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Thursday, December 11, 2008

Carter 100!

Best wishes to Elliott Carter, dean of American composers, on this auspicious day, and may he have a good number more happy, healthy, years of composing masterworks.

Playlist: why, the Pacifica Quartet's new disk of 1 and 5, of course. I'll get my account of this past weekend's festivities posted some time today.

2 comments:

  1. Dean of American composers?? In some minds, maybe, but certainly not all (plus, the very idea of having a "dean" is pretty questionable, anyway). I don't hate his music, and some of the ideas are interesting to listen to, but a lot of it is weighed down by such massive doses of pretentiousness and self-importance that it becomes a kind of self-parodying kitsch. A comment Charles Rosen made about Busoni has become fixed in my mind as being apt for Carter - something about being a genius as a composer, but without musical talent.

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