what are the most significnt classical works of the last 15-20 years?

http://listen101.blogspot.com/

'significant' who knows, but here are six works for chamber / orchestra that felt living and 100% cobweb free. I've only heard recordings, though.

James Tenney - Critical Band, 1988
Iancu Dumitrescu - Galaxy, 1993 / Pierres Sacrees, 1991
Gérard Grisey - Quatre chants pour franchir le seuil, 1998
Helmut Lachenmann - Das Mädchen mit den Schwefelhölzern, 2002
Morton Feldman - For Samuel Beckett, 1987

first person to say Ades gets laughed at a lot

Everything on the Eastman is enjoyable. He sings a long acapella introduction to his "Joan of Arc" piece for 10 cellos, and his voice was great! I wanna mash it up with Ciccone Youth's "Macbeth" and see how it sounds.

And second "For Samuel Beckett" and "Different Trains."

jaymc - is "new music" any better for you?

Phil check out Eastman's singing on Davies "Eight Songs for a Mad King" - its an excellent performance, and the "Unjust Malaise" set is really interesting from the one track i've heard. Lots of surprising twists and turns - v good.

Matt - "the road" - how is it?

I listed some 21st century recordings I was really enjoying in 2004 on this thread (scroll down for mine besides lots of good stuff at various points), if that's what you mean by 'most significant'.

Anyway, I'm not into this idea that classical has "significant works" that are released every 15-20 years (if you mean that these are works that, lets say, advance the state of the art). Instead, you could easily compile 5-15 recordings of works released every year, and these would be recordings of works composed in the last 5-10 years that if you got it could help you build a picture of what classical type music is with itself these days.

Dunno. "Contemporary classical" just sounds like an oxymoron. There must be a better way to describe music composed and performed in the classical tradition that doesn't use the word "classical."

xpost yup

"Art music" and "serious music" are other terms that are sometimes used, but some people are uncomfortable with those as well.

They're all sort of arbitrary, but I wouldn't get behind something like "modern composition." I mean, to my knowledge no one uses anything like that at the moment, and writing any kind of music is composition. Of course, "pop" music can be serious or artistic as well, but I think those terms do a better job getting at the heart of the distinction (if there needs to be one) between pop and classical music.

I don't see exactly what makes Stockhausen "contemporary classical" as his music sounds nothing like anything done in the 18th and 19th century.

I wouldn't even like to think that what I'm listening to as classical bcz I've heard v little before 1910 (and I'm sure ppl who don't care for anything after Debussy never mind 2nd viennese might be tempted to say the same) except i haven't put that much thought into a better name for this stuff.

I go for 'new music' bcz its a description of what happened to classical - how it was turned on its head, re-configured (destroyed haha) etc. Something you could seemingly listen to w/out "baggage". Don't like art or serious music bcz i simply wouldn't like to think of it as something so damn precious, and much of it happens to be funny (which surely plays with the idea that its art at all). xxxp

1986 - Harrison Birtwistle: Earth Dances
1987 - John Zorn: Spillane
1988 - Kaija Saariaho: Grammaire des rêves
1989 - György Kurtág: Ligatura: Message to Frances-Marie (The Answered Unanswered Question)
1992 - Meredith Monk: Atlas
1993 - John Tavener: The Apocalypse
1994 - Michael Finnissy: Folklore II
1995 - Péter Eötvös: Atlantis
1996 - Arvo Pärt: Litany
1997 - Alwynne Pritchard: Craw
1998 - Gérard Grisey: Quatre chants pour franchir le seuil
1999 - Rebecca Saunders: cinnabar
2000 - Ian Wilson: … wander, darkling

I don't see exactly what makes Stockhausen "contemporary classical" as his music sounds nothing like anything done in the 18th and 19th century.

The classical tradition means using classical forms - that is, sonatas, concertos, symphonies, etc., and typically classical instrumentation - that is, the instruments found in a symphony orchestra.

I need to hear more of the 80's/90's symphonic Takemitsu, though almost all of what I've heard seems tamer than his wilder arrangements for film. I also need to hear more Saariaho, & Meredith Monk deserves her own thread.

I actually went to see the world premiere of that piece.

His "Festina Lente" also narrowly qualifies.

Obviously using a symphony orchestra isn't a requirement for being part of the classical tradition, just a possible indicator. Experimentalism is also part of the classical tradition.

On the other, Classical (upper case) music technically hasn't been made since Beethoven. Then it was the Romantic era, then we have the 20th century, with all its subdivisions: serialism, minimalism, spectral music, post-minimalism, etc.

So, technically I can go see a "classical" concert at Lincoln Center, and have it be 75% post 1950 music, and even maybe have one piece be primarily electronic, without a stringed instrument in sight. Similarly, if I want to get a Stockhausen electronic CD, I go to the classical section of Tower Records.

Now, these days, calling new music "classical" is definitely a problem, both for marketing purposes and for purely semantic reasons. It would be better for the industry to attract younger audiences, by not calling it classical anymore, due to the internal responses that word conjures. Similarly, contemporary has different responses due to the atonal composers of the early to mid 20th century. Using "new music" (which I prefer) is really bland and says nothing.

So what to use? We need a name for all of the great music coming out of the new music scene that has more in common with the experimentation of Stockhausen and Radiohead than it does with Mozart.

Unfortunately, it's a stumper.

Don't know about significant but these are some I enjoy/have enjoyed (and I like lots that's been listed):

Diamanda Galas - Vena Cava
Elliot Sharp - Abstract Repressionism
Evan Ziporyn - Tire Fire
Fred Frith - guitar quartet stuff on Upbeat and Ayaya Moses
Lindsay Cooper - Face In the Crowd (sax quartet, played by Rova)
Shawn Bell - Currents II (a lovely classical guitar piece; post-minimal with lots of energy and pretty use of very dissonant harmonies; a lot of harmonics)
William Beauvais - Incoming Light (for prepared classical guitar; gets the sound of a gamelan out of the instrument; I'll disclose that the composer was my guitar teacher)
Robert Normandeau - Clair de Terre (Why do you shy away from listing electronic music, milton?)

Frankly, a lot of classical music, including some things that I've listed, is just too damn long to put on very often.

elliott carter - symphonia: sum fluxae pretium spei
harrison birtwistle - pulse shadows
alfred schnittke - string quartet no. 4
henri dutilleux - l'arbre des songes
györgy kurtág - kafka-fragmente
gérard grisey - quatre chants pour franchir le seuil
sofia gubaidulina - johannes-passion
chaya czernowin - dam sheon hachol
toru takemitsu - from me flows what you call time
luciano berio - notturno
luigi nono - la lontananza nostalgica utopica futura
kaija saariaho - amers
györgy ligeti - violin concerto
magnus lindberg - clarinet concerto

do i go on?

Glad to see props for Litany and Jagden und Formen (which lots of people reckon to be a hugely significant work).

Some things that haven't been mentioned yet (I don't think):

Adams - Violin Concerto, Chamber Concerto. Much prefer these to the more famous operas.

Birtwistle - Gawain

Andriessen - Vermeer

Messiaen - Eclairs sur l'Au-dela ...

Finnissy - The History of Photography in Sound

Loads loads loads more....

For what it's worth, I quite like 'contemporary classical' because it is both accurate and oxymoronic; it captures something about the disintegrating end of a tradition that is faithful to the music itself. The Wire's 'Modern Composition' and Alex Ross's 'New Notated Music' are nice, and ring-fence things much more clearly, but that's why I tend to resist them as genre terms. They rely on judgments about composer activity (composing, notating) that aren't always present in the music they're describing. Contemporary classical is contradictory, problematic (see also Kalvos and Damian's 'Non-pop', which is a kind of watered-down version of this), and that sits pretty well with the situation of every composer on this list - you can bet it's a question they've all confronted. Here's to awkwardness!

That said, the following examples all have scores.

Some late Lutoslawski scrapes into the "significant works of last 15-20 years" category, e.g. "Chain 3" and "Chantefleurs et chantefables" (sp?).

Some works by Brits worth a mention (not in same league as Birtwistle, but still very good):

Jonathan Harvey - "Inquest of Love" (opera)
Simon Holt - "Sunrise’ yellow noise"
George Benjamin - "Antara"
Peter Maxwell Davies - Symphony No.5
I wouldn't say Thomas Ades is a complete dead loss either.

(some of this has not been recorded on CD but look out for it IN ALL STORES IN 2034!)

Brian Ferneyhough "Mnemosyne" ('86)
Chris Dench "Sulle scala della fenice" ('86-'89) (both flute)
Richard Emsley "Flow Form" piano ('87)
James Dillon "Windows and Canopies" 20 instr ('85)
Barrett "Vanity" ('90-'94)
Michael Finnissy "Recent Britain" clarinet/voice+tape/piano ('98)
Jennifer Walshe "as mo cheanne" for voice and violin ('00)
Christopher Fox "A Canonic Break" ('02-'03) for six percussionists (+ tape? excellent bit when the percussion sounds like it 'decays' at around the six mins)
Rebecca Saunders "albescere" ('02) for ensemble

ywbs - go on go on go on...:-)

Sundar - A lot of the pieces I really like are probably 5-20 mins long - too long? A lot of the longer recent pieces I like (Ullmann's "a catalogue of sounds", 'Jadgen und formen', 'NUN', etc) have a kind of logic to them that's followed for however long it takes. Even though i don't pull it out often its such a good listen that I end up feeling that its enough (for quite a while anyway).

For the past 20 years, he's been busy producing mountains of new music which is all highly significant and all part of his magnum opus, LICHT, which is without question the most significant work of the last 20 years. I'm hard pressed to see how anyone could argue otherwise, actually, if we're simply using significance as criterion.

Not heard Licht but would probably like to, at least in bits.

-Music in a Similar motion
-music in 12 parts
-Einstein on the Beach
-koyyanisqatsi
-string quartet #2
-aphex twin remake of Hero's Symphony

those are the important ones by him as i can tell.

Michael Tippett - The Rose Lake, String Quartet No. 5
Elliott Carter - String Quartet No. 5
Karlheinz Stockhausen - Helicopter Quartet
Lee Hyla - We Speak Etruscan

There are great pieces by Feldman (Piano and String Quartet, 1985) and Takemitsu (To the Edge of Dream, 1983) that just miss the cut, as does Peter Garland's Sones de Flor.

A lot of people are into Chen Yi and Bright Sheng -- Sheng's "H'un (Lacerations)", from 1988, is highly regarded.

Some of Toby Twining's stuff is pretty cool. Also check out Stuart Dempster's Underground Overlays from the Cistern Chapel.

(Whatever Philip Glass has done that's significant, it definitely hasn't been in the last 20 years...)

I haven't met anyone who hasn't loved this record

I disagree about Glass. His 3rd symphony (early 90s) as well as powwaqatsi and 1000 airplanes, his songs Freezing and Liquid days contain some really good and important stuff. (ranks easily with other pieces by adams) had they been written by someone else im sure those pieces would be on the list as well. He's been too prolific and his work has become very inconsistant, but there's good stuff to be had even after 1986 (20 years ago)

Micheal Gordon also should be named - Decasia, several shorter works: imreadywhenyouare, the light is calling,Tinge, etc.

George Crumb should also be mentioned - ancient voices of children, but this, like most things on this list are well over 20 years old.

Laurie Anderson's O superman and other songs from the album "big science" contain some important stuff.

more of my 2 cents

Regardless of what anyone thinks of the music, though its quality is highly significant as well, the scope of the undertaking makes it the most singular composition of the moment under discussion.

Can't stand most of John Adams stuff, though the WTC piece (On the Transmigration of Souls) was about 100 times better than I expected.

Among the minimalists Reich is definitely The Guy, but everything I've heard in the last 20 years seems like a far cry from the brilliance and power of Drumming or Tehillim or It's Gonna Rain. Different Trains has flashes of inspiration, and Electric Counterpoint is OK, but I heard some of City Life and found it kind of embarrassing, it sounded like really bad Andriessen.

harrison birtwistle - theseus game
elliott carter - oboe quartet
peter eötvös - three sisters
morton feldman - piano and string quartet
elena firsova - the mandelstam cantatas
sofia gubaidulina - the canticle of the sun
györgy kurtág - officium breve in memoriam andreae szervánszky
peter maxwell davies - naxos quartets (ongoing)
olivier messiaen - éclairs sur l'au-delà
per nørgård - symphony no. 6, "at the end of the day"
krzysztof penderecki - violin concerto no. 2, "metamorphoses"
kaija saariaho - graal théâtre
alfred schnittke - peer gynt
salvatore sciarrino - studi per l'intonazione del mare
toru takemitsu - spirit garden
galina ustvolskaya - piano sonata no. 6

i'd provide descriptions but i'm lazy these days...

you're right, though, string quartet no. 2 and triadic memories are superior works. but sentimentalism has got to count for something.

I find Ustvolskaya pretty much unlistenable but yes, she's definitely significant.

try out his 4th string quartet, geir.

-- you will be shot (metaeverythin...), May 18th, 2006

Really? I've tried very hard to like this piece, but I still can't hear it as anything but an over-written, under-inspired drag.

Dear Mr Pretendy Hongrodot.

You aint gonna top that one.

"There's also "third stream" people like Anthony Braxton who fall somewhere between classical and jazz."

You know i never got round to doing a thread on early "third stream" music after reading some random article but now i can't recall a single thing about it.

I've only heard Harbison's Violin concerto - can't remember getting much out of it but that ws a while ago.

(Was doing some listening last night with this thread in mind - I'll do some more and do a list with a line or two...someday.)

Adam's "book of alleged dances" is probably some of the best contemporary chamber music i know.

most things i can mention have already been mentioned. But to note- pretty much anything i've ever heard played by Bang on a Can is important/interesting/good.

It's his name.
STOCKHAUSEN. Imagine that word intoned with booming authority,
preferably by a native German speaker. Everyone loves a good
Composer Name.

Right on, Geir. Damn those newfangled "african" rhythms! Damn them to HELL!

Anyway I v. enthusiastically second (third/fourth/et seq.) Osvaldo Golijov

Sort of. But the true avant garde has generally been made of classical composers. The innovations in pop and rock music tend to be of the "first to incorporate X into pop music" type, where X is something that had already been done by classical musicians.

There are also works in the classical canon that weren't all the experimenting though

Yes, obviously.

On one hand, classical (lower case) these days is pretty much a blanket marketing term, much like "alternative" quickly became used to sell hard rock that didn't sound like the '80s radio in the early '90s.

On the other, Classical (upper case) music technically hasn't been made since Beethoven. Then it was the Romantic era, then we have the 20th century, with all its subdivisions: serialism, minimalism, spectral music, post-minimalism, etc.

This is basically true, though I think calling "classical" a marketing term and comparing it to "alternative" is a bit overly cynical. Classical with a small c just means the art music of any era and any tradition. Classical with a big C was a specific movement in European art music which lasted from roughly 1730-1820. It followed the Baroque and preceded the Romantic period. The 20th century was different in that there wasn't much of a unified compositional style; the roles of classical and popular music in the average person's life began to shift, and classical composition was fragmented into many different movements, several of which you mentioned.

Anyway, just trying to clarify a little bit.

I agree Ryoji Ikeda's Op is spectacular, but I'm not sure it's "important" really.

All of Glass' most important work seems to have occurred before 1986. There's good stuyff after that, yes, but "important" I don't think. Maybe Songs From Liquid Days comes closest, since it made him the first classical composer to be the musical guest on SNL.

Aphex Twin isn't "classical" which doesn't mean he's not good. I think he's great (but I like Autechre much more!) Just not classical. I wouldn't put Ligeti on the list of most important techno albums, either. There's lots of crossover stuff that doesn't fit into easy "classical" category too that's important: Sonic Youth, Laurie Anderson, Slayer, all have had important influence even on many classical composers.

"But the true avant garde has generally been made of classical composers. The innovations in pop and rock music tend to be of the "first to incorporate X into pop music" type, where X is something that had already been done by classical musicians."

Classical music does some really good things. Roughly I'd say its amazing at handling multiple textures to create a noize/silence in a way most genres don't quite do for me, and obviously much electronic music and early forms of sampling were first developed by classical musicians. And there is a really good relationship to jazz via improv. But the statement isn't really true - bass-centered music, say, wasn't developed by classical musicians (or if it was I've still to hear it). Or how about R&B type singing? The orchestra just isn't very good at doing certain rhythms..

Clearly not every style of music was pioneered by classical composers; but "bass-centered music" and "R&B-type singing" don't strike me as major innovations in the same way as, say, polyphony, sampling, atonality, minimalism, program music, synthesizers, etc. Frankly I'm not sure what you mean by "bass-centered music;" plenty of art music could be described as bass-centered.

I dunno I just read yr post as one of those "classical music is always ahead of the curve hurrah!" type things and then I remember some of the fusionistic exercises, some of the attempts of classical musicians to incorporate electric guitars and lots of minimalism I have nothing but contempt for and all i see is red.

And I'm not sure what you mean when you say minimalism, but the minimalism movement in classical music (based on lots of repetition with minor variations) has been cited as the progenitor of techno and what have you.