Tapas, Cartizze and Ragù. What on Earth do we Mean by ‘Classic’? (1)

Late evening in a cozy bar of our rione where we wash down Spanish tapas with Cartizze Prosecco.

Our before-dinner aperitivo, once in a while.

ψ

Mario: “You recently wondered how come far eastern little girls, hence culturally ‘alien’ in some way, can perfectly play European ‘classical music’ (in the narrow sense.) You also added that such music (from 1750 to 1830 roughly) originated in that crossroads between Germania and Italia, once the ancient frontier or limes of the Roman Empire which separated the Roman from the non Roman.”

Flavia: “Your associations are bizarre.”

Giorgio: “Allow me to be bizarre at least in my blog amore.”

Extropian: “I remember you saying at the end of a post on music that Mozart who came from that area perfectly combined Italian taste with German knowledge.”

Giorgio: “Yes, a perfect fruit of that cross-way region, although Schubert shouldn’t be ignored either.”

[A classic lied by Schubert I owe to Sledpress]

Giorgio: “Incidentally Flavia, I’m struggling both with Mauro Giuliani (on my guitar) and with the Latin poet Horace. I do feel they have something in common.”

Flavia: “Despite the big difference in greatness and time? Ti stai rintronando il cervello?”

What do We Mean

Mario: “Now the problem arises: what the hell do we mean by classic? Entire generations of students have been plagued by this aesthetic notion.”

Giorgio: “You know I don’t like clear definitions. That’s what dictionaries are for, not blogs (not mine in any case.)”

ψ

We leave the bar. Roma may not be Canada, but winters get damn cold here too sometimes.

 

Franz Schubert. Image via Wikipedia

How Can Japanese Little Girls Play European Classical Music Perfectly?

Japanese little girl. Click for attribution and to zoom in

In the previous post we have shown two little Japanese girls capable of perfectly playing some music of the classical period.

Which surprised me in many respects and made me reflect.

Germany, Vienna and Italy

First of all by ‘classical style’ we mean the music created from the mid 1700’s until the first decades of 1800 thanks to contributions from Germany (Southern Germany – Mannheim etc. -  but not only), Vienna and Italy, which changed the spirit & the technique of music into something inspired by the ideals of ancient classical art.

In other posts we’d mused about this magical region where many centuries earlier Roma and Germania met (and clashed,) ie the Roman provinces (Germania Superior, Raetia, Noricum and Pannonia) along the axis of what was once the limes germanicus or frontier of the ancient Roman Empire (look at this map!) that separated the world of Rome from the un-romanized Germanic (and non Germanic) tribes (read more: 1, 2, 3.)

It may be a simplification (and an obsession,) but that ‘classical music’ in its narrow sense (in the broad sense it refers to all Western art music since its beginnings) was much later to be born in such cultural crossroads – well, it didn’t happen in our opinion by mere chance.

[Roman & non Roman. Where are hence the traces of this duality in today’s societies? - we had asked ourselves]

Haydn. Portrait by Thomas Hardy. Wikipedia image

Now this ‘classical music’, that followed Baroque and developed before the spread of Romanticism, is characterized by formal balance, a certain restraint and a terse simplicity attained with extreme economy of means together with a very refined taste: which makes the performance of such art daunting despite its apparent easiness. Its model is in fact that of Hellenic art, although adapted to modern times (and to modern music, since we know so little of ancient music.)

This may be a reason why playing Mozart, Haydn or Boccherini and Clementi ‘well’, that is, with the necessary purity, is often more difficult than rendering subsequent and technically harder pieces of the Romantic and contemporary repertoire. I saw pianists who could easily play Brahms and Scriabin but sweated their way through the end of a Mozart adagio.

The Japanese and the Russians

Now, that these Japanese children, coming from a different planet, are able to do this extremely well – isn’t it amazing?

Classical balance and taste is nothing one can improvise. One needs to have breathed such air.

Take the Russians, such formidable musicians. Not completely European ok but closer to us than the Japanese for sure, they have traditionally always hesitated before the classical repertoire (and when they didn’t … the result was often not among the best.)

So, the Russians fail where the Japanese don’t – there must be something in those Eastern cultures I am not aware of.

Some readers have got any ideas?

ψ

In the meanwhile, as an Italian, I know the Japanese – a few I’ve met who study bel canto in Rome – love Italian opera quite a lot whose style always resisted the complexity of the romantic and late-romantic German harmonies and voicing (Verdi Bellini and Donizetti etc. on one hand, Wagner or Richard Strauss on the other hand: two different universes altogether! Roman & non Roman?)

Once more. What these oriental people may find in the Western ‘classical’ style of music?

Mario: “By the way, I heard that classical music makes hogs as fat as whales.”

MoR: “What?? Are you kidding me?”

Mario: “It is true! This Vietnamese pig farmer, Nguyen Chi Cong, found a new way to make his 3,000 hogs eat more quickly and happily by having them listen daily to the music of Beethoven, Mozart and Schubert. It seems the soothing effect is also working for other domestic animals!”

MoR: *Rolling eyes*

ψ

Related posts:

Music, Politics and History

Roman Limes. Between Two Worlds

Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli’s Chilly Genius

From the two Sides of the Roman Limes

See also the series dedicated to the notions of ‘classic’ & ‘classical’ (1, 2 and 3)

Sex and the Search for a Method

I am preparing a post on method.

Why?

1) Because I am a passionate dilettante philosopher who is not content with just blogging. I need a method in my blogging.
2) I had promised a method post, so it is very Roman-like to keep my promise (well, ancient Roman-like, contemporary Romans having lost many of the old virtues.)

Truth being the method governing my posts keeps bugging me since I started this blog, and, needing to process my ideas a bit I propose this posting sequence to my readers:

I) a post as a preparation for the method post (ugh!). It’s the present post. I need it for clearing up my mind before the real thing.

II) A post on SEX, as a break. It might help not to lose ALL my readers because of my philosophical manias.

III) The real thing, i.e. the method post.

IV) A second post on SEX, to beg for additional pardon, thus ending this sequence in full glory.

Ψ

What do you think? Will you pardon me? Will SEX help?

Rhetorical questions not expecting answers let’s put some preparatory ideas together and that the trip begin!

Game of Ideas with Hidden Links

1) We will touch upon questions from numerous points of view, as if for each topic there were like a forum of different positions in the writer’s mind.

2) A thought in progress where who is writing is gradually clarifying his ideas. Such ideas might contradict one another because the writer is constantly reaching new (and sometimes opposite) perspectives, which could baffle the reader but also help her/him understand how complex things can be.

3) A game of ideas then, with anecdotes and facts only apparently deprived of connections. Such connections (mental links) will sometimes be explicit (said) or implicit (unsaid,) which should bring the reader to make her/his own connections, namely towards creative non-passive reading / thinking (which of course may imply total disagreement with the writer.)

Ψ

Well, at least Magister was very successful in this game. But Magister is Magister.

Writing vs Thinking

Writing, thinking, clarifying,
striving to sort out thoughts
in ways so “clear and ordinate”
and comprehensible.

This, many years ago, Magister counselled
for the good education of the mind.
Beloved Magister,
writer, philosopher, educator…

Ψ

Writing in fact is a stern discipline linked to the activity of thinking. Writing teaches us how to think in ways so clear and ordinate. It obliges us to. Reason and word (word = discourse, written or oral) are actually only one word in Greek: logos. Awkward prose or clumsy oral-written reports often reflect muddled thoughts.

As for myself the problem is more complicated:

• writing in a foreign language makes the task challenging and

• we have this fatal attraction for digressions, for the free wanderings of the mind and all its unrestrained associations, ie for chaos (something Magister definitely wouldn’t condone.)

We like both sides of the moon – the dark indistinct and the crystal-clear. We appreciate discipline, clear argumentations, polished sentences, but we also dig lush jungles of words – in literature & thought we having impressive examples of both.

• We get nourishment and peace from the perfect equilibrium of Western Classical Music: Mozart, Boccherini, Clementi, Haydn and young Beethoven. Or Italian Opera: Verdi, Bellini, Donizetti etc. wrongly called romantic, since Italian Opera is classical in its nature (and even Puccini is like that.) Interesting how Italians never totally absorbed Romanticism, their classical heritage and almost inborn sense of taste (and grace) being too tenacious (read here.)

• We also get a lot of pleasure from insane Western Romantic music (older Beethoven, Wagner, Mahler, Scriabin etc.), maybe because of the Celtic and German blood in us  possibly engendering (a myth, ok) some excess.

Thus said, will our so-called philosophy be muddled? Will readers think we are crazy? We really have no idea, dear readers. We really have no idea at all.

Note. We just gave you an example of digression + bizarre association. The concepts of writing and thinking were linked with music, two totally different spheres of the human experience, but the connection appears evident to me.

We do this a lot. We associate a lot, but we understand it can confuse the reader. See an example of these free associations in the post Relax & Creativity.

Weakness or Strength?

My friend the Jurist told me yesterday: “Why the hell are you worried about this roving of the mind? This is only a blog, it can be crazy.”

True, but the thing is I am a bit ambitious (to a certain extent, or I will fail). I am actually attempting a research. A research from a man-in-the-street-of-Rome point of view, though nonetheless a research. Thence this roving tendency could turn into a weakness (or a strength?)

Are we capable of carrying out such research? Who the hell knows, but we take the chance.

A Philosopher in Every Man

Magister used to say that every person is a natural born philosopher, that is, everyone, during the entire course of his/her life, keeps building a constantly evolving grid of concepts & connections among them. This world vision or Weltanschaung (read here) enables us to comprehend the surrounding world (from Latin comprehendere, cum + prehendere = put together, grasp, or insert into a grid). Comprehension of the surrounding environment – it implies also better interaction with it, the two things going together.

Ok, if this is true of every man (that he is a natural born philosopher,) and, if I am a man, which I certainly am, I should somehow hope to be able to transmit my Roman feel in a sort of organized way. Is that true?

In principle yes, ALL though depending on the degree of discipline, education and availability of time I dispose of.

A Helping Hand

1. What’s the difference – one might ask – between a philosopher on one hand and a peasant or a man of the street on the other hand? No difference, only level of training, skill, specialization may differ. The philosopher is a pro. Which doesn’t mean the non-pros must shut up. I will not.

1. We should all learn to think (and write) more effectively because it can help us greatly to make our days and guide us in the fundamental choices of our life. The more efficiently we think, the happier we live, classical measure though being vital here: if we think too much and act too little, we can get neurotic.

This blog intends to give a helping hand to those who think self-improvement is important (and possible.)

Reason? Not All

Ideas are now taking shape a bit as regards my future method post. The next writing will though as promised be devoted to SEX, SEX, SEX NOTHING BUT SEX (though in the Roman way.) In the meanwhile, some additional patience pls.

I can dominate my chaotic mind with control, writing, striving for some order. But chaos is still there; non rational things, disorder, even entropy, are still there – in our minds, in the Universe, who the hell knows: I need to delve into what the guys at the Third Culture are doing, or I’ll say a bunch of stupidities.

What I do know is we cannot live in disorder. We need to discipline ourselves most of the time.

But not all the time.

We also need excess, spring breaks, fun, Carnivals, Saturnalia – a Roman festival (see picture below) where rules were broken, reversed: masters became for example slaves and slaves masters.

The Romans were big gurus in the art of living. They ruled the world with humour on their faces and tongues (sometimes crass tongues, to say the truth) and not with mystical seriousness. They faced the most dreadful tragedies with utmost courage but preferred comedies.

Reason and order are not all. They can lead to horrors if taken too seriously, a great lesson from the non ideological Romans, that the people from colder climes do not seem to have quite understood. Taking things too seriously can call disaster. All the promised perfect paradises, all the Utopias – they brought despair most of the time.

Let us then have fun also! Carnivals are made for that! Look at Rio in Brasil, look at our Spanish cousins! – an economic success although Madrid has movida every night!

Good g-o-d-s, how can I finish this never ending blabbering?

Maybe with Coelho‘s beautiful words, from his novel Zahir:

Let us have some respect
for our life on this planet..

Italian version