This interview helped me understand why I don't enjoy a lot contemporary classical music as much as other music. I can't tell if the performance was good or not because I have nothing stylistic to compare the piece to. I have no expectations that the piece can play with, so it's almost like hearing someone speak a different language that I don't understand at all - there are basic things like loud and fast being energetic in some form, but that's as concrete as it goes with some pieces I listened to a song recently that has some harmonic move that isn't classical at all, but the 3 singers and the accompaniment were clearly on the same page and in tune so it sounded very intentional and not like a mistake at all (and it was beautiful, but that's more subjective). It challenged my expectations not just to be different but to be good
Thanks for this interview! I was listening to Suckling's music for the first time yesterday. Listened to the Departing landscape album twice. I haven't heard anything recent that seems to be written FOR the listener as much as this. It's very modern but he really takes you by the hand at each moment of the composition with perceptive beacons that enable the mind to never feel lost but never bored either with too obvious expectations. The level of craftsmanship and precision in details is stratospheric with a broad range of influences but there's no hint of arrogance or self satisfaction in it.
I just had the strangest experience: I’ve just composed and given the first performance of a piece called ‘Earthrise’, which aims to express some of the emotions I experienced whilst viewing the feed of last year’s Artemis I mission; specifically the moment when the Orion capsule cleared the moon and the distant Earth came into view. Just before beginning to watch this interview I was writing up some notes on the piece… to then hear you open with this question was rather a shock! L’esprit du temps…
I agree with Samuel that the idea of this interactive opera/fantasy/game, is very exciting for the fact that the audience is now involved in the modularity and as he said, it is no longer just the property of the composer/performer...because as he also said, the audience without this involvement is bound to hear it and frame it along the lines of a normal narrative, or rhetoric, series of expectations, even though that wasnt the original intention...I am anxious to try it out myself now!
This is an exceptionally interesting conversation. I especially enjoyed the discussion on genre which is central to my own work. You're doing good work, Samuel. I'd never heard of Mr. Suckling before but I checked out his site and I like the samples I heard. Getting composers known to people who are interested is important and, in my opinion, not being done as well as it could be. I sometimes wonder if someone who was a "marketing expert" might be able to give us some advice on how this could be done more effectively. As an aside, I think the term "new music" is too bland and could refer to the latest pop song, the meaning it actually has for most people. I think we need a better meme for what we're doing. I'm going to think about that. Thanks for this.
As are all your inerviews, this was thoughtful and interesting, thank you. I dipped in and out and ultimately heard about half of it. It is an interesting point you raise about whether the concert hall is an outdated format. I had never thought of this point before but it struck me instantly as true. I will go even farther and state that classical music itself is out of date and is no longer relevant to the every day life of most people. In response to your title, though you haven’t asked for it, I offer that there is no mystery to uncover and no truth to reveal that isn’t already known. Music is beautiful if it is, and the only way to find out if it is is to play it for someone and see how they react.
25:56 I wonder if this idea of a piece of music having "universal" value - outside of considerations of personal tastes - really is that utopic. If a piece is constructed in these ways that Martin Suckling very elegantly expresses, proposing its intrinsical context and rules and then digressing from them, does the piece not then become its own genre or reference during the listening experience ? Therefore, the appreciation might be universal, but the qualities and sensations brought on by the piece are specific and unique to each listener (which is the case anyway with any piece of art).
As long as we humans have not figured out how composition and creativity really work we can not teach it to a computer. But maybe a computer can become creative in music by leaving the groundwork to humans and instead become a master in combining existing building blocks to suit a musical project : take all the recorded works of Milhaud, cut them into three types of phrases (see Smith Brindle : phrases with a relative beginning, developping or ending character) and paste them together in different combinations based on melodic and / or other musical similarities to fit the ebb and flow of a film score for instance. Well I suppose DJs have been creative in a similar manner for the last 40 years or so ;-)
What's the point of incorporating AI in music making other than a fun occasional gimmick for the composer? Humans are perfectly capable of being creative on their own. Or maybe AI is for people who can't be creative on their own.
Martin's humility and wisdom is something we should all aspire to as teachers, artists, musicians, composers...
I imagine Samuel palling around with Martin before the stream, and as soon as they go live, Samuel starts hitting him with these hardball questions.
This interview helped me understand why I don't enjoy a lot contemporary classical music as much as other music. I can't tell if the performance was good or not because I have nothing stylistic to compare the piece to. I have no expectations that the piece can play with, so it's almost like hearing someone speak a different language that I don't understand at all - there are basic things like loud and fast being energetic in some form, but that's as concrete as it goes with some pieces
I listened to a song recently that has some harmonic move that isn't classical at all, but the 3 singers and the accompaniment were clearly on the same page and in tune so it sounded very intentional and not like a mistake at all (and it was beautiful, but that's more subjective). It challenged my expectations not just to be different but to be good
Thanks for this interview! I was listening to Suckling's music for the first time yesterday. Listened to the Departing landscape album twice. I haven't heard anything recent that seems to be written FOR the listener as much as this. It's very modern but he really takes you by the hand at each moment of the composition with perceptive beacons that enable the mind to never feel lost but never bored either with too obvious expectations. The level of craftsmanship and precision in details is stratospheric with a broad range of influences but there's no hint of arrogance or self satisfaction in it.
I just had the strangest experience: I’ve just composed and given the first performance of a piece called ‘Earthrise’, which aims to express some of the emotions I experienced whilst viewing the feed of last year’s Artemis I mission; specifically the moment when the Orion capsule cleared the moon and the distant Earth came into view.
Just before beginning to watch this interview I was writing up some notes on the piece… to then hear you open with this question was rather a shock! L’esprit du temps…
Cool!
I agree with Samuel that the idea of this interactive opera/fantasy/game, is very exciting for the fact that the audience is now involved in the modularity and as he said, it is no longer just the property of the composer/performer...because as he also said, the audience without this involvement is bound to hear it and frame it along the lines of a normal narrative, or rhetoric, series of expectations, even though that wasnt the original intention...I am anxious to try it out myself now!
This is an exceptionally interesting conversation. I especially enjoyed the discussion on genre which is central to my own work.
You're doing good work, Samuel. I'd never heard of Mr. Suckling before but I checked out his site and I like the samples I heard. Getting composers known to people who are interested is important and, in my opinion, not being done as well as it could be. I sometimes wonder if someone who was a "marketing expert" might be able to give us some advice on how this could be done more effectively.
As an aside, I think the term "new music" is too bland and could refer to the latest pop song, the meaning it actually has for most people. I think we need a better meme for what we're doing. I'm going to think about that. Thanks for this.
Let me know what you come up with. Composers suck at marketing :)
As are all your inerviews, this was thoughtful and interesting, thank you. I dipped in and out and ultimately heard about half of it. It is an interesting point you raise about whether the concert hall is an outdated format. I had never thought of this point before but it struck me instantly as true. I will go even farther and state that classical music itself is out of date and is no longer relevant to the every day life of most people. In response to your title, though you haven’t asked for it, I offer that there is no mystery to uncover and no truth to reveal that isn’t already known. Music is beautiful if it is, and the only way to find out if it is is to play it for someone and see how they react.
Maybe they talked about that in the half you didn't listen to?
25:56 I wonder if this idea of a piece of music having "universal" value - outside of considerations of personal tastes - really is that utopic. If a piece is constructed in these ways that Martin Suckling very elegantly expresses, proposing its intrinsical context and rules and then digressing from them, does the piece not then become its own genre or reference during the listening experience ? Therefore, the appreciation might be universal, but the qualities and sensations brought on by the piece are specific and unique to each listener (which is the case anyway with any piece of art).
As long as we humans have not figured out how composition and creativity really work we can not teach it to a computer. But maybe a computer can become creative in music by leaving the groundwork to humans and instead become a master in combining existing building blocks to suit a musical project : take all the recorded works of Milhaud, cut them into three types of phrases (see Smith Brindle : phrases with a relative beginning, developping or ending character) and paste them together in different combinations based on melodic and / or other musical similarities to fit the ebb and flow of a film score for instance. Well I suppose DJs have been creative in a similar manner for the last 40 years or so ;-)
So... Where are all these links you mention at the end? i.e. Martin's music, Blackfell (black-felt or however you spell it...)
Working on it. Thanks for your patience.
Should be fixed now! Check out his opera Black Fell..
Pay someone to do it? 😁
Knowing nothing about suckling I kinda feel like that’s a weird question to start out with maybe. But this is my reaction after a few minutes in.
Shouldn’t we be writing for ourselves and let the chips fall where they may?
What's the point of incorporating AI in music making other than a fun occasional gimmick for the composer? Humans are perfectly capable of being creative on their own. Or maybe AI is for people who can't be creative on their own.
It’s just another tool in the toolbox
Go to a dead moon and then to dead planets...stupic
*the sound of the point being missed*