popular pieces is in average higher than that of classical pieces – since pop pieces are so short (unambitious) and the listener unforgiving.

Piece as a Fact Of Nature vs Piece as a Historical Fact

There are roughly speaking to opposite poles of looking on musical composition. On one pole is a piece as a historical achievement, with all its eventual shortcomings, and on the other a piece as a fact of nature; not something that is written by a particular composer in particular time, but something that is discovered, like a scientific achievement. So Peter Hill writes in 1996: “Moreover, by exercising our historical imagination, the arrangement for piano of The Rite of Spring gives us a sense of a masterpiece at an early stage of it's discovery...”. What delights us is that a composition is a work of nature, and that composer succeeded in divining this natural law and expressed it through music. Music in many ways is more science than art. It can be said that the difference between a good and a bad piece is, simply, that the former is true and the other false; a piece is like a theorem – if it is making us feel something, it is true, that is, it works, and the other way around. Music shows to be about nature and universe as much as about humans. It can convey the most unimportant things seemingly; but if they are expressed, the musical statement is important; because it is a fact of nature, and is truthfully capturing something. In the realm of universal music, it is important to reach the truth, and it is less important the truth of what.

On Cult of Personalities

Schumann's symphonies don’t get revised despite it is proven that they can be bettered. This is because classical music is based on cult of human personalities and historical authenticity, more then on objective, depersonalized musical truth. In classical music, works of Beethoven or Berlioz are played for centuries in original versions despite theirs imperfections. For generations one does not dare saying that Beethoven's symphony can be bettered, from respect. Error will go hidden in order to protect authority.

This inclination towards artificially producing idols is a characteristic of the religious attitude. It falsely keeps arbitrariness as a part of universal value of a piece.

Universal musical plane is made of what constitutes universal musical virtues, as a contrast to period things. Claude Debussy speaks: “I am more and more convinced that music, by its very nature, is something that can not be cast into a traditional and fixed form. It is made up of colors and rhythms. The rest is a lot of humbug invented by frigid imbeciles riding on the backs of the Masters – who, for the most part, wrote almost nothing but period music. Bach alone had an idea of truth.” In primordial musical space imperfections are not tolerated but remedied, because the strive is for the absolute quality and not for historical authenticity. Instead of a cult of personality, there is a strive towards objective truth. However worshiped an author may be for all the good he achieved, the shortcomings of his work must not be hidden. The aim is music to be true to natural laws of music, and not to be a slave of shortcomings that came from period or personal reasons.

On Authorship

Many authors can contribute to the same piece. The one who had the final word on how it will sound must not even be the main contributor. For example, if some composer/arranger tomorrow finds the ‘perfect’ shape for Beethoven’s 9^th symphony, it would be a great achievement of course but Beethoven would remain the principal composer of the piece.

I have heard so many times moans from music lovers or musicians when they discover that some famous composer used or even based a piece on a synthesizer preset, which is not invented by him. But those presets are there to be used. We can generally speak about a composer as a re-cycler of what is already there, made by others or him in the past, as well as speak about a composer as an inventor of completely new things, from practically nothing. I would think twice before proclaiming the latter as necessarily more worthy.

Let’s remember, on transcendental level of music, like in science, there is a search for ideal, for archetypes. People supplement each other on that journey. And for any piece to reach the transcendental level, it has to be touched by a divine man.

On Preciousness of Good Music

There was a notion during XX century that music that naturally communicates towards many people is easy to write. It was presumed that popular music can easily be produced in heaps. It is true that enormous amount of popular music pieces were produced; but most of them own theirs popularity not to music itself, but to extra-musical reasons, as we all know. There is only a handful of world-wide successful instrumental writers, and every of them created not that much popular pieces. Simply, good music is precious and sparse. This is what makes it both wonderful and cruel.