The avantgarde's relation to popular music

Toaster Mantis wrote: I'm actually somewhat confused whether things like jazz and experimental electronic music (noise, drone etc.) qualifies as "art music" or "popular music". In jazz' case, it seems to have started out as basically a kind of popular music based on call-and-response dancing but developed into something way more highbrow in the 1950s and 1960s. I wager it's a case-by-case situation there.

Edited by Dean - April 12 2015 at 12:04

Dean wrote: jayem wrote: Svetonio wrote: jayem wrote:  (...) "Art music" only distinguishes from "music" if it means "pure art music", or "pure music", that is: music that's here only for the musical experience and doesn't (at least partly) aim at providing a necessary income, or music that doesn't (at least partly) serve another purpose like meeting other people. In that regard, some music called "prog" fits to being called "art music". (...)   I agree. Good to know !!  ...And what they call "fusion" ...DuhHhhhh... Well done Jean-Marie, I think you have successfully managed to shoot yourself in the foot

jayem wrote: But only because I failed to honour your first answer into thanking or nodding.

Svetonio wrote: jayem wrote: (...)  That's why I welcome Svetonio backing my first comment, though I can't really agree that each and every prog piece would fit to being (non phrase-noun meant) "pure art music" or "inner-directed" (doesn't read pretentious bollocked if it means that it's just music we enjoy  fancying alone rather than dancing to it in the midst of a crowd). (...) Of course that not every prog song is Art music, but the percentage of great prog songs & epics is quite sufficient, so we no need to speculate. Same is with Jazz which is mainly Art music too.

Nope.

jayem wrote: I have no problem with that. I'd vote for "Erudite music" instead of "Art music" (we'd have to precise whether it's symphonic orchestra geared or rock geared, etc ) and the "Art music" tag  would disappear forever !!

Well, the argument in the essay I linked to in the opening post goes that new ideas and paradigm shifts within popular music have to come from the "art music" world like modern classical, experimental jazz etc. but are then disseminated into popular music from more avantgarde forms of music somewhere in the liminal zone: Music that is technically speaking part of "low culture" but avantgarde so far as it's oriented towards a countercultural niche rather than the mainstream massculture and does look to the "art music" for inspiration... like certain styles of progressive/psychedelic rock (like Zappa and RIO), the more erudite corners of black/death metal, industrial/noise/power electronics and so on.

The influence will then spread from the "hard core" of the music subcultures to the mainstream through, as the innovations are picked up on elsewhere in the subcultural genres into ever more accessible form. The paradox is that for the cultural life at large to advance and grow, that sphere depends on artists who either isolate themselves from it or outright reject it.

Have I made that clear? The question is then whether that narrative actually holds up under scrutiny, so far it appears that it's probably a stretch at best though it might have a kernel of truth. In the words of the contemporary British poet Esther Adaire: Attempting to write history in a linear fashion feels like telling lies. Some truths are tangential to the line of emplotment. Once you delve into the complexities of an event, you find yourself in a feedback loop of metanarratives.

Toaster Mantis wrote: Well, the argument in the essay I linked to in the opening post goes that new ideas and paradigm shifts within popular music have to come from the "art music" world like modern classical, experimental jazz etc. but are then disseminated into popular music from more avantgarde forms of music somewhere in the liminal zone: Music that is technically speaking part of "low culture" but avantgarde so far as it's oriented towards a countercultural niche rather than the mainstream massculture and does look to the "art music" for inspiration... like certain styles of progressive/psychedelic rock (like Zappa and RIO), the more erudite corners of black/death metal, industrial/noise/power electronics and so on.

Edited by Dean - April 13 2015 at 04:03

^Piss artist.

I don't believe something like Prog or any other form of highly evolved Rock Music would stand up to the sort of academic scrutiny afforded to Art Music*. That's not to say the latter is in any quantifiable way better, but most Popular Music when broken down into thematic development, modulation, rhythmic groupings, motivitic sources, counterpoint, harmonic innovation etc just looks a bit like erm...bo-toxed jingles advertising tight fitting clothing.


(*That's correct, I can't define that either.)


Edited by ExittheLemming - April 13 2015 at 04:33

I'm reading the essay a second time and the author actually admits that avant-prog, industrial, metal, punk etc. have an advantage over "art music" even as they draw influence from it, in that those subcultures are not part of the academic cultural power structure. Hence, they have more leeway to think outside the box in terms of concept because they do not depend on academic consensus for approval and support. This might in turn be how they can open the possibility for the more mainstream music circles to pick up their innovations. People who won't listen to Edgar Varese might still listen to Frank Zappa, and people who won't listen to Zappa might still listen to The Beatles' later relatively experimental albums. People who won't listen to Karlheinz Stockhausen might still listen to Krautrock, and people who won't listen to Krautrock might in turn listen to electronic music or post-punk. People who won't listen to Glenn Branca might still listen to 1980s noise rock, and people who don't listen to 1980s noise rock might still listen to 1990s grunge.

Another paradox, of course, is that for music subcultures to maintain their avant-garde role they have to be somewhat exclusive in order to not compromise their founding ideals... they can't be wholly part of the art music world but they also have to maintain some distance from the mainstream. Which can end up in subcultures eating each other up from the inside out of paranoia regarding entryism from either front, see this essay on the very subject written by an electronic/industrial musician. I re-linked it on Facebook and one metal reviewer I know in person ended up agreeeing with it, I think it's a "memetic auto-immune disease" that no subculture is really free from even if it takes different forms in different cultures.

The author also appears to admit near the end that it's dubious how often most artistic countercultures in practice live up to their self-declared ideals, in particular that of independence from both academic elite and mainstream mass culture. This is why he concludes that it's important for every music scene with an associated "ideology" or perhaps more accurate to call it a guiding ethos, to have an elite - however tiny - who actually live up to those ideals.