Context

Context
At an orchestra concert with a friend they were playing Berlioz's Symphonie Fantastique. I wouldn't read the program notes, and my friend kept telling me that I'm missing so much, that the notes make the music mean so much more. But what does the music offer on its own, with the background that I happen to have? Is there anything interesting about an art which is dependent on context, independent of the context on which it depends? The art sensitive to context can mean more, more easily, because all the world's other offerings can be alluded to. On the other hand, the less context-dependent works can appeal to a larger audience, since people need not know about allusions which aren't made. The challenge is to reduce context and increase meaning, creating a work that is appealing in a more universal way. In somewhat of a paraphrase of ideas that Gunther Schuller was speaking about in a talk at Brown University, popular music has failed in this arena. It is very generic, but appealing to a very low common denominator of musical knowledge, lacking complexity and meaning. A success is the adaptation of Romeo and Juliet into a modern day film. The brilliance of the 1996 movie that contains no speech besides the original Shakespearean language but with a current setting shows how a classic (a work not dependent on very much context) can maintain its original meaning and include more. Context-free (or freer) works can always be interpreted with context (they are a subset). New contexts can augment or modify original meaning. A danger exists when original works are set in contexts (like adding background information, historical ssetting, eg. the composer was deaf when he wrote this piece) because often the new context cannot be forgotten and the art never returned to its virgin state. I've often read books only to see their movies, be disappointed and never remember my own images of how the characters looked, how they spoke. Context-free is unachievable, since language itself is so dependent on context of culture, education and experience.

Context

At an orchestra concert with a friend they were playing Berlioz's Symphonie Fantastique. I wouldn't read the program notes, and my friend kept telling me that I'm missing so much, that the notes make the music mean so much more. But what does the music offer on its own, with the background that I happen to have? Is there anything interesting about an art which is dependent on context, independent of the context on which it depends?

The art sensitive to context can mean more, more easily, because all the world's other offerings can be alluded to.

On the other hand, the less context-dependent works can appeal to a larger audience, since people need not know about allusions which aren't made.

The challenge is to reduce context and increase meaning, creating a work that is appealing in a more universal way.

In somewhat of a paraphrase of ideas that Gunther Schuller was speaking about in a talk at Brown University, popular music has failed in this arena. It is very generic, but appealing to a very low common denominator of musical knowledge, lacking complexity and meaning.

A success is the adaptation of Romeo and Juliet into a modern day film. The brilliance of the 1996 movie that contains no speech besides the original Shakespearean language but with a current setting shows how a classic (a work not dependent on very much context) can maintain its original meaning and include more.

Context-free (or freer) works can always be interpreted with context (they are a subset). New contexts can augment or modify original meaning.

A danger exists when original works are set in contexts (like adding background information, historical ssetting, eg. the composer was deaf when he wrote this piece) because often the new context cannot be forgotten and the art never returned to its virgin state.

I've often read books only to see their movies, be disappointed and never remember my own images of how the characters looked, how they spoke. Context-free is unachievable, since language itself is so dependent on context of culture, education and experience.