Austin-auto

A kind friend forgave my ignorance of popular and indie music since I know a fair deal about classical music. This, she deemed, was an elevated sort of knowledge. The compliment was appreciated, but I can't logically justify it to myself. Knowledge of classical music is just as useless in everyday life as baseball stats or celebrity gossip. Perhaps more useless since people rarely ever know what I'm talking about. Also, I can't say that my focus is any more intense during a performance than a football fan's is during a game, though perhaps my memory is more actively engaged. I can't see how naming members of any of the world's orchestras (which I can't do) is any more valuable than naming players on sports teams. My performance abilities are no more keen for my interest than the Guitar Hero addict or the guy who plays pickup basketball on weekends. You're probably just as able to pick out a song appropriate to a mood or situation from popular music as I am from classical.

As another example, I complain that so many popular songs are little more than looped tracks with maybe some key changes and vocals on top. Well, guess what? That's existed in classical music for centuries. A phrase that's repeated over and over like that is called a ground bass or an ostinato. You know Pachelbel's canon, right? A lot of string players (pretend they) hate playing it because it's the same GD thing over and over again. Ravel's Bolero is another example that uses an ostinato which I won't link because I hate it that much. The use of ostinati went out of fashion for a century and a half but came back for different purposes. And while not technically an ostinato, listen to the different repeated figurations in the left hand of this Mozart sonata. (Who can name what the low-high-middle-high bass pattern that starts the piece is called?) Or in the right hand of this Beethoven sonata. So I can't say I'm above repetitive music either.

Granted, most of what gets played is not heavy on ostinati the way jazz or rap music is. But there are other sorts of repetition. A song in strophic form repeats a theme with each stanza. Fugues consist of several statements of a main subject sometimes with episodes between each statement. Rondo or ritornello form similarly repeats a statement of a main theme between other themes. Even the grand sonata-allegro form involves a total of three statements of the first, second, and closing themes along with any variations in the development and coda.

In some respects, repetition serves to lighten the burden on the composer to write new material. But it also offers a chance for brilliant development of ideas. For a very fundamental example, take Beethoven's Symphony no. 5 in C minor. (All four movements there for ya.) It opens with the most famous four notes in the world. And that simple rhythmic motive, short-short-short-long, is used in a thousand variations of mood, melodic contour, key, texture, and so on throughout the entirety of the work. Repetition that's not repetitive. Certainly there are artists today who accomplish this as well, but they tend not to be as popular. I have a theory about that, but that's another post.

So maybe that's one aspect to classical music that earns it the epithet of 'elevated'. Quite often, you have to really be paying attention to even notice when it's being repetitive. And isn't it a joy to be paying attention? You can walk past the Mona Lisa and think it's just a painting of an odd-looking woman. Or you can understand the history, details, and genius behind and in that masterpiece and feel honored for the experience.