I’d offer excuses for my long absence from MVAP but the truth is that I simply wasn’t inspired to write anything. But now I’m mad, and I’m going to take it out on all of you.
“Bless me Father, for I have sinned – I read a Vox.com piece today.”
Don’t do Vox, my children – their like is sinful and unclean.
The title of this Vox piece is “How Beethoven’s 5th Symphony put the classism in classical music”. And right away I can tell we’re in for a treat.
I’ll spoil the surprise for you: the author quotes nothing from Beethoven himself about the 5th Symphony in this article. Either Beethoven had nothing to say about his 5th, or – more likely – he said nothing the author could find that was in any way cancel-able about it. Or – most likely – the author did no research into Beethoven’s thoughts.
Instead, the evidence cited for “classism” in the 5th Symphony consists entirely of the following:
- Concert hall dress codes and conduct rules
- A comment from an unnamed 19th century concert attendee
- Vox.com’s own podcast about the 5th
- The opinion of some music critic I’ve never heard of and whose career pedigree goes unmentioned
- The opinion of some clarinetist that – again – I’ve never heard of and whose career pedigree goes unmentioned… except for the explicit mention that he’s black
And nothing else. I listened their entire 33:51 minute podcast they made – may God forgive me – and it turns out the podcast is just the long version of this article – albeit without adding supporting evidence or better arguments – so I don’t have to deal separately with it.
Starting from the top: concert hall dress codes and conduct rules. Some concert halls have rules for their patrons, requiring formal dress and conduct during their performances. The conduct rules include a requirement to remain silent -and refrain from applause – until after the piece is concluded, so as to not distract the musicians nor interfere with other patrons who are trying to listen.
This, apparently, is considered exclusionary. Vox writers Nate Sloan and Charlie Harding avoid making the… unfortunate argument about black concert goers that I’ve seen before, and instead make the claim that the fact that these conduct rules are shared among high class concert halls suggests the rules are more about enabling privileged people (who, according to them, are exclusively rich white men) to show they belong than about respecting the music or their fellow patrons.
I wish I was kidding. This ‘argument’ deliberately disregards the perfectly reasonable explanation (that the authors themselves suggest in the podcast) such that it’s about courtesy in order to ‘REEEEE’ about white privilege, as such people are wont to do. Since they’ve already given the actual reason for these rules, I’m just going to move on.
Next, a comment from an unnamed 19th century concert attendee, who apparently endorsed the following:
“…all women shall be gagged by officers duly licensed for the purpose before they’re allowed to enter a concert room.”
This, for some reason, is taken to be an example of misogyny from classical music fans – as opposed to an observation that women were prone to talking loudly in inappropriate situations in the 1840s. As someone who has attended more than one film with my dear mother that ended with me nursing a headache after she insisted on shrieking at the characters on the screen (she does this at home as well), I’m just going to observe that stereotypes exist for a reason and move on.
Next we move to the comments from ‘classical music critic’ James Bennet II. I initially made the mistake – and if you read this before I edited the piece you may have seen my mistake – in assuming it was the same James Bennet who resigned from the New York Times after it published Senator Tom Cotton’s Op/Ed earlier this year.
It wasn’t. This Mr. Bennett does not have nearly so lofty a career as that.
Anyway, Mr. Bennet (can’t help but remember Pride & Prejudice here) is of the opinion that the fact that the classical music giants were all white men – and Beethoven’s continued popularity – serves to “convey to the other [emphasis added] that there’s not a stake in that music for them.”
Quite aside from the obvious question of where Bennet stands on the issue of cultural appropriation – classical music is quintessentially European in origin, after all – he skates around the question of whether any modern classical musician is good enough to equal Beethoven. YoYo Ma (pictured above), gets ignored, as all Progressives ignore Asian contributors to anything.
I would like to remind you, at this moment, that literally no arguments have been advanced thus far that don’t amount to “Beethoven was white, classical music giants were all white, and its mostly white people who like classical music”, and we’re nearing the end of the article.
Quite frankly, if there are no famous black symphonists, I assume the reason is because none of the ones who do exist (if any) are good enough to be famous for their symphonies. Economist Thomas Sowell, former Congressman Allen West and Justice Clarence Thomas are all fans of classical music; clearly that suggests that nonwhites (for those not familiar, all three are black) can and do enjoy classical music and can get something out of it. Why they might be rare, I don’t care to guess, but I’ve certainly never heard of a skin color test to be able to buy a classical music album, to buy a violin or to attend a concert hall. Or, hell, to watch a Youtube video.
I don’t know or care why classical music isn’t especially popular among black people, but since there’s no barrier to entry beyond the cost of a concert hall ticket and formal clothes – and the ability to be courteous during a stage performance – I don’t imagine racism is the reason.
And finally we to the comments from clarinetist Anthony McGill. Excuse me: black clarinetist Anthony McGill, of the New Yor Philiharmonic orchestra. I didn’t bother to check out his career pedigree – as you’ll see from the next part, there was no point.
And what does he say? The article paraphrases here to indicate that he believes orchestras are alienating “new, diverse audiences” (quoting the article authors) by “not promoting any of the composers alive today that are trying to become the Beethovens of their day.”
I’d like to take a moment to observe that the racist and exclusionary classical music genre somehow has a black musician in one of the most prestigious positions in the world
For the editification of anyone not closely following the attacks upon American culture from the neo-Marxists, almost this precise argument has been previously advanced such that the continued popularity of the likes of JRR Tolkien and Robert Heinlein is preventing “new, diverse writers” from becoming as popular as they were.
See also: Two LA County Sheriffs Shot
Do I need to explicate the part of this argument that they are desperately trying to get us to ignore – that the giants are giants because their work was really good, and the new people complaining that they don’t have a chance are simply not that good? The giants in every genre, in every industry, stand out long after they are dead in no small part due to the fight they had to become giants in the first place. If they complained that the giants of their day were stopping them from advancing, those words haven’t reached us from the past – instead, we remember what they did to beat those giants and take their places.
That said, I’m not going to take this Progressive ‘argument’ seriously. The main modes of Prog ‘arguments’ are always the same: equivocate the meaning of words, shout “ism !” and “ist!”, engage in special pleading, and blatantly ignore the obvious; and this is no exception. All of these are present here in this piece, more or less, and honestly it gets tiresome.
Why? Because none of this is in any way sincere. They don’t actually believe any of this stuff is true in any kind of concrete way.
Many have suggested that this is all because they hate white people. Beethoven isn’t a classical giant because his music was amazing – he’s a classical giant because he was white, and you’re a Nazi/racist/misogynist/bad tipper for suggesting that’s not the reason. Robert Heinlein was white. Tolkien was white.
Or perhaps it’s because they hate men. Obviously, we’re misogynists for keeping all of the amazing, talented, stunning and brave female symphonists from achieving the heights they deserve, and all of the forgoing were men.
Or perhaps it’s because they hate Christians (ditto).
But while you’ll certainly find plenty of Progressive adherents who hate white people, men, Christians or all of the above, at the ideological level it’s not about any of those things.
What they actually hate is standards. They cannot stand being judge and found wanting – they don’t have enough emotional stability to handle it. So instead, anyone who can be said to have accomplished anything must be destroyed, so as to spare their fragile egos.
These people are actually white, Christian male supremacists. Such men have accomplished everything significant in the last 600 years, they reckon, and so everyone not the equal of such men necessarily feel inferior – according to them. That inferiority harms their self-image, and so the entire idea of accomplishment – and the people who are capable of it, and all of their works – must be destroyed.
I – admittedly this is probably by virtue of my being a white, straight agnostic man – happen to like standards. Being able to actually tell “A” from “Not-A” is how my ancestors were able to avoid accidentally poisoning themselves, after all. And in the interest of ensuring that I don’t accidentally drink gasoline – because my jihad against standards prevents me from saying it’s objectively harmful to my health to do so – I intend to sit back and play Ode to Joy at maximum volume while I enjoy my dinner.
If you must read the original article, it can be found here.