Date: Thu, 20 May 1999 20:06:08 -0700 (PDT)
From: Dennis R Redmond <dredmond-AT-OREGON.UOREGON.EDU>
Subject: Re: ADORNO & JAZZ: JAUSS CONTRA ADORNO [12]


On Wed, 19 May 1999, Ralph Dumain wrote:

> morbid little troll who can't do any better than wallow in the death throes
> of European culture, such as the wretched, malodorous productions of
> Shoenberg and Beckett, a culture that deserves to die, a culture that
> deserves to be exterminated if it will not leave us of its own free will.

"Die Ausrottung und Vernichtung der entarteten Kunst" is the exact term, I
believe. 

I wonder how many folks on this list, though, have heard and truly
appreciate the works of the Second Viennese School (the magnificent Alban
Berg, the crystalline Anton Webern, and the epic Arnold Schoenberg). They
are the equivalent in richness and complexity of the greatest of the jazz
modernist compositions (Armstrong, Basie, Bird, Monk, Coltrane, etc.
etc.). In fact, the increasingly collectivized masterpieces of postmodern
music (Hendrix, Velvet Underground, Bob Marley, Cypress Hill... my guess
is I'll be adding Dr.  Octagon to this list soon, too) would be
unthinkable without the School's central achievement, which was to shatter
the hegemony of tonality forever, and unleash the instrumental
productivities of the orchestra, in much the same way that Bird and Monk
emancipated the saxophone and the piano from the rhythmic conformities of
a mass-culture-trending big band and swing.

And as Heiner Mueller put it, Wozzeck continues to shave his superior,
every day.

-- Dennis