A day at home spent with the New York Times archives. "Music; The Devil Made Him Do It" by Anthony Tommassini, and "Art and Politics."

Karlheinz Stockhausen.
A week after 9/11 in 2001, Karlheinz Stockhausen (as many of you may remember) released a statement during a press conference in Hamburg stating that the attack on the World Trade Center was "the greatest work of art that is possible in the whole cosmos," and that human minds achieved "something in one act" that "we couldn't dream of in music."

Personally, it's easy for me to discount all of these remarks as a fucked up statement from an aging-senile octogenarian whose egomaniacism has sunk him into a realm lightyears away from lucid reality. But should we discount such remarks so quickly? As Tommasini says, "perhaps Mr. Stockhausen is a raving has-been, whose words are best ignored. Still, it is important for artists to reclaim art from such reckless commentary, as Ligeti did recently in suggesting that Mr. Stockhausen be confined to a psychiatric clinic."

"Art may be hard to define, but whatever art is, it's a step removed from reality. A theatrical depiction of suffering may be art; real suffering is not. Because the art of photography often blurs this distinction, it can make us uncomfortable...The image of a naked, fleeing, napalm-burned Vietnamese girl is truth, not art. Images of the blazing twin towers, however horrifically compelling, are not art." -Tommassini.

Truth. Art is hard to define, and the advent of aleatory music and fluxus have made that distinction even harder - but aesthecizing reality, and further, aesthecizing terror, will always produce a very distinct line between art and lunacy. Mr. Stockhausen, may he rest in peace, is of the latter.

But then again, what of politics and music, and its inevitable connection with each other? Must the two coexist? As Michael Gordon claims, "what if I agree with your politics but I hate your art?" And to extrapolate a bit, what I don't agree with your politics but I respect/love your art? The latter is harder to justify.

"I’m not suggesting that we do this anymore than I would suggest you search through your refrigerator and find out the politics of the farmer who grew your broccoli."

Well, I love the music of Charles Wuorinen, but I don't ever want to meet him - a self-involved egomaniacal Republican with an uncanny ability to proselytize eloquently and effectively, who oddly (in the our field of music), is a staunch pro-Bush/pro-War supporter. Too often, the politics of ultra left-wing post-modern artists hurt me by producing horrible works of music; I'm hurt since bad art, ignorance, and stupidity should never enter the realm of left-wing; it makes us weaker than we already are.

I'm happy that we still have artists out there who continually fight for the liberal aesthetic, and the music of Frederic Rzewski, Steve Reich, Terry Riley, and George Crumb will always be top form in both its message, meaning, content, and music.

That being said, and on the eve of a performance and presentation I must give tomorrow on Karlheinz Stockhausen, these two aspects of art torture me. For a man who has pioneered such incredibly intelligent eras of aleatory music, electronic music, blended elements of serialism - I really hate him.

I might one day change my mind, but I can't see it happening.