'The Classical Style' reading group, week seven

 

II  THE CLASSICAL STYLE 

2.  Structure and Ornament 

By ERIC WAGNER
Special guest blogger

The references to Rossini on page 101 makes me think of the popularity of his “The Barber of Seville” in the mid-twentieth century from Bugs Bunny in “The Rabbit of Seville” to Alfalfa of the Little Rascals singing “Figaro, Figaro, Figaro”. Joseph Kerman has written about how people have complained about the “death” of classical music for over a hundred years. Kerman notes that classical music survives, but often not in the way some people wish it would. In his wonderful (non-technical) book  Opera and the Morbidity of Music Kerman notes the surprising revival of the popularity of opera in the 1990’s and the popularity of the Three Tenors and the CD Chant. 

The discussion of ornamentation in this chapter makes me think about popular music in the last forty years, especially post-Mariah Carey, post-Whitney Houston singing, where singers typically add more ornamentation than in the music of the seventies and eighties. Watching American Idol in the 2000’s I noticed how young singers tended to add way more ornamentation than I tended to like. I think about changing performance styles of “The Star-Spangled Banner”.  

I love the Heisenbergian tone of pg. 104, with Rosen’s uncertainty about how to find an accurate interpretation of music especially when it comes to knowing what kind of ornamentation Mozart would have liked in the slow movements of his piano concerti. 

The first 108 pages of this book have laid the groundwork for appreciating the classical style. We have  reached the top of the roller coaster. Enjoy the ride!