AGAINST

1. Classical music is a complicated art: it's difficult to find one's way into it.

2. It's an exclusive art: most people don't like or understand it. It's not a popular art.

3. The very length of most classical music pieces can send any listener to sleep,

4. People want the kind of music to, which they can dance or just talk to friends. It should be simple, cheerful and up-to-date.

 

 

5. When you criticize you normally try to find faults rather than virtues, but it certainly does not exclude the expressions of virtue. Read the following dia­logue where the characters make comments about themselves and others. Note down the expressions in bold type. Be ready to use them in dialogues in class:

Liz and Michael on the way home from a jazz concert.

Michael: Perhaps you might consider me a bit of a fanatic about jazz... but that was a fantastic concert, wasn't it?

Liz: I'm not exactly — how shall I say? I suppose I'm not crazy about jazz,and the melodies were hard to follow. Could you perhaps help me to understand it better?

Michael: I've tried to help many people... I've done my best to open a jazz club, so I've become quite good at interpreting jazz, though I had no one to rely on. Anyway, in the first place there are two elements in jazz. One is the playing of instru­ments so that they sound like the half-shouted, half-sung blues of Negro folksong. The other is the steady, unchanging 1-2-3-4

beat initiated from the French military marching music the blacks heard in New Orleans where jazz was born around 1900.

Liz: Well, I'm an easy-going person really unless of course you start discussing jazz. Then I'm a bit vicious. Basically I'm receptive to any music that has harmony and melody. That's me. But I didn't even recognize any of the tunes, though I have heard some jazzmusic before.

Michael: Well, that's riot surprising, since another important feature of jazz is "improvisation" or "making it up as you go along", therefore tunes can sound different each time you hear them.

Liz: Well, I think I've kept myself —- yes, I've kept myself respectable — that's the word I'd use — respectable and dignified on my appreciation of jazz. The musicians played with great skill and speed. And when they improvised they played a completely new variation of the basic tune every time.

Michael: Absolutely. That's one of the greatest thrills of a jazz session. Tunes are not the most important feature of jazz. It's not the composer but the performer who makes a good piece of jazz. In fact it's almost impossible to write down much of a jazz in musical notes!

Liz: In that case jazz is rather elicit and separate from other kinds of misic, if only the performer knows what's being played. I say, get rid of these thugs who call themselves professional musicians — get rid of them.

Michael: Professional or not, you leave the musician out' of it for a while/As for jazz, it has influenced many kinds of music, particularly pop which still borrows from jazz its beat, its singing style and its improvisation.

Liz: You shouldn't be asking me what I think of jazz... But what I think of rock music... this music is a mess.

Michael: But how do you explain the fact that hurfdreds and thousands of young people simply go mad over rock music? For example, I listened to Shubert's messes. I'm not saying that I didn't understand them. As a matter of fact I enjoyed listening to them. But music like that isn't able to give me anything new, whereas rock music feels a thousand times nearer, more immediate.

Liz: No, Michael, I'm unable to understand it. And that's probably my main fault, I should say. Then... Professional musicians are always neatly dressed... But heavy metal rock players! Well... you'd have to see them to believe it. There is only one hope for it — a special section (department) for rock music at the Composer's Union that will do something about the situation.

Michael: So you're the sort of ordinary decent person who wants to restore the position ot classical music.

Liz: Yes and no... But I'll let you have the last word on jazz and I'll stick to my own opinion on rock.

1. Have you ever been to a live jazz concert/rock music concert? What is your impression of them?

2. Do you agree with all that is said in the dialogue? In what statements concerning jazz or rock music do you find the criticism appropriate?

 

Below are statements about music which express different opinions. Imagine that they are your opinions and change them into subjective argu­ments. (Use the expressions showing critisism.):

1. "There is only one way to come to understand music by learning to play a musical instrument whether an external one like the piano or flute or by training the human voice to become an instrument."

2. "However good recorded music might be, it can never really take the place of a live performance. To be present at an actual performance is half the enjoyment of music."

3. "I find I have to defend jazz to those who say it is low class. As a matter of fact all music has low class origin, since it comes from folk music, which is necessarily earthly. After all Haydn minuets are only a refinement of simple, rustic German dances, and so are Beethoven scherzos. An aria from a Verdi opera can often be traced back to the simplest Neapolitan fisherman."