CORRECTION: At around the 43:30 mark, I refer to February 2018 as being "last month" when it was really a year and a month ago, because I suppose I'm in denial about it truly being 2019.
Staying true to Feldman, you really made an almost hour long documentary rather than a 20 minute video as "the world doesnt need another 20 minute contemporary [video]" An absolute blessing
Samuel Adler once told me Feldman was one of the most profane people he knew and was capable of swearing a blue streak if in the right mood. I found that observation refreshing.
This is fascinating! I really enjoyed watching the video. I would like to add, as an artist and musician, looking at a painting by standing farther away does not do what you state in the video. You’re not looking at the entire work, you’re looking at the work from a specific point in space time. Form and scale work differently in visual art than how you’ve described it. When you’re looking at a painting further back, unless you’ve consciously chosen to de-focus your eyes, you are still moving over the surface of the painting, focusing on particular aspects of the work in favor of others. This has, partially, more to do with how human eyes and the brain operates, but it is important consideration when comparing the two disciplines. Visual art and Music share so much territory, that it’s important to realize the nuances between the two.
You're so welcome! Might I ask where you and your students are located, so I can update my CV accordingly? (I like to keep track of where my videos are used as supplemental material.)
@@ClassicalNerd I am a secondary music school teacher (having completed a PhD in music composition at the University of Hull, UK) at the Music school of Rhodes, Greece. I do teach composition at my school to a couple of students (I am recommending your videos as well as Samuel's Andreyev' s and 12tone). I am also planning to show your videos (if that is OK) to my music History classes at the school using, subtitles (hope I get a good translation in Greek by Google translate). Once again thank you very much for the help. For us, that chose to live, compose and teach outside the big 'centers',your channel is valuable.
I am always delighted to hear of the international reach of my content. :) I hope Google Translate works well enough for you. One of my regrets about this channel is that it doesn't make nearly enough money for me to hire translators for subtitle work.
AWESOME CONTENT, LOVE LOVE LOVE. John Tilbury was my piano teacher at Goldsmiths College in London!!! I play all this contemporary music too....The first time I heard Feldman's music was when John Tilbury asked me to his concert at the BBC Studios in Maida Vale, after that I started playing Feldman's piano music, we also played the indeterminate Feldman compositions and I play Palais de Mari and also Triadic Memories which I've played in concerts. Actually Feldman and John hung out together and John would tell me lots of stories of their little escapdes in Europe together.
Great video! Love Feldmans music. One of my absolute favorites when I paint. And as a painter and 2D design teacher I just want to add that although a painting is fully present one does control the speed at which information reveals itself to the viewer by controlling the amount of contrast between elements. High contrast moves quick, low contrast moves slow. And then there is the technical narrative. In any case I understand why you are saying painting is without form but I promise there’s much more to it. Love this channel! Keep up the great work!
Bless you my son... I would ask that you do one on Luc Ferrari and Pierre Schaffer. Music Concrete's impact on what we take for granted in music can't be overstated. Lamont Young would be a great rep of Minimalism. I will say that what you're doing is so important. This was such an informative, yet grounded dissertation on Feldman. I grew up in the '90s and Morty was breaking big because of people like Bernhard Gunter, David Grubbs and Jim O'Rourke but this was before the web is what it is now- you had to be a detective if wanted to hear it. Explaing his music without pretense is the best way to disseminate it Thanks
You should do a Great Composers video on George Crumb. He has his share of cult fans and dissenters, and is less 'sentimental' than traditional composition. BUT he is an incredibly unique (and underrated) identity and writing style; experimenting with graphical notation and emphasizing timbre and texture over tonality, not to mention spirituality and symbolism poured in to nearly all of his works. It would be really cool if you could make a little 6 minute video on Crumb. He is one of my favorite composers and deserves a bit more exposure (despite being a Pulitzer Prize winner).
I, too, love the work of Crumb-but my policy has been to stay away from doing videos on living composers, because living composers' careers are not over and you can't do a proper retrospective. Sorry!
when i was little, my mother bought my coats from the feldman family factory outlet in woodside, n.y. though he was always kind, his appearance would frighten me.
Feldman and John were both 'grandteachers' of mine, and I did get to meet and work a bit with the wife of late Feldman, Barbara Monk Feldman (whose music also stunning, by the way)
Sort of late getting to this. I remember Feldman from my days at the University of Buffalo. One evening in Baird Hall (I think it was there) he performed a work for piano. I don't believe I liked it at the time, but all these decades later I still remember it, which is more than I can say for most other music I heard then.
Guston and Feldman ? Please do one of the important Asian composers(we have enough on Takemitsu ,Yun and Hokosawa stand out !) . Your approach here is enjoyable your knowledge of often cited Stefan Wolpe really impressive . You read letters and really know many of the composers who matter . This is your most entertaining video -I hope it reaches many . Feldman is important for us Americans ! I don't require entertainment but that is the ethos of our times . Anyway ,I love what you do . Can't imagine you have time to read commentary of complete strangers . Wolpe being a Marxist makes sense but did he really think his music could mean "anything " to non-musicians . Creative types rarely take he necessary time to understand art that is not their feild . Man in the street -Pollock didn't listen to Bartok , Wolpe or Webern and I've yet to meet a painter who thought seriously about music ! ! Love your anecdotes they give us so much about the background of the person as composer which is not the same as their music I'm coming to believe now after reading Feldman's Masterclass transcripts ! Vareses and eldman hit it off but he and Elliott Carter rarely did . Nice to know but what is meaningful may or may not matter in sound , unthrough composed music . Wolpe is so difficult to listen to . Hope I develop more ears for his stuff .
For anyone who's as dull as me as to look up which painting did he sell for 600.000 dollars: it's one of Rauschenberg's "black paintings": another of which he has sold to Earle Brown for almost double the price that Feldman paid, at 26 dollars.
Hi Classical Nerd another fantastic video! One of my favourites in fact. I am interested in the analysis of the Bass Clarinet and Percussion piece but you said the name so fast I couldn't quite catch it! Did you have a link that I could follow please? Yours most gratefully, Alex
Samuel Andreyev has some very in-depth piece analyses on his channel! The _Bass Clarinet and Percussion_ analysis is at ruclips.net/video/emeDjNSxsCs/видео.html
I've been enjoying your takes on some composers. (Listened recently to this, Zappa, Varese, Ravel.) Would love to hear one from you on Elliott Carter. (Maybe there is one, haven't looked.)
In ‘82 I bought a Feldman CD at New Music Distribution Service on Broadway. I had no idea who the composer was. It changed my life. I have listened to For Philip Gaston live. I love modern music - listened to Todd Dockstadter in high school. Bought the one and only record by United States of America. Viva Morty
Great video. Great RUclips channel. Great ''bioGRAPHy influenced their music (graphic grid)''-teacher. Keep going this nice approaches of musicians, Classical Nerd 👌👍✋
There was supposedly some sort of Stefan Wolpe Conference a number of years back at C. W. Post College LIU here on LI, I didn't know about it at the time, and was just getting more into Feldman then, so I doubt I would've known to attend, but I wish I had. Some of Christian Wolff's pieces are really intriguing, though I've only heard a handful so far. I did manage to get to, and review, Feldman's SQ II at Carnegie Hall around 2003 or so, performed by Flux Quartet. That was something else. I also caught a free memorial performance for Earle Brown at MoMA Queens LIC around 2002, which was ok. I'm much more into Feldman by far. I think mainly Feldman's earliest music (such as the material on the Barton Workshop box set Ecstasy of the Moment) was all building blocks to work towards his later, lengthy pieces, which really don't sound anything like his early works, for the most part, but some of those elements of pitch, timbre, and hypnotic, repetitive sounds are still there. People bitch about Feldman's late pieces being repetitious, but I believe he was aiming for a true hypnotic effect in most of the late pieces. And by hypnotic, I mean hypnotic on a grand level. Also, his later pieces like Piano and String Quartet, For John Cage or For Philip Guston, are anything but meant to be performed in any improvisational manner (as compared to even some of Cage's late works).
When will the video on Duke Ellington appear? I'm looking forward to it partly because he was born exactly 100 years ago before me. (on the 29th of April)
The Ellington video should be out on/around his birthday, actually! My typical production time has been primarily eaten by all the cool stuff that my gamelan has been up to, including prepping for a performance in Washington DC. Between that, my decision to invest the time/energy in deeper research for more substantive content, and my plan to alternate between requests and my own stuff, and production _has_ slowed ... but some _very_ cool things are in the works.
I have recently discovered this channel, and it’s very helpful! I do have a request tho, for composer. Since you’ve done Frank Zappa, can you do one on Stephen Sondheim by any chance?
I don't think we know enough about the Feldman-Marcus situation. Details on Shostakovich and Ustvolskaya are a little easier to come by and at no point when I was researching my earlier videos on either of them did I come across any intimations of impropriety (apart from the teacher-student dynamic, which-while unethical by our modern standards-was commonplace throughout most of Western music history). Further, Shostakovich admitted to being influenced by Ustvolskaya, which Feldman never did when it came to Marcus (although the extent of this influence hasn't been researched).
Edward Elgar, Anton Bruckner, Johann Strauss, William Walton, Akira Ifukube, George Gershwin, Duke Ellington, Vincent Persichetti, sooooooo many composers!!! Edit: Balakirev, Glinka, Mussorgsky, Rimsky-Korsakov, Oh my!
In an attempt to keep the extraordinary number of requests manageable, I can only take five requests from any given individual. Please consult lentovivace.com/classicalnerd.html to determine which of the twelve composers you listed you would like to officially request.
I had the opportunity for a oneon one interview with Feldman which was published in the LA Free press. I saw myself as part of the music avant garde so I approached it sympathetically. I have never heard a complete piece for Feldman. I think I saw his 'music' belonging more to concept art rather than music in any pure sense of the word. He presented himself as ne would imagine a hyper-opiniated New Yord Jew -- none of this intended as anyway pejorative even with frequent references of his emplyment in the 'habedashery' business. At the time I remember his appreciation and closeness with John cage.
This is cool! Never expect that Feldman was greatly influential at his time. Anyway, can I please request the following composers? Cyril Scott Samuel Barber Henryk Gorecki Matilde Capuis Dominick Argento FYI, you mistakenly wrote Radames Gnattalli twice on your list... Maybe you should check other names as well to make sure you didn't write the same name repeatedly :)
Unfortunately, I have capped the number of unique requests that individuals can submit at five, and you already have five pending requests. I didn't like having to institute such a policy, but the pool is so _inordinately_ large that I needed to find some way of slowing its unstoppable growth. The Gnattali requests have been merged. Since I can't possibly keep track of the whopping 296 (!) uniquely requested subjects, I always hit control-F when I'm editing the page to see if a request has already been submitted, but since the "é" in his name requires the use of an HTML special character, it didn't register.
about Bunita Marcus - Feldman was not someone 'she didn't really like'. They had a relationship for 10 years. Even now, Marcus does lectures on Felldman's music, and on his obsession with rugs...
After watching this, it seems like the later Olivier Messiaen had more in common with Morton Feldman than I might have guessed. I want to resent Morton Feldman for making music unrecognizable, and Messiaen for making music incomprehensible. I think of the strange moodiness of the old Ray Bradbury stories. Especially The Martian Chronicles. While the characterization was poor (almost to the point of wax-dummy caricaturisations of people), the stories has a ghostly effect. Even the made-for-TV series of The Martian Chronicles was not necessarily creepy, but somehow emotively existentialist. Haunting. Morton Feldman expresses and emotion so raw. Do and carnal, that one wonders how a snail or a dog might feel his own emotions. Suspended intellect. The cry of the soul. No wonder most people can’t handle Feldman. Or avoided him. Or maybe it’s just too long to listen to. Solution: incorporate extended yoga positions while listening to three-hour Morton Feldman pieces. And save the Bach for church.
My compliments! That is a well done-and-presented video about a composer that seem actually a bit underestimated nowdays. I am a cinema student in venice and I am looking to write something about Feldman for a commissione. I wish to contact you via e-mail to Ask a little about the souraces of info that you used, may I?
Thank you! My sources are all in the description. You can email if you have any questions, but this was done long enough ago that I'm not likely to be of that much help in re: the provenance of any particular bit of info.
That's kind of a silly argument. Beethoven's Symphonies and Schubert's pieces go on for a good while! Or most of them do. But Feldman was saying that because it was supposedly becoming a hoary contemporary classical cliche to do the 20 minute piece, at the time. At least Feldman proved later he could come up with mammoth, hours-long pieces and pull it off. Where, as he said, it's all about scale by then. The piece becomes a total, all-encompassing environment, if it's working for you, rather than merely a piece of music. SQII is the ne plus ultra of that type of large scale piece. I don't know what Feldman was talking about later when he told a friend he was composing "lots of melodies," in the early 80s or so, when, there are some melodies in his later music, but, they are subtle to an almost absurdist level. I mean, they aren't Bee Gees melodies. They have nothing to do with that type of "melody." His melodies were more like addictive, repetitive phrases that get under your skin after listening to the piece over and over again. They get into your brain and blood stream. Slowly. And quietly.
I did a video on Xenakis a while back, on my old, super-close-to-the-camera set [ ruclips.net/video/Suis4IfbAAE/видео.html ]. It's not _quite_ as in-depth as this video, but I still think it stands as a decent introduction to his musical background and philosophy.
50 min. on Feldman. If u ever do JS Bach 2.0 it just might take vid 1, 2..., each 1hr long. Could you do a trendy vid on the late-20th&early21stC "Golden Age" of Choral music? Choral societies are popular in UK & parts of US, Eric Whitacre is at least a mild rage, & a guy like Morten Lauridsen is described as something like the best American composer who hardly anyone has ever heard of.
Honestly, my (eventual) remake of Bach will probably be around the same length of time as this, or perhaps even less, because there already exists a lot of excellent Bach analysis and I'm not going to repeat the work others have done. I'd likely focus more on Bach as a figure in the wider scope-who influenced him, what his contemporaries thought of him, etc.
Morton Feldman [not Gould, if you will] reminds me of a mafia don. At least he looks like one. But, there the similarity ends. Morton composes the sort of music that suits him; if you don't like it, well then, that's your problem. It took me eons to develop an appreciation for his craftsmanship, his one-off technique, his idea of what we should be listening to. Anyway, I like Morton.
Hi Thomas, check out my tribute to the music of Morton Feldman: Memórias (Memoirs), there's a video wiht some parts of the score, and if you want to see the score, I can send you the pdf.
I truly enjoy your efforts to bring the life and art of composers to us in an entertaining manner. My suggestion would be to keep your lessons to about 30 minutes because you share so much with us in that amount of time. This video is 50 minutes and you started to lose me about minute 34. I know you have a lot to share with us but you may want to consider an intermission. Feldman had the same problem.
While I've considered splitting videos up into multiple installments (and did with Harry Partch), ultimately I feel like people can pause the video whenever they like, and come back later. I don't want to have to cut material because some subjects just need more time.
@@ClassicalNerd You'll be amused to know that I feel it inappropriate to leave the class (or freeze the class) while the professor is talking. But, your point is well taken.
@@ClassicalNerd It was, "They're more of a set of guidelines than an actual set of rules" love your videos btw, and can I recommend a very random but important book? Its called Capitalist Realism - it talks about the state of the world today from a wide, philosophical perspective and is without a doubt the most important book I have ever read.
Morton's music affected many composers after he was gone, me included. In his honor I composed a pavane for him you might enjoy. Unlike Mort's music, this is short. ruclips.net/video/oEGc5j5DPjk/видео.html
Moderate to severe death got me pretty good. Feldman represents the stereotypical emissary of the deconstructionist art movement that I abhor. If you want to highjack my attention for any amount of time from my finite lifespan it had better be something of skill and complexity that It adds value to my life. Leave the indefinite meditations in the trash. The wonder of life is not in the basal simplicity and inherit emptiness at it's core, it's the fact that anything structured, calculated, and beautiful can be created and exist at all.
CORRECTION: At around the 43:30 mark, I refer to February 2018 as being "last month" when it was really a year and a month ago, because I suppose I'm in denial about it truly being 2019.
That sin cannot be forgiven.
I must also correct:
indeterminancy has nothing to do with chance, that would be aleatoricism.
Staying true to Feldman, you really made an almost hour long documentary rather than a 20 minute video as "the world doesnt need another 20 minute contemporary [video]"
An absolute blessing
Right, totally right
you're gonna be a great professor somewhere someday
He is already one! Best lecturer there is.
here, now!
50 minutes? Yes, that's the only possible video size on Feldman, like a documentary. I'll even slow down the video to get closer to his music.
im so happy this channel exists
Great programme about Feldman. His music and art are one of the most original ones I've encountered with.
Samuel Adler once told me Feldman was one of the most profane people he knew and was capable of swearing a blue streak if in the right mood. I found that observation refreshing.
I love the contrast between his painfully delicate music and his wise guy, high-fiving personality.
Hahahah true
This is a great honor for me to have my name flashed onscreen during a Classical Nerd video!
Just found your channel, and this is great! Looking forward to watching more, thank you!
This is fascinating! I really enjoyed watching the video. I would like to add, as an artist and musician, looking at a painting by standing farther away does not do what you state in the video. You’re not looking at the entire work, you’re looking at the work from a specific point in space time. Form and scale work differently in visual art than how you’ve described it.
When you’re looking at a painting further back, unless you’ve consciously chosen to de-focus your eyes, you are still moving over the surface of the painting, focusing on particular aspects of the work in favor of others.
This has, partially, more to do with how human eyes and the brain operates, but it is important consideration when comparing the two disciplines. Visual art and Music share so much territory, that it’s important to realize the nuances between the two.
Thank you so much Classical Nerd, you are way cool !😁
I super love this! My composition class during my Bachelor study should have this kind of vibe. Thank you so much ❤
Thomas this is awesome!!
Your videos are precious for us and our students. Thank you so much!
You're so welcome! Might I ask where you and your students are located, so I can update my CV accordingly? (I like to keep track of where my videos are used as supplemental material.)
@@ClassicalNerd I am a secondary music school teacher (having completed a PhD in music composition at the University of Hull, UK) at the Music school of Rhodes, Greece. I do teach composition at my school to a couple of students (I am recommending your videos as well as Samuel's Andreyev' s and 12tone). I am also planning to show your videos (if that is OK) to my music History classes at the school using, subtitles (hope I get a good translation in Greek by Google translate). Once again thank you very much for the help. For us, that chose to live, compose and teach outside the big 'centers',your channel is valuable.
I am always delighted to hear of the international reach of my content. :) I hope Google Translate works well enough for you. One of my regrets about this channel is that it doesn't make nearly enough money for me to hire translators for subtitle work.
AWESOME CONTENT, LOVE LOVE LOVE. John Tilbury was my piano teacher at Goldsmiths College in London!!! I play all this contemporary music too....The first time I heard Feldman's music was when John Tilbury asked me to his concert at the BBC Studios in Maida Vale, after that I started playing Feldman's piano music, we also played the indeterminate Feldman compositions and I play Palais de Mari and also Triadic Memories which I've played in concerts. Actually Feldman and John hung out together and John would tell me lots of stories of their little escapdes in Europe together.
Great job ! I'd like to watch a video like this on Harry Partch, Conlon Nancarrow and Captain Beefheart.
Duly noted: lentovivace.com/classicalnerd.html
Many thank for this, just discovering Feldman music now, very interesting to know the background
Great video! Love Feldmans music. One of my absolute favorites when I paint. And as a painter and 2D design teacher I just want to add that although a painting is fully present one does control the speed at which information reveals itself to the viewer by controlling the amount of contrast between elements. High contrast moves quick, low contrast moves slow. And then there is the technical narrative. In any case I understand why you are saying painting is without form but I promise there’s much more to it. Love this channel! Keep up the great work!
Bless you my son...
I would ask that you do one on Luc Ferrari and Pierre Schaffer.
Music Concrete's impact on what we take for granted in music can't be overstated.
Lamont Young would be a great rep of Minimalism.
I will say that what you're doing is so important. This was such an informative, yet grounded dissertation on Feldman.
I grew up in the '90s and Morty was breaking big because of people like Bernhard Gunter, David Grubbs and Jim O'Rourke but this was before the web is what it is now-
you had to be a detective if wanted to hear it.
Explaing his music without pretense is the best way to disseminate it
Thanks
Duly noted: lentovivace.com/classicalnerd.html
Really great video about my personal hero Morton Feldman!
Wow, this was brilliant! Many thanks!
You should do a Great Composers video on George Crumb.
He has his share of cult fans and dissenters, and is less 'sentimental' than traditional composition. BUT he is an incredibly unique (and underrated) identity and writing style; experimenting with graphical notation and emphasizing timbre and texture over tonality, not to mention spirituality and symbolism poured in to nearly all of his works.
It would be really cool if you could make a little 6 minute video on Crumb. He is one of my favorite composers and deserves a bit more exposure (despite being a Pulitzer Prize winner).
I, too, love the work of Crumb-but my policy has been to stay away from doing videos on living composers, because living composers' careers are not over and you can't do a proper retrospective. Sorry!
@@ClassicalNerd he died recently… 😢
Speaking of Pierre Boulez, an episode on him would be great! Also, Gershwin... or anyone really your videos are just great in general!
Duly noted: lentovivace.com/classicalnerd.html
How about Frederick Delius? My primary school's named after him, yet barely gets a mention.
when i was little, my mother bought my coats from the feldman family factory outlet in woodside, n.y. though he was always kind, his appearance would frighten me.
This is absolutely fantastic, thanks.
Awesome as always !!
Wonderful video, Classical Nerd!
"…and moderate to severe death." That is a well placed quip. Starting off with a bang, and good god damn, is it ever memorable!
thank you very much for these really very interesting explanations
Best vid so far in the 21rstc.Thanks-I luv Feldman
Love your charisma
Feldman and John were both 'grandteachers' of mine, and I did get to meet and work a bit with the wife of late Feldman, Barbara Monk Feldman (whose music also stunning, by the way)
Sort of late getting to this. I remember Feldman from my days at the University of Buffalo. One evening in Baird Hall (I think it was there) he performed a work for piano. I don't believe I liked it at the time, but all these decades later I still remember it, which is more than I can say for most other music I heard then.
If it's the recital hall in Baird itself (on the second floor, as opposed to Slee), that is the room in which I currently TA!
@@ClassicalNerd Great heavens! In that I never heard of Slee, it must be the same place. But every one I knew must be gone by now.
Guston and Feldman ? Please do one of the important Asian composers(we have enough on Takemitsu ,Yun and Hokosawa stand out !) . Your approach here is enjoyable your knowledge of often cited Stefan Wolpe really impressive . You read letters and really know many of the composers who matter . This is your most entertaining video -I hope it reaches many . Feldman is important for us Americans ! I don't require entertainment but that is the ethos of our times . Anyway ,I love what you do . Can't imagine you have time to read commentary of complete strangers . Wolpe being a Marxist makes sense but did he really think his music could mean "anything " to non-musicians . Creative types rarely take he necessary time to understand art that is not their feild . Man in the street -Pollock didn't listen to Bartok , Wolpe or Webern and I've yet to meet a painter who thought seriously about music ! ! Love your anecdotes they give us so much about the background of the person as composer which is not the same as their music I'm coming to believe now after reading Feldman's Masterclass transcripts ! Vareses and eldman hit it off but he and Elliott Carter rarely did . Nice to know but what is meaningful may or may not matter in sound , unthrough composed music . Wolpe is so difficult to listen to . Hope I develop more ears for his stuff .
Where did u read Feldman Masterclass Transcripts?
Adam Neely & Samuel Andreyev need to cosign you
Fantastic work. Thank you
While Morton Feldman wouldn’t see it this way, His songs and overall view on music works very well in the concept of Harmolodics
feldman's early compositions are not 'graphic notations', though they are noted on graph paper.
Love it!
this really looks like the very best video of this guy ^^ how inspired~
For anyone who's as dull as me as to look up which painting did he sell for 600.000 dollars: it's one of Rauschenberg's "black paintings": another of which he has sold to Earle Brown for almost double the price that Feldman paid, at 26 dollars.
Good intro. Made my day!
"Coptic Light" is one of my favorites among all of Feldman's works.
Hi Classical Nerd another fantastic video! One of my favourites in fact. I am interested in the analysis of the Bass Clarinet and Percussion piece but you said the name so fast I couldn't quite catch it! Did you have a link that I could follow please? Yours most gratefully, Alex
Samuel Andreyev has some very in-depth piece analyses on his channel! The _Bass Clarinet and Percussion_ analysis is at ruclips.net/video/emeDjNSxsCs/видео.html
Thank you!
Love the flutophone in the background. Used it in my work The Zippy Opera, which John Cage attended at Boston University.
Thanks for this.
I think I am ready for Feldman!
YOU are a delight. Subbed.
I loved this video.
Excellent!
I've been enjoying your takes on some composers. (Listened recently to this, Zappa, Varese, Ravel.) Would love to hear one from you on Elliott Carter. (Maybe there is one, haven't looked.)
Carter has been bumped in the request pool at lentovivace.com/classicalnerd.html.
Simply adore him!
24:50 so essentially Feldman pieces are like Chomsky talks
In ‘82 I bought a Feldman CD at New Music Distribution Service on Broadway. I had no idea who the composer was. It changed my life. I have listened to For Philip Gaston live. I love modern music - listened to Todd Dockstadter in high school. Bought the one and only record by United States of America. Viva Morty
Great video!
Great video. Great RUclips channel. Great ''bioGRAPHy influenced their music (graphic grid)''-teacher.
Keep going this nice approaches of musicians, Classical Nerd 👌👍✋
please do a separate video on Stefan Wolpe
Duly noted: lentovivace.com/classicalnerd.html
Superb video
Thank you...
There was supposedly some sort of Stefan Wolpe Conference a number of years back at C. W. Post College LIU here on LI, I didn't know about it at the time, and was just getting more into Feldman
then, so I doubt I would've known to attend, but I wish I had. Some of Christian Wolff's pieces are really intriguing, though I've only heard a handful so far. I did manage to get to, and review,
Feldman's SQ II at Carnegie Hall around 2003 or so, performed by Flux Quartet. That was something else. I also caught a free memorial performance for Earle Brown at MoMA Queens LIC
around 2002, which was ok. I'm much more into Feldman by far. I think mainly Feldman's earliest music (such as the material on the Barton Workshop box set Ecstasy of the Moment) was all building blocks to work towards his later, lengthy pieces, which really don't sound anything like his early works, for the most part, but some of those elements of pitch, timbre, and hypnotic, repetitive sounds are still there. People bitch about Feldman's late pieces being repetitious, but I believe he was aiming for a true hypnotic effect in most of the late pieces. And by hypnotic, I mean hypnotic on a grand level. Also, his later pieces like Piano and String Quartet, For John Cage or For Philip Guston, are anything but meant to be performed in any improvisational manner (as compared to even some of Cage's late works).
Could you do a video on Alexander Borodin? Because that would be epic.
Duly noted: lentovivace.com/classicalnerd.html
OMG this was absolutely brilliant! :D
Great!!!
Feldman had a slavic soul. moments in rothko chapel remind me of something from Shostakovich's 15th symphony.
When will the video on Duke Ellington appear? I'm looking forward to it partly because he was born exactly 100 years ago before me. (on the 29th of April)
The Ellington video should be out on/around his birthday, actually! My typical production time has been primarily eaten by all the cool stuff that my gamelan has been up to, including prepping for a performance in Washington DC. Between that, my decision to invest the time/energy in deeper research for more substantive content, and my plan to alternate between requests and my own stuff, and production _has_ slowed ... but some _very_ cool things are in the works.
I have recently discovered this channel, and it’s very helpful! I do have a request tho, for composer. Since you’ve done Frank Zappa, can you do one on Stephen Sondheim by any chance?
I don't cover living composers because one cannot do a substantive retrospective on an incomplete career. Sorry!
Classical Nerd ohh got it! Thanks anyway for helpful videos!
Do you think the dynamic of Feldman and Marcus (pardon the mispelling) is like that of Shostakovich and Galina Ustvolskaya?
I don't think we know enough about the Feldman-Marcus situation. Details on Shostakovich and Ustvolskaya are a little easier to come by and at no point when I was researching my earlier videos on either of them did I come across any intimations of impropriety (apart from the teacher-student dynamic, which-while unethical by our modern standards-was commonplace throughout most of Western music history). Further, Shostakovich admitted to being influenced by Ustvolskaya, which Feldman never did when it came to Marcus (although the extent of this influence hasn't been researched).
Please make a video about the composers Pēteris Vasks
, Arvo Pärt
, Eugène Ysaÿe
.
I don't cover living composers because their careers are ongoing, but Ysaÿe has been bumped in the request pool: lentovivace.com/classicalnerd.html
I understand.
Thank's!
Edward Elgar, Anton Bruckner, Johann Strauss, William Walton, Akira Ifukube, George Gershwin, Duke Ellington, Vincent Persichetti, sooooooo many composers!!!
Edit: Balakirev, Glinka, Mussorgsky, Rimsky-Korsakov, Oh my!
In an attempt to keep the extraordinary number of requests manageable, I can only take five requests from any given individual. Please consult lentovivace.com/classicalnerd.html to determine which of the twelve composers you listed you would like to officially request.
I had the opportunity for a oneon one interview with Feldman which was published in the LA Free press. I saw myself as part of the music avant garde so I approached it sympathetically. I have never heard a complete piece for Feldman. I think I saw his 'music' belonging more to concept art rather than music in any pure sense of the word. He presented himself as ne would imagine a hyper-opiniated New Yord Jew -- none of this intended as anyway pejorative even with frequent references of his emplyment in the 'habedashery' business. At the time I remember his appreciation and closeness with John cage.
When is your Duke Ellington piece?
I plan to have it done by his birthday.
This is cool! Never expect that Feldman was greatly influential at his time. Anyway, can I please request the following composers?
Cyril Scott
Samuel Barber
Henryk Gorecki
Matilde Capuis
Dominick Argento
FYI, you mistakenly wrote Radames Gnattalli twice on your list... Maybe you should check other names as well to make sure you didn't write the same name repeatedly :)
Unfortunately, I have capped the number of unique requests that individuals can submit at five, and you already have five pending requests. I didn't like having to institute such a policy, but the pool is so _inordinately_ large that I needed to find some way of slowing its unstoppable growth.
The Gnattali requests have been merged. Since I can't possibly keep track of the whopping 296 (!) uniquely requested subjects, I always hit control-F when I'm editing the page to see if a request has already been submitted, but since the "é" in his name requires the use of an HTML special character, it didn't register.
The Feldman impression 🤣
about Bunita Marcus - Feldman was not someone 'she didn't really like'. They had a relationship for 10 years. Even now, Marcus does lectures on Felldman's music, and on his obsession with rugs...
After watching this, it seems like the later Olivier Messiaen had more in common with Morton Feldman than I might have guessed. I want to resent Morton Feldman for making music unrecognizable, and Messiaen for making music incomprehensible. I think of the strange moodiness of the old Ray Bradbury stories. Especially The Martian Chronicles. While the characterization was poor (almost to the point of wax-dummy caricaturisations of people), the stories has a ghostly effect. Even the made-for-TV series of The Martian Chronicles was not necessarily creepy, but somehow emotively existentialist. Haunting. Morton Feldman expresses and emotion so raw. Do and carnal, that one wonders how a snail or a dog might feel his own emotions. Suspended intellect. The cry of the soul. No wonder most people can’t handle Feldman. Or avoided him. Or maybe it’s just too long to listen to. Solution: incorporate extended yoga positions while listening to three-hour Morton Feldman pieces. And save the Bach for church.
My compliments! That is a well done-and-presented video about a composer that seem actually a bit underestimated nowdays. I am a cinema student in venice and I am looking to write something about Feldman for a commissione. I wish to contact you via e-mail to Ask a little about the souraces of info that you used, may I?
Thank you! My sources are all in the description. You can email if you have any questions, but this was done long enough ago that I'm not likely to be of that much help in re: the provenance of any particular bit of info.
The exchanges with Morty are gold
TY
Some good stuff in there.
That's kind of a silly argument. Beethoven's Symphonies and Schubert's pieces go on for a good while! Or most of them do. But Feldman was saying that because it was supposedly becoming
a hoary contemporary classical cliche to do the 20 minute piece, at the time. At least Feldman proved later he could come up with mammoth, hours-long pieces and pull it off. Where, as he said,
it's all about scale by then. The piece becomes a total, all-encompassing environment, if it's working for you, rather than merely a piece of music. SQII is the ne plus ultra of that type of large scale piece. I don't know what Feldman was talking about later when he told a friend he was composing "lots of melodies," in the early 80s or so, when, there are some melodies in his later music,
but, they are subtle to an almost absurdist level. I mean, they aren't Bee Gees melodies. They have nothing to do with that type of "melody." His melodies were more like addictive, repetitive
phrases that get under your skin after listening to the piece over and over again. They get into your brain and blood stream. Slowly. And quietly.
gotta love the Becca Stevens record in the back
They're both signed, too!
A vid on Iannis Xenakis would be sick!
I did a video on Xenakis a while back, on my old, super-close-to-the-camera set [ ruclips.net/video/Suis4IfbAAE/видео.html ]. It's not _quite_ as in-depth as this video, but I still think it stands as a decent introduction to his musical background and philosophy.
Great Video!!! If I can make a request on a composer that I like! I would like Richard Wetz!
Actually can I make the same request? I would like to see that as well!
Lots of love for Wetz recently! I added him to the request pool not long back and now he's almost at the top.
Eliot Carter looked like jimminy cricket
I would like to add +1 for Alan Hovhaness, please and thank you.
Duly noted: lentovivace.com/classicalnerd.html
ruclips.net/video/GKWiuk7i4Ow/видео.html
50 min. on Feldman. If u ever do JS Bach 2.0 it just might take vid 1, 2..., each 1hr long. Could you do a trendy vid on the late-20th&early21stC "Golden Age" of Choral music? Choral societies are popular in UK & parts of US, Eric Whitacre is at least a mild rage, & a guy like Morten Lauridsen is described as something like the best American composer who hardly anyone has ever heard of.
Honestly, my (eventual) remake of Bach will probably be around the same length of time as this, or perhaps even less, because there already exists a lot of excellent Bach analysis and I'm not going to repeat the work others have done. I'd likely focus more on Bach as a figure in the wider scope-who influenced him, what his contemporaries thought of him, etc.
Morton Feldman [not Gould, if you will] reminds me of a mafia don. At least he looks like one. But, there the similarity ends. Morton composes the sort of music that suits him; if you don't like it, well then, that's your problem. It took me eons to develop an appreciation for his craftsmanship, his one-off technique, his idea of what we should be listening to. Anyway, I like Morton.
43:58 Tell that to Messiaen
Explain
Look it up.
My favorite Feldman piece: Madame Press Died Last Week At Ninety
Great one, and I Met Heine on the Rue Furstenberg is also a great unsung Feldman piece. And Viola in My Life 1-III!
Hi Thomas, check out my tribute to the music of Morton Feldman: Memórias (Memoirs), there's a video wiht some parts of the score, and if you want to see the score, I can send you the pdf.
Oh, and the duration can be at least 14 (or 15) minutes, and at most, any duration over a few hours.
I truly enjoy your efforts to bring the life and art of composers to us in an entertaining manner. My suggestion would be to keep your lessons to about 30 minutes because you share so much with us in that amount of time. This video is 50 minutes and you started to lose me about minute 34. I know you have a lot to share with us but you may want to consider an intermission. Feldman had the same problem.
While I've considered splitting videos up into multiple installments (and did with Harry Partch), ultimately I feel like people can pause the video whenever they like, and come back later. I don't want to have to cut material because some subjects just need more time.
@@ClassicalNerd You'll be amused to know that I feel it inappropriate to leave the class (or freeze the class) while the professor is talking. But, your point is well taken.
Can you do Elliott Carter or Milton Babbitt? Or Penderecki?
Duly noted: lentovivace.com/classicalnerd.html
I came here from Tantacrul equating Feldman to confusing randomness in design
Did I spot an extremely subtle pirates of the Caribbean reference
I wouldn't put it past me, but I don't remember every throwaway line in this video.
@@ClassicalNerd It was, "They're more of a set of guidelines than an actual set of rules"
love your videos btw, and can I recommend a very random but important book? Its called Capitalist Realism - it talks about the state of the world today from a wide, philosophical perspective and is without a doubt the most important book I have ever read.
God your german here is soo much better and more natural than in your Bach video!!
Morton's music affected many composers after he was gone, me included. In his honor I composed a pavane for him you might enjoy. Unlike Mort's music, this is short. ruclips.net/video/oEGc5j5DPjk/видео.html
Moderate to severe death got me pretty good. Feldman represents the stereotypical emissary of the deconstructionist art movement that I abhor. If you want to highjack my attention for any amount of time from my finite lifespan it had better be something of skill and complexity that It adds value to my life. Leave the indefinite meditations in the trash. The wonder of life is not in the basal simplicity and inherit emptiness at it's core, it's the fact that anything structured, calculated, and beautiful can be created and exist at all.
Glockenspiele
Why are you assuming we only know 1 indeterminacy composer?
... I don't?
@@ClassicalNerd That's just the impression I got from a comment in the video you made.