More on taxonomy

I may seem like a fully-paid-up member of the Guardian-reading, tofu-eating wokerati, but the Guardian‘s end-of-year cultural lists can be mystifying, serving largely to enhance my sense of becoming an Old Fogey (cf. Staving off old age).

Now, I’m all for the demotion of the hegemony of WAM, whose claim to a fictive prestige has long been obsolete (note What is serious music?!, Is Western Art Music superior?, Just remind me again, what is music?!, and Feminine endings). Sure, the Guardian does give “classical” a look-in (here, and here). But I can’t help being amused by the niche sense of “old music” in this roundup—there I was, expecting a roundup of medieval ballads, Tallis, or dhrupad…

Discuss, with reference to a cab driver’s interpretation of “early music” and the oeuvre of Bruno Nettl.

Old music, allegedly.

New musics, Caccini 1601. Source.

As to “new music” (an article with the peak Guardian comment “it’s been an incredible year for Brazilian baile funk”), WTAF?! For me, still catching up on the stile nuovo (n.1 here), even an end-of-year playlist for 1707 (Bach, Handel) would be rather modern—and how about the New Music of the Tang dynasty, eh, with Sogdian dance grooves All the Rage through the reign of Xuanzong. Take THAT, Guardian!

And then The best songs of 2023 … you may not have heard (How did they guess?). The Guardian concept of “folk” seems a tad limited; and the jazz list for 2023 reminds me how paltry are my attempts at educating myself. Or we can try the Songlines-esque “best global albums”—sure, all this partly revolves around the concept of “album”, not uppermost in the minds of Moroccan herders on the way to an ahouach festivity. OK, I’m just ranting against commercial hype.

Don’t get Me Wrong, I do Delight in all Manifestations of the Terpsichorean Muse—it’s just that I’m ever more aware of being excluded from a lot of them.

Among my Mélange of playlists (raga, Chinese, jazz, Mahler, flamenco, and so on), there’s no beating my Playlist of songs, old and newish—not even quite as ethnic as it could be… Also delightful is A playlist for Emma and Leylah.