LAMENTING THE SUPPOSED END OF BEAUTY IN MUSIC- SOME THOUGHTS OF A

GUITARIST ON THE RUMORED DEATH OF MUSICAL TRADITION

Michael D. Wolfson

Have we experienced a cultural erosion in the world of music over the last four or five centuries? We
certainly have experienced a major change. To call it an erosion would be to interject a value judgment.
Perhaps we can get there later. I really do not intend here to consider the relative merits of different
musical styles (classical, folk, jazz, pop/rock, flamenco, ragtime, bossa nova, rap etc.) nor do I intend to
over emphasize the relative merits of different instrumentation. These are appropriate subjects,
perhaps, for future papers. Instead, we are now looking at whether various sociological, historical,
economic, and technological forces, as well as legal and other restraints, may have combined to lead to
a lessening of musical norms and a great disregard for past traditions in musical culture. This will be
revealed here by way of a few IRL examples, but it can only be resolved by the dedication and
appreciation of everyone.

For myself, it has been recently suggested that I have a colossal ego in thinking that my skills in music
performance are somehow “superior” to others. Not being inclined to accept that assessment, I began
looking for kernels of truth that may underlie the accusation. What I found was that quite the opposite
was true. I regard my status as a modern day trustee of musical culture, here on earth charged with
assistance in the maintenance of long held musical traditions. My primary instrument of choice is the
classical guitar, although I dabble in other instruments and play ragtime, improvise jazz instrumental
interpretations of the great American songbook and even play some folk, flamenco, Renaissance, and
other styles. I have committed to memory (at least I am muscle memory efficient at spitting out the
notes) around 7 hours of music. To that, I can safely add 30 to 40 additional hours of music that I have
a degree of proficiency in reading off of sheet music with less than a few flubs. I dedicate 2, and
sometimes 3, 45 minute practice sessions daily to maintaining this repertoire. (Although some would
debate whether less than perfect performances are correctly considered to be part of a “repertoire”, I
settle for the term as meaning “well played by consensus”. By that reckoning, if the average observer
considers it to be well played, it is deemed part of a working repertoire. Of course, being prepared to
perform at a concert hall is quite different that being ready to play at a casual setting such as a
restaurant or coffee house, where unobtrusive, sotto voce, background music is the goal and no one is
there to critically hang on every note. And even the AI community must not forget that flawless can
also be feckless.)

Why learn so much music? Why dedicate so much time in my waning years to this endeavor? Delayed
gratification for its own sake? No! My interest in maintaining a large repertoire of various styles, time
periods and countries of origin stems entirely from a desire to maintain cultural traditions in music.
Indeed, Bach would not be “alive” today if no one bothered to play his music. Perhaps if my talents and
memory retention capability were greater, I could get away with spending a bit less time. I do realize
that there are some musicians who practice much more (I hear of 6+ hours a day for some). I am also
aware that a typical concert musician preparing a 45 minute presentation might spend 3 or 4 months at
4 hours of so a day to get ready. Kudos to those dedicated souls!

Recorded music is simply not the same. It is a crystallized instantiation of a prior performance, more
dead, shackled and frozen than alive. (Recorded jazz is the Pan-ultimate oxymoron!) A recording is
also a technological approximation of real music. A listener hears a speaker cone vibrating to produce
its best approximation of the sound captured by a microphone that is in turn merely approximating the
intended acoustics of the performance. As one counterexample, the sound of a good Brazilian
rosewood/cedar top soundboard vibrating is lost to a world that only hears recordings though hi fidelity
sound reproduction. It is worse yet if the listener is using earbuds or mp3s. None other than Mick
Jagger complained that modern listeners are being short changed in sound quality. Even the smell of
the Brazilian rosewood /cedar combo permeates the nearby listeners’ nostrils, a smell that only those
who appreciated the earlier formulas of Chanel No.5 perfume might remember. This, of course, was
before a moratorium was placed on Brazilian rosewood as an endangered flora courtesy of the CITES
Treaty, the IUCN red list, and other legal restrictions designed to save the species from extinction. The
wood is already functionally extinct and all that remains is a “graveyard” of stumps. It would take
1,000 years of careful regrowth before new Brazilian rosewood of sufficient quality to use in lutes,
guitars, recorders and others would even be possible. So, beginning in the late 1600s, British traders
began removing good wood from the Brazilian rain forest, which continued forward for 400 years of
over-harvesting the trees, and we are now left with a world that has a compromised Amazon forest,
global warming, unusual animal migration patterns, and perhaps even the emergence of covid19 and
more to come. What a great price to pay to achieve beauty in music!
My “non-promotional” personal verbal meanderings continue. When I practice guitar, I am engaged in
a memory dump, in part reviewing the correctness of my motor memory which, when combined with
kinesthetic and visual cues, aural recollections, knowledge of harmony and memory of listened melody,
enables me to give some relatively well played self-performances. My conscious mind can actually
interfere with this process, so I must try to distract it by fantasizing that I am performing for the
composer. (Hey Bach, how am I doing?) This type of light fantasy, combined with a few other
neumonic tricks, seems to best help maintain such a large repertoire, with 2 or 3 repeats per
composition per week. Such a schedule leaves a little extra time for polishing some rough edges along
with some recreational sight reading (itself a nurtured discipline) and memorizing a few more works to
expand the repertoire even further. This is ego-less effort, strictly dedication to a tradition, an offering
to aMuse.

So, what is the point of it all? Keeping alive a musical aesthetic. The argument is that even if the Bach
Mozart, Chopin, Beethoven, Tarrega and other pieces that I do were as easy or as lacking in
sophistication as the 3 chord pop songs I sometimes hear on TV or the radio, they would still be worth
preserving as cultural relics, if nothing else. Music is a common and universal language, not a dead
one! No need to review the history of the philosophy of aesthetics to see the value in maintaining the
old by way of retaining the ability to perform such works on demand. Family, friends, casual listeners,
myself, restaurant or coffeehouses goers, churches, retirement homes, and, yes, concert halls- outlets
abound. Even audio and video recordings can be made, despite the limitations previously mentioned.
Were I not retired and concerned about jeopardizing my amateur status by making money performing, I
might even look to play on a cruise line. But alas, copyright, insurance, tax, and certain contract and
other legal restraints prevent my going that direction.

Still asking whether musical culture is restrained? Some components of music today seem to be under
assault and actually are in danger of irrelevance to the populous. Rap and other types of music
sometimes regard melody and harmony as historic relics in a world that equates newness with progress.
And melody and harmony are not the only components in danger. Creativity of musical expression via
a composer is giving way to AI. Synthesizers, speakers and earbuds are compromising timbre and tonal
variation. Improvisation and other degrees of freedom in melodic, rhythmic and harmonic variation are
even disappearing. Swing is just one obvious example of this. And as a final assault, the universal
access to recordings on the internet has today made career opportunities in music much less
economically appealing.
We must bring back what we have lost. The art of the fugue can be re-found just as we may be able to
resurrect the art of taking a flight to the moon or erecting a building that won’t collapse. This
comparison is actually suspect, since technological progress is expected. No one seriously wants to
reexamine flat earth theories or reinvent the wheel. But, bringing back lost art in music can be hard to
do. As one example, a conflict has existed since ancient times between the harp and lyre. (Ask Hermes
and Apollo!) Those instruments are the ancestors of the modern day piano and guitar. Until the mid-
17th century, the guitar, along with its predecessors, was the predominant instrument. More music has
been composed for it and its lineal ascendant, the lute, than the piano. Interestingly, however, today the
technologically enhanced pianoforte is widely respected as a superior instrument due to its ability to
allow one to tackle very complex music, and its wide dynamic and pitch range. Yet, much is lost to
those that would ignore the guitar. The piano is “strikingly” two dimensional in sound. The instrument
offers a sustain pedal and loud soft dynamic and nothing more. No vibrato or other tonal subtleties that
a guitar can easily express. There is a reason that Beethoven regarded the guitar as a “little orchestra
unto itself”, that Chopin regarded it as “the most beautiful of instruments, save perhaps two”, and that
Debussy called it an “expressive clavichord”. (We can even discount Segovia’s flippant remark that the
piano is a “humongous monster, you bang on its teeth and it screams”!) Remarkably, many of these
composers composed little or nothing for the guitar. Bach taught lute and had a choice instrument
among his possessions when his estate was inventoried, but delivered few works for it. Beethoven,
although quite familiar with the works of guitar composer Fernando Sor, wrote only a few chamber
works for the instrument. Perhaps the pre-Torres guitars of his time were just too intimate and lacking
in sound projection and sustain to be taken seriously enough to use in composition. (Beethoven also
composed a piece for the mandolin, although even the mandolin probably projected better than the
guitar of his time.) Berlioz was a proficient guitarist and reportedly conceived all of his elaborate
“sound of wall” fullness in his orchestral compositions on the guitar. Technologies advance while
richness in tradition often subsides?

A plausible argument can be made that the classical guitar is actually superior to all other instruments,
despite its continued lacking in sustain and projection. Contrary to modern preferences, it stands as the
perfect compromise to all other solo instruments and their respective limitations. Unlike a piano, it can
produce vibrato and other tonal subtleties of which a piano is simply incapable. But, the guitar can
handle vastly more complex music than a violin, for example. While a violin may have tonal/timbre
advantages, it cannot easily navigate the complex polyphonic, contrapuntal, and block chord passages
that a guitarist can breeze though. (Imagine trying Villa Lobos Etude No.1 in Em on violin!) As far as
the orchestra is concerned, yes you may need 50 or more instruments to come close to achieving the
expressive subtlety that a guitar can produce. Of course, with that many instruments looking to express
tonal variety, no compromise is really necessary.

Still, the basic point here is not that the guitar is superior. That appears obvious to the fully informed.
The real point is that cultural diversity is eroded by ignoring the traditions of the past. This includes
not just the compositions, but consideration of all musical styles, and awareness that technological,
sociological and other forces can conspire to eradicate much of the value of what has come before. One
day the various instruments made of Brazilian rosewood will deteriorate beyond repair. High quality
speakers and AI programs will still abound and probably be further improved. What is missing in
ignoring the past in musical tradition is far more than nostalgia. Just because most folks now think of
Jerry Lee Lewis as the flashiest of piano entertainers, ignoring the Liberaces of the past (or the
Gottschalks, for a gotcha comment), does not mean that we should simply give up on our rich historical
heritage. Culture in music has not ended. And, we cannot forget to look back on occasion.

Copyright 6/29/2021 Michael Wolfson email: mwolfson@stanfordalumni.org