13- Music - Musica

La musica comienza con Juan Sebastian Bach

Written by Jose Manuel Recio

Tuesday, 01 December 2009 00:02

Jose Manuel Recio

La Música, tal como la conocemos hoy, comienza con Bach. Él es el eslabón entre dos grandes maneras de entender la música. Como arte, y como artesanía. Antes de Bach, la música estaba al servicio de algo. Servía para acompañar a un texto, para alabar a Dios o para distraer a un noble. Después de Bach, (aunque no de manera brusca, claro, estas cosas requieren su tiempo), la música está porque tiene que estar. No es de extrañar que el 90% de la que oímos hoy en la sala de concierto comience con Bach, y termine con Mahler (aunque esto ya es otra historia).

Last Updated ( Wednesday, 02 December 2009 01:45 )

Bach to Basics

Written by Ilkka Talvi

Tuesday, 01 December 2009 00:00

Ilkka Talvi

Johann Sebastian Bach

Anybody who has studied the arts, such as painting, knows that an important part of the training, especially in the past, was to copy old masterworks. For instance Manet spent years in museums, trying to understand the secret of how the Flemish masters handled light, or how and why earlier Italian masters included very detailed landscapes in their portraits. In short, in order to create something new and unique, one had to have an understanding of art’s history. The same is true with music: a composer ought to know why Debussy sounds like Debussy, Hindemith like Hindemith. Part of general music education is to understand counterpoint and harmony, or to analyze a fugue. Unfortunately very few performing artists are interested in the past performance practices, perhaps wanting to stay away from anything “old-fashioned” that could possibly ruin their reputation as instrumentalists.

Last Updated ( Wednesday, 02 December 2009 01:46 )