Classical Music and the definition of a "song"

[Kingoftonga]

I've seen a few mentions of classical music, both in the 90s thread and the recent songs poll. I've listened to classical music since I was a kid, and I've only recently come around to "popular" music like rock, jazz, and rap. So I decided to start a thread about my first love. I've been befuddled by classical music in playing some of these games, because I'm never sure how to address it as the "album" and "song" format favored by popular music. It doesn't really fit.

On my recent list of favorite songs, for example, I chose not to list any pieces on my list that were originally written as a score. I think it's stretching the definitions of "song" to include a ballet suite like Le Sacre du Printemps or a symphony such as Beethoven's 7th (possibly my favorite piece of music). The Stravinsky piece that placed on the list might be a "track" from a CD, but it is certainly not a "song," and was never intended to be listened to apart from the rest of the piece.

(I'm certainly not criticizing anybody who did put classical music in their list, and I'm happy that some classical pieces finished as high as they did. But I'm curious how others deal with the format, and I think it raises some interesting questions).

Pieces such as Debussy's "Clair de Lune" fit a bit more squarely in the definition of "song" for me, but the format still makes me uneasy. There is only one definitive "Stairway to Heaven," for example, and the rest are covers or live versions. But there are hundreds of definitive versions of "Clair de Lune," or Le Sacre, and different conductors, soloists and ensembles bring something different to the same work. How to judge? While most popular music is born as a recording, most classical music is born as a score that is later manifested in multiple recordings. If I were to include classical music in my list of favorite songs, the first ten spots would be taken up by ten different recordings of Beethoven's Seventh Symphony. It just doesn't work for me.

Dates are also a problem, because very old pieces can still be released currently. Should a 2012 recording of Le Sacre du Printemps be counted as a 2012 piece, or a 1913 piece? Classical "albums" are even thornier, since record labels often take to cramming several unrelated pieces onto a CD. Most classical music was written before the "album" even existed as a format; only pieces such as Philip Glass' Glassworks have recently taken that into account.

So, how do others compare "classical" and "popular" music? (I sort of hate those descriptors, but it's the easiest way to divide the two genres). And how many classical music buffs are out there? Seeing the amount of classical that ended up in the songs poll made me happy. Any chance we could pull together an AMF poll on classical music?

[Henry]

Thanks kingoftonga for starting this thread. I look forward to participating in a classical musical poll. My experience with classical music was much more intense as a youngster and teenager than it has been since and would benefit from a refresher.

I prefer to be as inclusive as possible in describing my musical preferences. So, I was glad to follow suit when I saw others including classical music on their lists in the 2012 all-time songs poll. I did not recall the inclusion of classical songs in the 2010 poll.

While your point regarding the definition of song is excellent, it seems more abstract (and therefore perhaps more likely to be determined on a basis that could seem arbitrary to those who disagree with a resolution) to me than some of the other points you made which were also excellent.

More pragmatically, I also struggled in determining which version and the year associated with a particular version I should choose for a particular classical piece that I wanted to include on my list.

[HRS]

I also have doubts about this! Moreover, after I went to listen classical music more often, I started to actually feel more skeptical about the use of words such as experimental and avant-garde, because they seemed to assume a different meaning when related to the field. My favorite musicians, so far are Erik Satie, Shostakovich, Chopin, Philip Glass, Arvo Part and Wagner. Sometimes it hits me that popular music arguably exists for ages, but only took its contemporary form very recently; Rock music was born last century. Classical music has been around for centuries, transcending time in its sheet form and even taking recording form like the amazing Tabula Rasa. On the other hand, In a hundred years, it might be some of the records we listen now that might be perceived by posterity the same way we perceive an Wagnerian symphony these days. We can argue for days that classical music is much more intricate than popular music, start that whole popular vs classical thread every music forum has, but I really think that the groundbreaking releases from both sides will be remembered equally in time, even if by different audiences. I believe that popular music is much part of contemporary culture, society and the avant-garde of other art expressions as much as the romantic period was for vienna and that society and those art expressions. I guess jazz records have an even bigger shot at reaching a similar pedestal in posterity, seeing that its mark in the 20th century is really perceived throughout music and other art forms -- there's a beautiful book that a friend of mine kept telling me about that her boyfriend was reading which pretty much connects the explosion of jazz with both world wars and 20th century conflicts historically and philosophically, she couldn't give me the name, though. Also, I really like when classical trained musicians bring this acquired knowledge to popular music and end up giving us great albums, sometimes even masterpieces; I don't believe that classical training is what makes a musician complete -- and I also don't think that albums recorded by those are superior than others that aren't -- but it opens a whole new door for new experiments with music. In the age of ambient music, jazz, samples and Beck releasing sheet music the line that divides popular music and classical recordings seem more blurred than ever, especially in a globalized world where western music has been more and more infused with sounds from different places. I think that Classical Music still has its peculiar characteristics -- conduction, version, year, orchestra, solists, opera singers -- , but I think that the exchange between popular music and it has been stronger than ever before. David Byrne's How Music Works finds him discussing for moments the relations between the musician and format, so maybe sheet music was a format before the album, before the vinyl, before the compact discs and now digital music. I just started reading and maybe he will speak about Classical Music or we can interpret his thought and discuss how Classical Music relates to formats!