Is anyone interested in contemporary music?

[es347]

I must stay, that is one strange production! Wow....

..strange is putting it mildly...please make it stop

 

[amirm]

Reminds me of opera. I hate opera. One thing I love about string quartets is no "singing". Don't forget Morton Feldman and Gloria Coates for modern music.

Just listening to Morton Feldman:

It is most excellent music! Soothing and enjoyable at the same time.

 

[Schallfeldwebel]

How scary will an Alfred Hitchcock movie be without modern (a-)tonal music? No one complains about modern music in movies and documentaries, or?

 

[Amphissa]

I'm not certain what is meant by the word "contemporary." Does it apply only to "currently living" composers, defining contemporary as living concurrently with us? Or is the term a sneaky way of referring to modernism, which would also include composers like Schoenberg, Berg, Stravinsky, Messiaen, and their kindred spirits? The video linked in the OP doesn't answer the question, as Boulez is still (last I heard) hanging on to life.

Contemporary, in the sense of living (or having lived during our lifetimes) is really a pretty broad concept. Boulez is hard core modernist. But there are composers working today whose music is much more palatable. John Adams, Jennifer Higdon and Rautavaara come to mind. And if we include composers who died during our lifetime, the music of Tubin, Atterberg, Hovhaness, Walton, Diamond and Arnold is much more accessible to the average audience.

I have a hard time with atonal vocals, no matter how well appointed the singer. I also have a difficult time with extreme dissonance and abrasiveness. I can cope better with atonality in orchestral or ensemble music, so long as there is some detectable pattern and development. I very much enjoy the music of Tubin, Atterberg and David Diamond, and some of the music of Hovhaness.