Variatio 29. a 1 ô vero 2 Clav

Jamie James' disappointing The Music of the Spheres seems to serve a dual purpose: a slightly more intelligent historical survey of an underground philosophy, and an explanation of why music these days isn't very good. Kicking off with a study of Pythagoras' fusion of mathematics and music, it postulates that before The Industrial Revolution/The Birth of Modern Science, music was composed as a reflection of divine mathematics. These mathematics, identified by Pythagoras and Plato, then recognised by a variety of familiar Dead White Males, including Bach and Newton, provide the structure of the Universe.

The Romantic movement, with its emphasis on 'the genius' ruined all of this, leaving contemporary classical composition obscure and overly-intellectual: he names Xenakis as a prime culprit. 

In spotting a paradigm shift between the music of Bach and Beethoven, James makes a fair case for a change in the function of composition. Bach, and even Mozart, held down jobs and churned out tunes for cash. Beethoven, Paganini and Liszt sold themselves as artists, and for the later, relied on their superstar status to pack out venues. 

Without examining the cultural and social shifts in any detail, James does describe the movement from the composer as employee to the composer as entrepreneur. That's worth noting, but his scholarship is frequently limited - for example, he recounts the myth about The Goldberg Variations having been named after a particular player. Even Wikipedia questions this. 

But the idea that the variations - alongside much of the music composed before those bloody Romantics ruined it - reflect a universal set of values - is common place.  James' problem is simple: although he rejects the idea of the 'romantic genius', preferring to create a mathematical harmony as the gold standard for composition, he plays into the idea of genius by ascribing hidden wisdom to Mozart, Kepler, Plato, Bach and the boys. 

Even before I get to the similarity of The Music of the Spheres to stupid hidden history books, James fails to rid himself of the taint that he claims is ruining music (his last words are 'how we long for silence.').

And the role call of Great Men will be very familiar to fans of the Masons. Hermes Trimegistus gets a shout out, so do Newton's alchemical writings, the scientists who defended heliocentricity (reflecting the barbaric authority of the church, natch).   

More on Arika, and the logic of Hegemony

I am still ambiguous about this particular reading of hegemony - that the powers-that-be are in control not only of the obvious stuff (like banks and governments), but the very ideas that are used to discuss politics. For example, in my discussion of 'community', I put forward the idea that 'community' is a manufactured idea, a commodification of the more simple fact of 'being together': this doesn't quite tale account of how groups have shared interests, which makes them more than just a bunch of random people. Like a church community probably has an interest in God and Jesus.

This analysis suggests that the debate about politics is limited to the terms as defined by the powers-that-be: it's possible that a good example of this is the way that the 'Big Three' British parties seem to share a belief in the necessity of 'austerity measures'. It's not acceptable to reject austerity within their discussions, just a matter of how much and who gets targeted. 

Yet the description of hegemony is susceptible to being accused of conspiracy style thinking. It postulated a vision of the world in which the world itself is an illusion (rather than Gnostic heresies or some versions of Buddhism and Hinduism). 

What the Poethical reading seem to offer is an alternative to the accepted terms of debate - and a mocking parody of rationality itself. I mean, tarot cards are a form of bullshit (although I like the use of symbolism) and astrology is totes amaze bullshit. 

Sequential Cohen, Russia Today

No Answers and Some Lies

As I flutter around a broader analysis of Scotland’s performance landscape, I am starting to realise that some of the questions I need to ask are economic. The plethora of works in progress, or the alliance of various productions within a festival format, are perhaps the result of the specific economic conditions of 2013. My complaints that they don't represent a full range of possible performance presentations, or that they are a form of aesthetic cowardice, are undermined by the likelihood that they are the result of financial constraints.

Aside from my prejudice against Marxism, it has a fairly coherent attitude towards art. All art is created from the economic base. Art made in a capitalist society will embody capitalist values. Both Maria Miller's speech on the importance of art that has a financial return and Rob Drummond's sarcastic response in The Riot of Spring share a common foundation. Perhaps that's what David Cameron meant when he said "we are all Thatcherites, now." 

Applying this hypothesis is to go beyond the simple idea that the level of funding dictates the nature of the performance. It suggests that any message contained within the work will be part of the broader message of the society that has created and observed it. 

In other words, be as leftist as you like, chump. You are still on message. 

Unfortunately, I don't like to discuss the money. That's mainly because I don't really understand how wealth is created. I have a vague idea that it is something to do with the equation involving human activity and natural resources. I do have a good conspiracy theory, instead.

Let's assume that there is a consciousness behind the monstrous display of global capitalism. I'll call it Leviathan, and make it very clear that it is not the Elders of Zion, the Freemasons or the Rotary Club. It's a philosophical postulate that has no ontological basis, also known as a metaphor.

This consciousness has some kind of purpose: survival, I guess. And part of its survival is to make people work hard for its benefit. It has its benevolent moods, but every so often, it needs to remind the people who is the boss.

So it decides that it is time for s credit crunch. There needs to be too little money to do around. It pretends that there is scarcity. Being a Leviathan, it controls the media, and tells that to put out the message that cash is tight.

Then it cuts arts funding, convincing the artists that the credit crunch is real. 

At this point, the artists start to get interested in poverty, and DIY, and leftist politics. They make work that expresses their anger at the state, at the stock market, at the arts minister who has such a dry vision of creative value.

Being artists, they witness more than suggest solutions. A piece like Chalk Farm doesn't have an answer to the problems of alienation, but it does represent a certain experience. And this experience is made more real by being in fiction.

(If you let the Leviathan metaphor pass, that last sentence will have to wait...)

So, while the art appears to be against the dominant ideology, it actually reinforces its power to dictate the agenda.