20th century composer Sergei Prokofiev never wrote openly about his grief. Rather, through the composition of his second concerto, Russian audiences watched his torment unravel through startling, dissonant notes.
The first version of the concerto burned in the Russian Revolution, and before its rewrite, Prokofiev received a stark, blunt letter. “I am writing to tell you the news,” wrote Maximilian Schmidthof, “I have shot myself… The reasons are unimportant.” Prokofiev did not take the news lightly. Throughout the rewriting of the piece and with a drastic shift from his original vision, Prokofiev determined he would write in full dedication to one of his closest, though briefest friendships.
When Prokofiev earned the opportunity to perform his concerto for the first time, he aroused a reaction he hardly predicted. The audience was instantly polarized: some jeered while others clapped desperately, hoping to cheer over the criticism. “The cats on the roof make better music!” exclaimed critics, walking out of the concert. On the other hand, Russian pianist Denis Matsuev would refer to it as “Prokofiev’s Everest… first place among all piano concertos.” Prokofiev took pride in his ability to engender two drastically different reactions, though as the novelty settled, the animosity, too, abated. Truly, if listened to without the expectation of traditional classical music, it is easy to recognize the piece is far from a cat’s creation.
Contemporary classical refers to all classical music composed in the 20th or 21st century, and succeeds periods such as the Baroque, Classical, and Romantic. Arguably, it is the easiest to distinguish from previous time periods due to its irregular rhythms, inharmonious chords, or novel techniques that may challenge what classically trained musicians are accustomed to. All these characteristics join to create a Contemporary Classical’s distinctively dissonant sound, which may be strange or startling to the ears. Due to its unconventionality, unfortunately, it has struggled more than any other time period to be considered an acceptable form of classical music, with unprecedented unrest spreading through modern concerts and performances alike.
The initial reaction to Prokofiev’s second concerto is akin to the fate most contemporary pieces meet. In 1914, when Luigi Russolo performed his “mechanized” classical music—which included pots banging and fork scraping—listeners physically fought orchestra members out of anger. Russolo continued conducting through the entire row. A decade later, during George Anthil’s ‘Airplane Sonata,’ while some shouted in favor of the piece, others fought fiercely in the aisles. The police arrived at the concert to arrest a number of people. Every decade, there seemed to be another physical altercation at a contemporary classical concert. Truly, no other movement in classical history incited such visceral upheaval.
Within the contemporary movement, the visual arts movement is nowhere near as hated as the classical one. Strangely, when it comes to famous contemporary artists such as Keith Haring’s multicolored figures, Jean-Michel Basquiat’s brazen pieces, and Yayoi Kusama’s deeply personal polka-dots, none received quite the criticism contemporary music has. In fact, there are various records of contemporary pieces selling for hundreds of millions of dollars, including Interchange (1955) by Willem de Kooning for $320 million and Number 17A (1948) by Jackson Pollock for $225 million. Both break traditional artistic norms with paint splatters and rough outlines surrounding jagged shapes, yet these paintings sold for inconceivable sums of money, while the most Prokofiev earned were discontented howls.
There are two possible explanations for this distinction, the first being that art galleries, no matter how jarring, can be looked away from—concerts cannot be in the same way. When it comes to galleries at the Museum of Modern Art or the Metropolitan Museum of Art, a displeased viewer can easily move on to the next painting if the first discomforted them. In fact, the artist is rarely present at these galleries regardless, so an extravagant show of tomato throwing and shouting may hardly satisfy one’s anger for an exhibit. The second reason lies in the fact that classical music garners greater audiences at once, and people lose their individuality when indistinguishable from anyone else in a dark concert hall. As listener after listener begins to protest a concert—sometimes because each person is equally outraged, but often because discontent becomes performative, contagious, and emboldened by anonymity.
These reasons only happen to account for part of the rationale behind contemporary classical hatred. If live performances supposedly spark unruliness more often than gallery displays, what happens to ballet, or other onstage events? A rowdy audience is less often there. Even stranger, ballet doesn’t chorus booing or projectile throwing unless it is accompanied by contemporary classical music.
It is difficult to find a case of live ballet-hatred, and no one quite has the audacity to disrupt a performance to express their discontent; rather, it proliferates through articles and websites online. The viral article, “Five things I hate about ballet” by Lewis Segal—focused on the decreasing quality of ballet today—caused great debate across the internet, with counter stories in The New York Times attempting to protect the reputation of ballet. Segal notes, “If people hate ballet, they frequently feel guilty and assume that it’s got to be their own fault, that they’re not educated or sensitive enough,” and proceeds to explain why guilt-free criticisms are necessary. However, that is the extent of today’s ballet hatred. That all descends to bedlam when contemporary classical music is mixed with ballet, where the audience, no longer keeping judgement private, erupts into madness.
The Rite of Spring 1913 Paris performance, composed by contemporary musician Igor Stravinsky and choreographed by Vaslav Nijinsky, is now notoriously referred to as one of the largest riots in response to a performance. The dissonant sounds were accompanied by dancers writhing and twitching, dancing on and off the beat, and dressed in typical Russian peasant clothes. Far too many norms were broken at once, and the audience despised it. The uproar began also instantaneously, as Stravinsky stated, “when the curtain opened on the group of knock-kneed and long-braided Lolitas jumping up and down.” Nearly 40 people were arrested due to the commotion in the audience.
Before this performance, Nikinsky created various sexually and emotionally provocative choreographies, similar to the one above, yet they evoked reactions that could hardly replicate the chaos of The Rite of Spring. In his version of Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun (L’Après-midi d’un faune), the audience sat motionless through the performance—even through a scene portraying onanism. The extent of the discourse was a mix of booing and applause as the curtain fell. Similar reactions followed through his choreographies of Games (Jeux), and Till Eulenspiegel (a ballet based on a German folk hero), though the strange civility of the audience comes from one firm distinction: the music was often Impressionist, not Contemporary. Considering that most of his performances were accompanied by Claude Debussy’s critically-acclaimed pieces, who wrote with vibrant coloring and delicate, glass-like melodies, the audience was notably patient.
Clearly, there is something about contemporary music itself, not plainly contemporary performance, that is reflexively considered “bad.” It is something about inconsistent key signatures and harsh notes that many cannot accept, posing a significant challenge to contemporary composers and performers alike. Truly, is it possible to challenge conventional norms without provoking outright rejection? Or does contemporary classical want to be rejected?
It is important to note that countless contemporary composers are unjustly detested. In my own exploration of contemporary classical music, when performing Benjamin Lees’ Fantasia, I was shocked to find no key signature, alternating time signatures, and striking, rapid successions of chords that were surprisingly difficult to learn. Regardless of my initial apprehensions, the audience reaction was overwhelmingly positive, with comments remarking a deep respect for the atonal beauty of the piece. As it turns out, Lees’ composition was not the only contemporary piece to receive a laudatory response.
The first time I listened to Prokofiev’s Second Concerto, I was blown away by the rich profusion of elements that overcame all of its novelty, simultaneously developing an admiration for the technical skill it required. In another composition, Alma Deuschter, child prodigy and contemporary composer, before performing Waltz of the Sirens, announced, “I’ll tell you a little bit about the waltz that’s coming now, because it starts in quite a strange way and I don’t want you to get a shock!” The beginning, indeed, filled the air with the discordant, cacophonous sounds of the street—the horns sounded like cars honking, the strings like sirens—which gradually turned into a blend of harmonious ambulances wailing. As Deuschter puts it, “imagination takes over.” Philip Glass, another composer one may think of in the contemporary realm of music, wrote Metamorphosis I with playful themes, a joyful trumpet, and rightfully placed dissonances that never startle the listener. Even Arturo Márquez, who actually strays from any dissonant sounds in Danzón No. 2, finds his way on the contemporary classical stage by mixing frisky Cuban Danzón melodies into classical music.
The most controversial part of the contemporary classical movement is not its remarkably unkind noises, which people have mostly adjusted to over the past century, but it’s digitization. A dubstep remix of Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata mashed up with Chopin’s Etude Op. 10 No. 4 (Torrent) startled audiences with a computerized backtrack, with listeners remarking that “Neither Beethoven or Chopin would approve of this sacrilegious mashup.” Artificial Intelligence, too, has found its way onto the classical stage through composers such as Robert Laidlow, who uses a program called PRiSM-SampleRNN to enhance his pieces. In reference to his composition Silicon, Laidlow said, “The overriding aesthetic of each movement of this piece are the questions, ‘What does it mean for an orchestra to use this technology?’ and ‘What would be the point of an orchestra if we had a technology that can emulate it in every way?’” That is the common theme across most AI-infused compositions: they never intend to replace the human element. Whether that is an acceptable form of classical music, however, requires deeper reflection. Is classical music meant to preserve the naked beauty of a plain orchestra, or does it fall behind when it fails to incorporate technology?
Contemporary classical music isn’t just revolutionary. It breaks the rigidity of classical music, opens up newer, more catchy melodies for younger audiences, and expresses itself far more outwardly than any movement before. Brazen and unabashed, it rejects elitist notions, the exclusivity of classical music, and even the idea that there is “one way” to play an instrument. In a unique interpretation of Interstellar—involving 12 hands on one piano—while two people sit at the keys, four people pluck the piano strings, play them (almost?) like a violin, or lightly hammer them with a rubber drumming stick.
In this fashion, contemporary classical proves it has no boundaries. It fills itself with students tired of following tradition, and those who feel their self-expression is suppressed by classical norms. Unsuk Chin, in her composition Graffiti, states that she wanted to represent graffiti’s criticism of “the commercialization and uniformization of cities” through orchestra. Dmitri Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 7, “Leningrad” (1941) is inseparable from the politics of World War II, conveying the message of the city’s defiance against Hitler.
What makes classical different from any other genre is that all compositions, whether centuries or merely days old, will always be performed. There is no regression, but a constant expansion of every performers’ repertoire, which now expands across six eras at once. Contemporary classical stands out of those six because it evokes something all other eras avoid—discomfort and sometimes anger. It comes with the fact that unspoken topics and political upheaval translate to uncomfortable cacophonies.
I urge you to listen to one of the 13 pieces featured above. Let it challenge all of what you are accustomed to. Then, if you wish, you may hate it.
I urge you to listen to one of the 13 pieces featured above. Let it challenge all of what you are accustomed to. Then, if you wish, you may hate it.