Roll over, Beethoven

Let's stick with Luddy for a while. Although I'm adding this art as an afterthought. Am I the only person in the world unaware of M&Ms Dark Side?



There is this traditional image of Beethoven as a Titan at war with the Gods. Or as a Prometheus stealing divinity from the gods to enlighten humanity. You decide on your own favorite metaphor from any number of preexisting choices, or create a new one of your own. It doesn't matter. The point is that life for Lud is seen as a bit of a struggle, and his work is a piece of the divine given to humans, and that kind of special delivery doesn't come easily. It would seem as if the gods were especially cruel and precise in their punishment of Beethoven: what worse can you do to a composer than make him deaf? He can still compose music, but he can't hear it. Talk about rife with symbolism. The story goes that at the debut performance of the 9th Symphony, the fans went wild, cheering and hootin' and hollerin'. And poor Lud, conducting the work even after the orchestra was finished, deaf as the proverbial post, had no idea this was going on until someone turned him around to see the reponse his work had gotten from the crowd. (When Lucy tells this story to Shroeder, it always brings a tear to a Peanuts fan's eyes.)

So Beethoven is this great Romantic hero, at least in the terms we've laid down defining Romanticism. The individual touching the infinite to share with other individuals, everyone ennobled in the process, that sort of thing. But I think we need to talk a little about context. (Yeah, I'm seeing this entry as something to work into Caveman; you'll see why in a minute.)

Lud's dates are 1770-1827. (For comparison's sake, Bach is 1685-1750, Mozart is 1756-1791. There is a direct stylistic line from the orderly compositions of Bach through the -- strictly defined -- classical music of Mozart to the emotional late compositions of Beethoven.) This was a time when music was supported, as we've said, by patronage and commission. Bach was a kappelmeister, writing music for the church. Mozart got money from the rich and wrote music to accompany their dinners, as well as other, serious pieces. Beethoven did not compose for the nobility; he composed for himself. He still nonetheless required financial support, and got it. He just didn't respond with a lot of nice but forgetable music, as Mozart did (which is not to denigrate Mozart, who obviously wrote a lot of transcendent music, but Wolfie also wrote a lot of pap -- pretty pap, but pap nonetheless). Beethoven's works are primarily for serious concert performance.

Imagine the times. The 9th was first performed in Vienna on May 7, 1824. Lud may have been working on it off and on for ten years, seriously so the previous two. The audience comprises those people who, in 1824 Vienna, would go to a concert and hear the symphony. They will probably never hear it again. Most people in Vienna in 1824 will never hear it at all. (Not even Lud ever heard it!)

Music is ephemeral. Originally, i.e. historically, music is pure performance. You make up a song and play it. Maybe you remember it. Maybe someone else remembers it. Some people are very good at memorizing music quickly, especially simple music, so a piece can live on in time and geography beyond its creator, but it's still ephemeral. At some historical point we learn to "write" music; we create a language of notation so that we no longer need to rely on memory. As a result of this new ability of narration, we can improve the narrative content: music can get more complicated.

But music is still ephemeral. It takes a lot of resources. Or at least a piece like Lud's 9th takes a lot of resources. Ten years of his time, a big symphony orchestra, money, a big chorus, an audience of sophisticates capable of affording and appreciating such a venture. Music like this was a once in a lifetime event for the beholders, and maybe even for the musicians. Perhaps the greatest works of art being created at the time are limited in distribution to an exceptionally tiny few at exceptionally infrequent intervals.

In this context, you write music for that one listening. You write music that the audience will hear once that will last them for a lifetime. You can draw your own conclusions about the meaning of that music, the meaning of music per se, in this context. Your conclusions will be specific and they will be straightforward. You will be attempting to understand Beethoven. Which is a good thing. I encourage it.

So let's fast forward to my living room, in which there is a 5-disc CD player. In slot #1, Beethoven's 9th. In slot #2, the Beatles' Revolver. In slot #3, Ella and Louis (that's Fitzgerald and Armstrong, you schlub). In slot #4, Caetano Velosa's Noites Do Norte. In slot #5, Miles Davis's Kind of Blue. The context of Lud's 9th has changed dramatically (although the text itself remains the same). What does Beethoven's music mean when it is just one more piece of music? When instead of listening to it once in a lifetime I listen to it while I'm reading the Sunday Times or washing the dinner dishes? And heaven forbid, what happens if I hit the Shuffle button?

Welcome to Cultural Studies. There are lots of branches and approaches to cultural studies, but we approach CS from a position that, in this case, there is a variety of music that comprises a certain part of our culture. There are a variety of ways we listen to that music; I could go to a concert of the 9th, or I can listen on my iPod -- big difference. CS, at its worst, equates the 9th with Celine Dion, claiming that both are simply musical texts (you'll notice the I did not have a Celine disc on my machine, nor will I ever). CS at its best tries to figure out the meaning of a culture where Celine and Lud both vie for your listening pleasure.

You don't get CS without Structuralism, or some new way to evaluate contexts.

The semiotician will, on the other hand, read the inner Menick from the 5 disks in my virtual CD player. Why did I include these 5? What did I exclude? What does the choice say? The semiotician will try to understand the subtext of the choices.

The avant garde pomo might provide an alternate reading of the text, showing how my exclusions are more meaningful than my inclusions. My exclusion of, say, 50 Cent (or his half brother, Two Bits) probably shows an inability to cope with modern race issues while seeking solace in the separatist past by choosing the notoriously Uncle Tommish Louis Armstrong (not my belief, remember -- I love Louis).

I am, actually, a fan of CS. I like the broad approach to cultural artifacts. I don't think we should ennoble pop to levels above its grasp, but pop, by the very virtue of its popularity, says something to us about people, and even if I perhaps end up using CS as a door-opener for contextual study, I still enjoy it.

[I think of this kind of entry as Caveman Supplemental, a la Captain's Log Supplemental. What the hell IS a supplemental captain's log, anyhow? I can't wait to see the Borg Encounter in Vegas next month. Eat your heart out, Cruz!]