To what degree will you support musicians who (openly, possibly or jokingly) include racist, sexist, homophobic, or bigoted messages in their music, or who privately hold such beliefs?

I say do all of the music immaculately but always refer to the composer as "Dick Wanger"

lol

Dick Wrangler iirc

Fascism is one case where I feel like it's important to be able to mentally separate the aesthetic feeling from the ideology, if only so you don't get tricked by confusing the two. To me, it feels easy to "appreciate" the stirring / triumphant / glorious / romantic aesthetics of fascism -- they were demonstrably compelling and over-the-top in a way people are constantly cribbing from. (Will spare everyone like eight paragraphs here on Sontag, camp, Kiss of the Spider Woman, Mishima, and Starship Troopers.) They tap into some particular human (or just Western?) energy that's not strictly ideological. Same with mob energy, which can be pretty similar! So my answer to the thread question probably involves that feeling where this energy has been activated, and then you have to step back for a moment and double-check what it's being activated in the service of -- e.g., "is this a healthy communal anger or am I just being drawn into a mob?" -- and figure something out from there...

Jon -- I don't know from Wagner and am not making any assertions about his operas. I'm saying it seems perfectly natural for a person who holds nationalist or anti-Semitic views to create art with a genuine sense of nobility to it; it does not strike me as mysterious to reconcile.

xpost or announce "...composed by Robert Wagner...uh...oops, I mean Richard Wagner, damn I always get those two confused"

I agree with Mr Tyler that the Ring Cycle in particular is about forging the same vision of Germany that the Nazis would later endorse, because they come from the same tradition, not because the Nazis have somehow corrupted Wanger's work.

And I thoroughly enjoy/love his work, but I wd be astounded if the things that look anti-Semitic in the work of a guy obssessed with anti-Semitism didn't have even the slightest anti-Semitic connotations.

Jon -- I don't know from Wagner and am not making any assertions about his operas. I'm saying it seems perfectly natural for a person who holds nationalist or anti-Semitic views to create art with a genuine sense of nobility to it; it does not strike me as mysterious to reconcile.

No i feel ya I was just pointing out that I think these are not the two things Barenboim is finding mysterious to reconcile. He is talking abt a humanist kind of nobility, not a damn-this-is-GLORIOUS kind of nobility. The latter is of course very easy to reconcile with the notion of fascism/nationalism/racism.

The latter kind of nobility also shows up, in the Ring for instance in the Valhalla music, but this theme belongs to the Gods who are NOT the good guys, and the pomp of the Valhalla theme is v obviously used with irony. As in, when it is blaring out nobly as the gods enter the newly-built Valhalla you actually hear river spirits singing offstage about the bad faith Valhalla was built with.

I agree with Mr Tyler that the Ring Cycle in particular is about forging the same vision of Germany that the Nazis would later endorse, because they come from the same tradition, not because the Nazis have somehow corrupted Wanger's work.

Really? I dunno. I just don't get this from the Ring. It questions itself constantly, and seems to me to deliver no message that is not highly ambivalent. Strikes me as the most politically complex opera I've heard.

Let me add that having now read the essay linked by aero I am nauseated afresh at the disgusting shit Wanger said on and off the record.

Though the essay is full of questionable leaps of logic, there is a RW quote I've never seen before, spoken in re: the final act of Siegfried, which makes me want to throw up.

Ugh why am I bothering to defend this guy's operas, he's not even one of my favorite composers, I just happen to think The Ring is a musicodramatic masterpiece.

What I've read about the guy is that he was more nuts control freak like Walt Disney than garden variety hatemonger, though can't say I'm too impressed with Walt Disney either. What's a good Wagner substitute, though? With Disney there's at least Six Flags and Pixar.

Very long and probably not worth reading. http://sickmouthy.com/2011/03/22/objectionablemusic/

"In what other context would you tolerate savagery for lols?"

^^ A+

What's a good Wagner substitute, though?

Bruckner - arguably a superior composer, too (very arguably, I should say - he does not soar to the ridiculous heights of Wagner, but it can be argued that he sounds similar depths)

What I've read about the guy is that he was more nuts control freak like Walt Disney than garden variety hatemonger, though can't say I'm too impressed with Walt Disney either. What's a good Wagner substitute, though? With Disney there's at least Six Flags and Pixar.

― Philip Nunez, Tuesday, March 22, 2011 2:02 PM (19 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

you should REALLY REALLY read the essay aerosmith linked to upthread

also Bruckner understood choruses better than Wagner

Yeah I was gonna say Bruckner.

When it comes to baggage, though, one does have to point out Bruckner was hitler's favorite composer of all. But Bruckner the man was pretty much totally innocuous (while his music brings the cosmic, sub-oceanic, abysmal and bucolic in equal measure).

Bruckner doesn't even come close.

Apart from that, one wonder's what the point is in trying to take issue with somebody who died well over a hundred years ago, we're forgetting how different everything must've been, history combined with a widespread humanist climate can do that sometimes.

xpost Also the first few R Strauss outings are pretty much a humorous grand guignol answer to Wagner. Strauss is equally deft and elaborate but does NOT take himself seriously.

Apart from that, one wonder's what the point is in trying to take issue with somebody who died well over a hundred years ago, we're forgetting how different everything must've been, history combined with a widespread humanist climate can do that sometimes.

Seriously? is it really your position that everybody was a noxious antisemite? it's demonstrably untrue, if so.

Yeah this isn't a 19th century novelist casually using the N-word because that was what people did back then - it's virulent bigotry.

When it comes to baggage, though, one does have to point out Bruckner was hitler's favorite composer of all. But Bruckner the man was pretty much totally innocuous (while his music brings the cosmic, sub-oceanic, abysmal and bucolic in equal measure).

but yeah - I mean - Hitler loved painting, too - nothing wrong with painting. But what he liked about painting wasn't "its very essence opposes the Jewish infestation and uplifts the Aryan spirit," whereas it can be convincingly argued that that's exactly what he likes about Wagner. Bruckner, on the other hand, just a gentle dude thinkin about God. who Wagner was a dick to, btw, which makes me hate Wagner even more.

Wagner was a dick to Bruckner I mean not to God except like maybe broadly speaking

I just figured someone was bound to bring it up so might as well get it over with.

Yeah, Wanger was also, depending on the year, a leech and a dick to Liszt, who was one of the few true bros of the 19c.

Yeah, Wanger was also, depending on the year, a leech and a dick to Liszt, who was one of the few true bros of the 19c.

which we can all learn about from watching Lisztomania btw

Liszt, who was one of the few true bros of the 19c.

think there's a bunch of 19th-century cuckolded husbands who might differ with you on this score

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hRd88MPEvAE&feature=related

Rick Wakeman as Thor^^^

lol you guys are getting Phoenix songs stuck in my head - plz stop

some pretty hilar composer caricatures in this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uzG1qcav8aA

Seriously? is it really your position that everybody was a noxious antisemite? it's demonstrably untrue, if so.

I wasn't particularly clear but I'm saying that we're so far removed, in time and (what I'm emphasising here) in mind. It's easy to pass the huge differences in modes of thought between now and then, given the widespread default non-thought surrounding what it means to be human today.

>>Liszt, who was one of the few true bros of the 19c.

think there's a bunch of 19th-century cuckolded husbands who might differ with you on this score

Love is NEVER wrong, aero, come now.

One of the worst things Wagner did to Liszt was turn FL's daughter Cosima into an ideological clone of himself, one who DID live long enough to consort with Nazis...

whole movie is hilar, one of Russell's best imho

xp

prettylike: ah, I get you - we are coming at reality from deeply diff. philosophical standpoints in that case - I really think the present day vastly overstates the depths of its differences with the past - to the point where I consider the deepest differences one can name largely cosmetic, and that historians won't say "at this or that point in the late 20th century" (or whatever point one assigns) "some break occurred or finished occurring which drove a rift between the mindsets of preceding ages and the ones that followed" - I think western culture is basically of a comprehensible, apprehendable piece

I purchased an Arghoslent CD before. They are racist, redneck morons but the CD just kills.

I've heard rumors those guys are just taking the piss but idk. "Hornets of the Pogrom" as a title sounds like a Christopher Guest take on nsbm for sure though

I don't think so...

yeah but I mean did you ever read any crucial youth interviews? kinda smell misanthrophic art-prank. I don't listen to them just in case don't get me wrong but I think they might be kinda Mentors-level trolling

I'm sorry, I can't stop lolling at their songtitles (Incorrigble Bigotry!)

Speaking of Liszt, going to this on Wednesday, pretty awesome:

CIM ORCHESTRA with LESLIE HOWARD
(Concert Series)

Presented in collaboration with Cuyahoga Community College
LESLIE HOWARD, piano and conductor, guest artist
CIM ORCHESTRA
CARL TOPILOW, conductor

In honor of the 2011 bicentennial of composer Franz Liszt’s birth,
Leslie Howard and the CIM Orchestra will present world premieres
of newly discovered Liszt manuscripts.
Pre-concert talk begins at 7:00 pm.

Awesome! Was just listening to a volume of Howard's complete Liszt series this morning.

xpost The interviewer's italicised commentary is creepier than the band's answers.

I like this bit: "Even though we deal with taboo topics, none are expressed or dealt with in a disrespectful or irresponsible manner."

Says the band with members called Holocausto and Pogrom. I don't think they're just trolling though.

Shall we discuss tomorrow whether rap can be considered music, or merely talking over someone else's music?
― Siegbran, maandag 21 maart 2011 23:44 (Yesterday) Bookmark

?

Siegban

it's my position that what the Nazis saw in these tropes and what Wagner meant by them are one and the same.

Utter bullshit. Every generation re-invents the meaning and uses of art and thought. Wagner's nationalism should be seen in the context of the post-Enlightenment reaction to universals (mostly as posited by the French) and expressing itself in 19th century romanticism and nationalism; perhaps even defensible in some kind of Burkean way if conducted with humility and circumspection. I don't recall Wagner, whatever one thinks of his music, as ever calling for genocide however anti-semitic he may have been and German anti-semitism has pretty deep and complicated roots, ones that were not unknown throught all Christendom, tbf.

I don't think Wagner has to have called for genocide in order to put his nationalistic anti-Semitism in the same lineage as what the Nazis ended up doing, otherwise you are making an argument that veers perilously close to the "but he didn't dress up like a Klan member" line of defense against accusations of racial insensitivity.

Michael White, "I don't recall him as ever calling for genocide ergo he's not in the exact lineage of national socialism" is ridiculous. Most member of the fuckin' SS never "called for genocide" either - you wanna excuse them too? Does a guy gotta get "I'm a nazi" tatted on his face before he's actually a nazi, or can we look at his ideology and call it what it is?

well hold on there, chronologically speaking it was impossible for Wagner to be a Nazi, I will fully back up that argument 100%

acting like Wagner's shit was completely divorced from what inspired Hitler seems... completely wrong tho

chronologically speaking it was impossible for Wagner to be a Nazi, I will fully back up that argument 100%
^^^yes

Pretty sure genocide wasn't a Nazi policy in '33.

Yeah, but looking back, I find something offensive in almost every person in the past. Is that reason to refuse to engage with their work, especially music? I am not fond of Xtianity on the whole, should I throw out my Bach? Porgy and Bess can make me uncomfortable at times. Should I toss it and all of Gershwin?

"but he didn't dress up like a Klan member"

It doesn't matter what the Klan member wears, of course, but the quality of his/her music isn't affected either way, necessarily. Do we know the sculptor of the Venus de Milo's politics? Do we care? The mosaicist from Pompeii, was he racist against Carthaginians or Greeks or Germans? Does Ming dynast vase imply a world view that anyone not from the Middle Kingdom inferior? I dunno and I don't care.

My answer to the original question is that very often offensive people let their offensiveness ruin or marr their art. Inasmush as they don't and their work is good, I'll enjoy it at whatever level I enjoy it.