Classical music
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“I broke a G string while I was fingering A minor.”
~ Johannes Brahms on the Romantic era
“I said C minor.”
~ Oscar Wilde on classical music as he throws a trumpet at Bach
“My music is music about music.”
~ Beethoven on classical music
“Seriously, I don't see what your problem is?! Classical music is hard? I picked up a violin aged eight and played a Handel violin concerto on it! And I had never played a violin before! ”
~ Chopin on learning classical music
“Uh, like, classical music is, like, the easiest thing in the, you know, world. I still sort of believe that I should have, like, wrote more pieces, and stuff, in like C minor.”
~ Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart on classical music
Classical music is music that conforms to the classical unities of action, place, and time. It is a common stereotype that only old people, villains in action movies, and flaming homosexuals listen to classical music.
Classical music is often called "gay" because of the large number of effeminate, long-haired male composers. Actually there haven't been many of them, but perception is reality.
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[edit] History
The beginnings of classical music were called the Medieval, Renaissance, and Baroque eras. Most of the music back then was performed for an audience of one, namely God. This type of music (the little that has survived) is now usually loved by progressive rockers and Gothic pseudo-intellectuals.
The next important period was the Classical era, which is where classical music gets its name from. This ran from 1700 to 1830, during which time all European music imitated classical Greek culture, in mathematically rich pure sounds. Then came the Romantic era, from 1830, still in its dying throes. Although it began to peter out in about 1910, some composers still dribble out occasional Romantic music. This era produced music for candlelit dinners for two, suitable for expressing your innermost soul whether your partner wants you to or not. All of the gay composers came from this latter period.
The development of western classical music has been evolutionary, constantly building on the technical triumphs of the past. It has improved consistently through the work of such major figures as Johann Sebastian Bach, Mozart, and Beethoven (da-da-da dum), each work being an improvement over previous compositions, until the final apotheosis demonstrated by film music such as that written for Star Wars (daaaaa da, da-da-da-daaaaa da, da-da-da-daaaaaa da, da-da-da-dum).
During the 20th century classical music saw many new innovations. Atonal music was invented, which is usually some popular classical piece played slowly, upside-down, and in roughly reverse-alphabetical order (wnp ɐp-ɐp-ɐp), and then they invented aleatory (random) classical music (mum-ad ad-mu madum add-u).
[edit] Target Audience
The target audience of classical music (especially the old stuff) is masochists who strive to higher and higher pedestals of self-flagellation. You know the type: people who know about obscure composers, or who are doing a post-grad in composition; people who willingly submit to atonal, modernist compositions by former film composers.
[edit] How do you know someone is faking their love of classical music?
You can tell they're bluffing when they say they love Mozart, Beethoven, and Chopin. Tell them you are into Haydn, Field, and Brahms, and ask them what made them give up rock music.
You can tell they're bluffing when they name Handel, Palestrina, and Bach. Really, they just enjoy Pig Latin and Old High German lyrics. Just mention choirboys, and hint at closet homosexuality.
You know they're bluffing when they say they love Tchaikovsky, Wagner, and Ligeti. They don't really like classical music, they just enjoy the dark images associated with esoteric underground films. Tell them you are into Scriabin, Messiaen, and Shostakovitch, and ask them why they switched from industrial music to classical.
[edit] The classical unities
[edit] Unity of action
Musicians performing in an ensemble all concentrate together on the same things, with one end in view: the perfect cadence. To help them focus, they often engage a conductor, who also collects the fares and checks the tickets of the audience.
[edit] Unity of place
A piece of classical music is always played in one place. There are a few pieces of modern music that break this unity (for example Stockhausen's helicopter quartet), but the only legitimate reason for placing an orchestra on a train has been to demonstrate the Doppler effect, or to locate them in the conductor's natural environment.
[edit] Unity of time
A piece of classical music is usually played all at once. Pieces of music which are long enough to require intervals in their performance (for example, opera) are not deemed classical, but form part of the wider genre of soap opera.
The most famous piece of music to be presented in installments was Richard Wagner's unicycle The Ring of the Nibelung, and this is now considered to be the greatest composition incorporating Leitmotivs (a Leitmotiv is a piece of music primarily intended to be a cell phone ring-tone).
[edit] Did you know that?
- Rap is the technical term for really modern classical music?
- Wagner is loved by metalheads?
- Wagner loved metalheads?
- Modern classical musicians are subject to random urine tests, to ensure that they are not using banned performance-enhancing drugs?
