Comments on: Amy Winehouse and Nassim Taleb

by: Consuming good art decreases your overall art consumption « N=1

Fri, 10 Jul 2009 21:20:14 +0000

[…] July 10, 2009 by jason After reading a lot of Charles Bukowski’s writing, I’ve lost interest in reading a lot of other authors. They just don’t seem good enough anymore. This reminds me of something that Seth Roberts wrote about: Before last night I had heard of Amy Winehouse and I had heard Rehab, but hadn’t put the two together. Her Grammy performance blew me away. I watched a bunch of YouTubes of her. Back at the Grammys, I listened to an orchestra play Rhapsody in Blue. I used to like it; now it sounded awful. I listened to a few more group performances; they too sounded bad. Just as The Joy of Sake had made me no longer enjoy cheap sake, listening to a lot of Amy Winehouse had made me no longer enjoy “average” music — music where several individual performances are combined. […]

by: beta Levinson

Sat, 16 Feb 2008 01:16:53 +0000

Here’s an experiment: You can compare an orchestral version of Beethoven’s symphonies with Liszt’s arrangements of them for solo piano. See, for example:

http://www.musicweb-international.com/classrev/2004/Jan04/Beethoven_Katsaris.htm

by: Tony

Wed, 13 Feb 2008 22:46:49 +0000

Seth, thanks for the link. Interesting.

by: Pearl

Wed, 13 Feb 2008 16:16:10 +0000

I’m with Tony. Listening to Amy Winehouse for the first time makes everything ELSE sound better. Especially centuries of classical music.

Listen to Jaqueline Du Pre playing Elgar here: http://youtube.com/watch?v=L5C99JyP2ns

She was a rock star and a classical musican. Incredible.

by: Norcross

Wed, 13 Feb 2008 15:49:07 +0000

Agreed. I’ve basically stopped listening to commercial “over the air” radio, since 99% of what they play just isn’t good music. It’s crap. While it pens me as a music snob, it also means I don’t have to subject myself to inferior music.

by: seth

Wed, 13 Feb 2008 14:55:04 +0000

Tony, after reading this article

http://www.artsjournal.com/artswatch/aw-deathofclassical.htm

I agree with you, it’s not obvious that classical music is dying. I was thinking of the current situation vs 100 years ago when classical music was a much larger fraction of all music. I forget which composer was the first rock star.

by: Tony

Wed, 13 Feb 2008 12:33:39 +0000

“Orchestras are Mediocristan, I realized; individual singers are Extremistan. In art, emotional impact is everything. Extremistan allows really big impact; Mediocristan does not. Maybe this is why classical music is dying.”

This is the opposite for me. After developing my ear to better understand classical music, most of the pop I grew up on seemed like a distance echo of really emotional music. Second, to equate “classical” music with orchestral music seems puzzling.

There is probably more classical music being produced now than at any time before, and classical music has spread to large parts of Asia. I’d be interested in data which suggest that classical music is dying, though.

by: Danny

Wed, 13 Feb 2008 12:18:22 +0000

You’re absolutely right. It’s always bothered me that that egotistical composer only had the same impact as the 5th chair, first seat second violin. And when it’s a piece for solo piano? Each of the 88 notes can’t stand above any of the others. Those damn classical musicians may as well be communists, but that’s why they’re all dying, so it’ll be all good soon enough anyway.

by: Tim Lundeen

Wed, 13 Feb 2008 00:51:06 +0000

Great post!

I normally listen to popular music and like Amy Winehouse a lot, but recently found a classical piece that I love, Dvorak’s Stabat Mater by Shaw (http://www.amazon.com/Dvorak-Stabat-Goerke-Simpson-Atlanta/dp/B00001QGKI/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1202863660&sr=8-1). Extrimistan for the orchestra and chorus. (Not really fair, because there are a lot of solos, but see what you think.)

by: mike kenny

Tue, 12 Feb 2008 23:11:48 +0000

this post makes me think of the auteur theory of film. it seems like auteur films are better than the average film. one guy has a strong vision that is followed, versus a film made by a lot of collaboration by many–writers, director, actors. maybe this is the difference between extremistan and mediocristan. of course, there are good non-auteur films!