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A Second Renaissance Is Needed In Classical Music

Conversations, articles, and reports on the topic always tend to yield the same
result - the Classical concert-going public of today are primarily interested in hearing
music of the past. A look at the history of Western music reveals an abrupt change in
harmony style during a period of time ranging from the onset of the 20th century until
sometime after the Second World War - from largely consonant music to largely
dissonant. Consonance is a quality of music that pleases the ear, its notes ring
comfortably with one another, and there is no tension in harmony. Dissonance conversely
creates much tension, it’s harsh and biting to our ears; and yet we need some of it in our
works for variety (i.e.: resolving dissonance to consonance), and generally for a sense of
departure from the "home base" that is consonance. When dissonance is left unresolved, it
leaves an unpleasant aftertaste in the palette of our artistic minds. This is not what the
concert-going public is paying the big bucks for. Yet curiously, this is the most prevalent
quality in the Classical music of today, dubbed as “Contemporary”. Granted, this
dissonant music does appeal to the intellectually appreciative among us - much can be
said about its’ mathematical properties, among other things. One could go as far as to say
that this music appeals much more to our left brains, and while that’s all well and good,
something is wrong with the picture. For over 2000 years, music was squarely directed at
our right brains, our emotional selves, and to whatever ends, it still does in many of the
non-classical styles. One could argue that the reason Classical has evolved through its’
various styles (Baroque, Romantic, Impressionist, etc.) is because the composers at
certain time periods felt that the music of their recent past had expended itself as far as it
possibly could, that it was time for something new. The Contemporary sound has itself
been in style for well over seventy-five years now, about as long as many of those before
it. Would it not be then safe to say that Contemporary has also had its time? And if so,
where we do go from here, if it’s seemingly all been done? While there’s no exact answer
to this question, two qualities stand out as the most likely characteristics in the next,
inevitable movement in Classical music - (1) the new music will have highly integrated
electronic aspects to it (electronic music technology has long surpassed its infancy), and
(2) the music will reclaim the complex yet predominantly consonant quality it had during
its last spell, the Impressionist period.


An interesting theory, which has been shared widely in the society of music
history enthusiasts, states that the progression of music is closely linked with not only
other forms of art (such as literary and graphic), but also world events and the mentality
of citizens as a result. In the medieval times, during the rise of the church, the music was
bound closely to it, and as the (first) Renaissance came into full bloom the music did as
well. Next, Absolute music (music not bound to text) came into the world at the same
time as did the free thinkers of the Baroque and Classical periods (17th and 18th
centuries), while Romantic music closely mirrored our studious descent into the depths of
human behavior and emotion through psychology and psychiatry of the 19th century, and
its' intensity built ever higher just as the Industrial Revolution began changing the world
forever. Finally, the Contemporary movement first saw its earliest works when the dream
the world was building began to crash down. Our technology found its’ most unspeakable
uses during the World Wars, and the morale of musicians began to dwindle. How could
they write pleasant sounding music during a time of such atrocities? The pioneers of the
Impressionist movement, Debussy and Ravel, were both crushed in spirit by the First
World War. Composers such as Stravinsky, Prokofiev and Rachmaninoff all had to depart
from their homelands as a result of this war. But the foremost example lies in the
biography of the French composer Olivier Messiaen:

(3) "When the Second World War broke out, Messiaen, then thirty-one, was drafted into the army. In June 1940, he was captured by the Germans and sent to a concentration camp. Among the prisoners were three other French musicians: a violinist, cellist, and a clarinetist. Messiaen began to write a chamber music piece for them, to which he soon added a piano part. The composition of this monumental work's eight movements - the Quartet for the End of Time - helped sustain him through this terrible episode in his life. When the quartet was finished, Messiaen and his friends decided to organize a performance. The violinist and clarinetist had managed to hold on to their instruments; a cello with a missing string was found in the camp, as well as an old, out of tune piano. The concert took place on a bitterly cold night in January 1941, in front of five thousand prisoners."

Needless to say, the music he wrote did not sound like a walk in the park. And it
seems that our classical music has never quite recovered from the dissonant depths it sank
down to. This is not to say the music is bad, it is simply not appealing to our ears the way
the other styles were, and still are. It is possible that we are in a period of indecision, and
once again, current events seem to tell the tale for us. Will our world finally come out of
this 20th century phase of hostility (which is especially dangerous given the ever-
increasing advancement of technology), and will our music subsequently reflect it?
Classical composers have always been the ones composing purely for the sake of the
music itself, there has never been a commercial aspect to it, as with many modern styles.
Knowing this, we can safely assume that it will continue to follow the trends it always
has, constantly shadowing everything else happening in the world around us. By this
logic, however, if the world continued with its’ hostile tendencies, so too the music would
remain like it is now. But wait - the theory doesn’t always apply itself in this order,
sometimes it’s exactly the other way around. Sometimes the music is what’s directing the
order and progression of things, and inspiring people to become the decisive individuals
insofar as which direction the world will turn next.


If this is the case, my message becomes twice as urgent. We need to be writing the
kind of music that will inspire us all to take the steps we need to take; to get the world
where we all want it to be. And it won't be predominantly dissonant music, not by a long
shot. As intellectually appealing as it is, it's not going to inspire anyone. Sure, the music
has progressed away from the sorrowful character it had during our times of greatest
tragedy, towards a more experimental state, but this is still not enough to do more than
intrigue us for a short time. We need music that will awaken us at once, make us feel like
we can all help make the change we’re hoping for. We feel as though we are powerless
to affect change beyond the small piece of the world we are involved with, but what we
are really lacking is the inspiration. Popular music may have the ability to inspire us for a
fleeting moment of time, but it is the Classical music that can inspire us for a lifetime. As
we run out of time to make those inspired changes, before our resources are fully depleted
and our ecosystem broken, a second renaissance in Classical music is needed, now more
than ever.

Footnotes and Bibliography

(1) This paper not only stands in its’ own right, but is also an introduction to a forthcoming Research paper, entitled “The Third Music Revolution – Integration of Electronic and Acoustic Music”

(2) CD 1 Provides necessary examples of consonance’s last stand – Impressionism.
Four works of Debussy and Ravel each are provided.

(3) Quote Source: “The Enjoyment of Music”, 8th Edition, Joseph Machlis and Kristine Forney, 1999.

CD 2 provides necessary examples of one of dissonance’s most sorrowful product– Olivier Messiaen’s “Quartet for the End of Time”. All eight movements are provided. It is interesting to note that the 6th and 8th movements, the Praises to Jesus, do however contain consonant harmonies, much in the style of the Impressionists. Perhaps these were the movements that gave hope to the prisoners.

Originally posted by kcoul058:

So i apologize that, especially, the essay part was very poorly worded, but i was speaking only of pointlessly used dissonance, not the other kinds.

Originally posted by kcoul058:
When dissonance is used with purpose, to resolve, or even as some form of word painting, as done in the Renaissance and early Baroque, it is justified, it is just in my opinion that when it is used flagrantly, without any real purpose, basically just to "slam" a bunch of jarring chords together or make a melody that makes you shudder, it is of not much use to anyone.

Originally posted by kcoul058:
But when someone repeatedly hits a bunch of minor 9th and tritones at fff and then goes and does something else... well come on! Where is the musicality in that?