<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=iso-8859-1"><base href="x-msg://1864/"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; ">Art,<div><br></div><div>Thanks for your contribution. I read it with a smile on my face from beginning to end.</div><div><br></div><div>I listened to 4 again last night and it is "nice but no cigar." It never goes to the kind of dangerous places that 3 does, so the ride is not as interesting. 3 is in trouble in the first phrase and the climax of the first movement still scares the hell out of me.</div><div><br></div><div>What I do find interesting is how different each of the symphonies is and how they challenge us in different ways. I know very well there is no truth in matters of taste. My primary question (How do we measure greatness in music?) was meant to provoke thought, not to provide answers.</div><div><br></div><div>Here is the five-level metric you need: 24k, 18k, 14k, 10k gold plated, and pyrite.</div><div><br></div><div>Steve </div><div><br></div><div>Bonus: If you use my metric for the Mahler symphonies what do you come up with? Don't we all have a problem with 6, 7, and especially 8. Like Beethoven 9, Mahler 9 is in a world by itself. And, yes, it is puzzling why a composer as great as Beethoven would write four overtures for the same opera.</div><div><br></div><div>Steve</div><div><br></div><div><br><div apple-content-edited="true">
<div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: 'Bookman Old Style'; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; "><div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: 'Bookman Old Style'; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; "><div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-variant: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; "><div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-variant: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; "><div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-variant: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; "><div style="font-family: 'Bookman Old Style'; font-size: medium; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; "><font><b style="font-size: 12px; ">Dr. Stephen Jablonsky, Ph.D.</b></font></div><div style="font-family: 'Bookman Old Style'; font-size: medium; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; "><b style="font-size: 12px; ">Music Department Chair</b></div><div style="font-family: 'Bookman Old Style'; font-size: medium; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; "><b style="font-size: 12px; ">The City College of New York</b></div><div style="font-family: 'Bookman Old Style'; font-size: medium; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; "><b style="font-size: 12px; ">Shepard Hall Room 72</b></div><div style="font-family: 'Bookman Old Style'; font-size: medium; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; "><b style="font-size: 12px; ">New York NY 10031</b></div><div style="font-family: 'Bookman Old Style'; font-size: medium; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; "><b style="font-size: 12px; ">(212) 650-7663</b></div><div style="font-family: 'Bookman Old Style'; font-size: medium; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; "><font><b style="font-size: 12px; "><a href="mailto:music@ccny.cuny.edu">music@ccny.cuny.edu</a></b></font></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: medium; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; "><br></div><div><font face="Copperplate"><span style="font-size: 12px; ">America's Greatest Chair </span></font></div><div><font face="Copperplate"><span style="font-size: 12px; ">in the low-priced field</span></font></div></div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"></div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"></div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"></div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"></div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"><br class="Apple-interchange-newline">
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<br><div><div>On Dec 18, 2013, at 10:33 AM, art samplaski <<a href="mailto:agsvtp@hotmail.com">agsvtp@hotmail.com</a>> wrote:</div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"><blockquote type="cite"><div class="hmmessage" style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: Calibri; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; "><div dir="ltr">Stephen Jablonsky wondered why LvB's 4th seems to live in "a quiet<br>oblivion" compared to its temporally closest siblings. My opinion: it's<br>simply like one of those traffic jams one hits upon for which there is<br>no visible cause--everyone grinds to a halt, you inch along for a while,<br>then everyone speeds up again. In other words, it's a traffic jam just<br>for the sake of being a traffic jam; and like Jupiter's Great Red Spot,<br>has no reason ever to stop (other than, by 3am there's usually too<br>little traffic to sustain it). Likewise, the 4th doesn't get programmed<br>simply because nobody programs it. I'm pretty sure that anyone<br>programming _any_ Beethoven symphony will get noticeably higher<br>ticket sales than for, say, _Miraculous Mandarin_... and CERtainly<br>higher than anything by Ahnald.:)<br> <br>>Just for the fun of it, can you put Beethoven's symphonies in<br>>order [of] greatness (if that is even possible)?<br><br>The radio show _Performance Today_ about 10-11 years ago did a week<br>devoted to the things; and their guest conductor playing tour guide (I<br>forget who) said something to the effect of, "There are 8 Beethoven<br>symphonies... and then there's The Ninth."<br> <br>I personally don't believe you can do a meaningful ranking of them<br>individually, but you can perhaps separate them akin to geological<br>strata: 1-2 are journeyman works--competent, nicely crafted, but Not<br>Noticeably Above(tm) the best mature works of Haydn or Mozart. At<br>the other end is The Ninth, off by itself--and I'm not sure that _that_<br>designation is more than retrospective accumulated cultural baggage.<br>(Read Slonimsky's _Lexicon of Musical Invective_ for, ahh, opinions<br>contemporary to its premiere.:) For 3-8, I very strongly doubt that you<br>could get any statistically significant differences, even if you *could*<br>devise some metric for "greatness."<br> <br>>What do you say about 8?<br><br>For the record, 8 is one of my favorites. More user-friendly than 3, and<br>waaay less cloying than 6--although that last may be due to having<br>watched _Fantasia_ too often years ago. (And I'm pretty sure I'd like<br>4 more if I could hear it more...:)<br> <br>Art Samplaski<br>Ithaca, NY<br> <br>q.t.: If on the other hand you want to hear a truly -terrible- Beethoven<br>piece, make yourself sit through _Leonora #2_. It's exactly the same<br>as L3--save that, like Lennie's rewriting the 1st mvt. of K550 for one<br>of his Norton Lectures to be utterly 4+4+4+..., it is SO pathetically<br>square re phrase rhythm as to border on torture and/or parody. The<br>two of them would make a textbook case re shaping phrases for a<br>form/analysis class, save that some lawyer might argue it constituted<br>student abuse--and definitely *teacher* abuse to have to go through<br>it year after year!<br></div>_______________________________________________<br>Smt-talk mailing list<br><a href="mailto:Smt-talk@lists.societymusictheory.org">Smt-talk@lists.societymusictheory.org</a><br><a href="http://lists.societymusictheory.org/listinfo.cgi/smt-talk-societymusictheory.org">http://lists.societymusictheory.org/listinfo.cgi/smt-talk-societymusictheory.org</a><br></div></blockquote></div><br></div></body></html>