Boosters, Reporters, and Critics
John GibbonsIt occurs to me that in my fairly frequent excoriation of the musical “critical” fraternity, I’ve been grossly unfair; I’ve been expecting oranges from an apple tree. It may be a devolution, indeed, that so-called classical music is served in the papers by reporters and boosters rather than by critics, but because authentic criticism is so rarely, and in any case only tangentially engaged in by the scrivening class, I need to revise my expectations.
“Only the facts, Ma’am”… that’s where we are. But I question the notion that a concert is essentially an “event”. You can go online and find the pertinent schedules and performers for just about any musical organization in a jiffy. And we know that Daniel Barenboim or Martha Argerich or Maurizio Pollini aren’t going to crumple into a fetal position on stage and protest that they’ve forgotten how to play. Now that would be newsworthy! That scenario does, however, figure in a musician’s dreams (about once every couple of months I myself experience the old-hat nightmare that I go on stage to play a concert and have totally forgotten what notes to play).
So, if conventional reportage of musical events is not really necessary, perhaps the role the “critic” ought to play is that of booster. Lord knows it’s a difficult world out there for musicians and musical organizations trying to make a living. And show some civic pride, you! Our orchestra is the bestest in the whole wide world!
This is parochial and condescending. Sort of like the recent Youtube presidential debates.
We know the people and institutions the reporter and booster serve. But whom does the critic serve? To whom does the critic owe something? Naturally, to his readers and only his readers. He owes nothing except fairness and reasonable good will to anybody else. A critic should be a philosophical presence, which necessitates subjectivity. And a critic better know how to read a score. I regret to say that I’m pretty sure a plurality of critics are lacking in this respect. And because a critic uses the medium of words, he should have some literary flair. You know, I don’t think I’ve read a joke or humorous metaphor or allusion from any music critic in years. And it’s too bad. Look at the writings of great critics like G.B. Shaw, Romain Rolland, or Robert Schumann. Puns, allusions, metaphors, and whimsy of all sorts characterize their writings.
Here is a passage about program notes, but equally applicable to music reporters, from the internet commentator Ivan Katz: “It is not merely that I object to being treated like an idiot. I object to the patronizing tone of these annotations. I object to the general lack of research that such notes usually display, and I object to the steadfast refusal of the annotator to say anything even remotely “controversial” let alone “unflattering”…perhaps it is thought that jargon and high sounding mumbo-jumbo will impress the readers. It doesn’t. It merely bores those who it does not insult, and it helps no one.” Blunt words, maybe, but there is some justice to them. Music criticism can be a noble, and in my view, should be an essential, part of a genuinely musical culture; I only wish we had critics, and not mere reporters or boosters. In addition to Shaw and Schumann, I recommend the relevant essays in Schoenberg’s “Style and Idea” and the first volume of the newly released complete writings of Aldous Huxley. A wonderful collection of musical criticism is to be had in Paul Rosenfeld’s “Discoveries of a Music Critc”. Here is a sample from the latter book, concerning Richard Strauss’s Elektra (1908) and its character as a sort of harbinger of WW1:
“These deadly forces are not the inhabitants exclusively of opera houses or of the private worlds of two artists. [Strauss and his librettist, Hoffmansthal] They are the essences which actualized themselves in the World War. This, before us, already is the World War, the machine guns, the TNT, the mass murder. This is its crater. Red and black, the stage with its plethora of shrieks, screams, groans, and the sounds of dragged bodies and laboring whips, epitomizes a period, the one immediately preceding the inception ot the catastrophe, around 1907, permitting us to revisit it in thorough awareness. It is an overloaded, hysterical one, immense in technical prowess, but luxurious, crass, fat, materialistic, satiated, incapable of sublimation, stewing with explosives that wear the steel caps of projectiles. ..and, crater of this crater of the festering energies of the civilized man craving release in deadly expansion, we recognize, alas, the home…”
Beautifully extravagant, eminently disputable, splendidly literary, this is the sort of thing I’d like to see today. But of course, what we’re stuck with is “Ms. Lehman showed total command of her taxing part, and even when the orchestra was at it biggest fortes, could be heard with ease. The orchestra acquitted its role with considerable aplomb,” etc. etc.
Reader Comments (7)
To my taste, the Rosenfeld paragraph is grossly overwritten as to content, incoherent in its imagery ("stewing with explosives"), and undistinguished in style. Andrew Porter wrote rings around Rosenfeld and did it weekly in the New Yorker; Alex Ross does likewise though the New Yorker's coverage of classical music is sadly reduced.
Of course they've written for weekly or monthly magazines. Those who write about classical music performances in the daily papers may sometimes qualify as critics, but they aren't given the time or space to write real criticism, only brief reviews. These may be useful as consumer reports or, if the reviewer is so minded, they may serve a modest educational purpose. (Reviews and program notes may be the only classical music writing most people ever read.) To expect or demand more substance than this is unrealistic and possibly unfair, like dissing a fast food joint for not serving up haute cuisine.
Thank you for your comment. Obviously I disagree. My first paragraph, by the way, acknowleges the limitations inherent in current newspaper coverage. I like Rosenfeld's hyperbolic style, but the fact that you, for instance, do not, is part of my point. Good or bad, Rosenfeld has his own way of writing. Yeah, Porter and Ross are fine writers. As for the limited space accorded classical music in the papers, it's just a matter of who you want to blame. I don't diss fast food for not being haute cuisine, I diss it for being fast food. I don't diss newspaper coverage for not being more substantial, I diss it for being meaningless!
Oh, and one more thing, JF! Looking again at the Rosenfeld quote, I surely understand your distaste for his "style"...I bet most of my readers agree with you, and not with me...but your distaste may very well reflect a late twentieth century point of view; Rosenfeld's book was publ. in 1936, and the Elektra piece was clearly written considerably earlier. Also, I intentionally chose the most bombastic passage I could find in his book in order to contrast it sufficiently with the polite "criticalese" in use today. I do think daily newspaper criticism in the papers is just about kaputt.
Happy to continue this conversation if you like.
My preferences in criticism are not bound by any "late twentieth century point of view." I read Shaw, Hanslick, Debussy, Berlioz, Schumann, and others with pleasure and often learn from them--not because many of them happen to be composers (I'm less impressed with Thomson than many are) but because they write well and I'm interested in what they have to say. Rosenfeld, not to beat that dead and forgotten horse more than need be, strikes me as pumped up and pretentious beyond the actual substance of what he's saying; writers who strain that hard to impress, seldom impress me.
It's notable that my top 10 or top x music reviewers or critics wrote their best weekly or monthly, not daily. Some have also written for the daily papers (Porter and Ross among them, and Crutchfield too), one needs to earn one's living, but moved on when they could.
The record review mags, also monthly or bimonthly, also used to provide good reading; the Gramophone once featured Deryck Cooke and John Steane, the late lamented High Fidelity gave plenty of space to David Hamilton.
So I repeat: if you're looking for good music writing in the general press, as distinct from scholarly journals and monographs, it's seldom been found in the daily papers, but I can still find it, sometimes, in the weeklies and monthlies.
And, I repeat, the daily reviews do serve a purpose, and that's why we all read them--don't we? If the papers stopped printing classical music reviews, as some recently looked like doing, it would be a scandal. If this amounts to saying these reviews are better than nothing, that's a strong endorsement when it seems we might actually be reduced to nothing.
You know this topic better than I do, JF...that's clear. My view of newspaper coverage is utopian; there are so many degradations in the daily press, that singling out the classical music coverage is a little bit quixotic. By the way, some of your criticisms, or, let's face it, legitimate corrections of my point of view have already been acknowledged by me. But I will say this: daily coverage often isn't merely inadequate, it is wholly inept. I don't feel like singling any particular writer out, however; everyone has their own bete noires. I don't care much about the defense of "earning a living"; burger-flippers, lobbyists, telephone marketers, pornographers, and actuaries all can claim the holy privilege of "earning a living"...so can music teachers, the rowdiest of the lot. I concede to you that Rosenfeld seems less impressive on re-reading. I do like the critics in Opera News magazine, I see things I like in BBC magazine, and I cheerfully volunteer to read as many critical tomes as I have time for; Deryck Cooke, Robert Simpson, Charles Rosen, and Richard Taruskin for instance have composed criticism that has been very important for me. Mr. Ross concedes that his delightful book is "middle-brow"...fair enough. Virgil Thompson? I haven't seen any of his graveyards, as they say in the westerns. It's great to hear from you. Write in any timej, on this or other topics!
If you're going to take objection to the state of criticism, you'd better be willing to name names. Inventing critical prose, as you do in your last sentence, to make your point is cheap, and proves that you don't actually have anyone, or any particular review, to take exception with. If you did, you'd quote the lousy writing you so loudly claim is so prevalent.<p>The difference in medium is crucial, too, and the writing is different in a newspaper than in a weekly magazine because the readers are expecting something different. Magazine readers spend more time with the magazine, so the writer accommodates. Newspaper writers also accommodate, by being concise.
I don't see why satire or pastiche is cheap; neither do I see why generalizations about the declining standards in an industry is out of bounds, quite frankly. I'm somewhat surprized at the defense of the state of the art of daily criticism that I'm hearing, but viva la difference. If I don't specifically attack someone or something, I don't see the necessity of naming names. I'm willing to admit where I'm wrong, and there is enough in my post and these comments to justify this assertion...I admire those posts of yours, which I have read, by the way.