A reflection on the (un)reliability of music aesthetical judgement

M.-A. TURNAGE, Passchendaele (creation) 

Bruges 14/10, Birmingham 2/11

1. Mark-Anthony Turnage, Passchendaele (2013)
2. The semantic indeterminacy of abstract music
3. The aesthetic appreciation of premieres
4. Precognition and perception

Paul NASH, The Ypres Salient at Night (1918)

On the 14^th of October 2014, Concertgebouw Brugge (Bruges) held its opening concert of GoneWest (the provincial commemoration of the Great War) with an all-English orchestral program. Under the baton of Nicholas Collon, Philharmonia Orchestra London played Edward Elgar’s Cello Concerto, Ralph Vaughan Williams’s A Pastoral Symphony and the world creation of the commission work Passchendaele by Mark-Anthony Turnage. On the 2^nd of November the latter work enjoyed its UK premiere in the Birmingham Symphony Hall. On this occasion Ben Gernon directed the CBSO Youth Orchestra, which is celebrating its 10 anniversary this year.[1] Not unimportant for my exposition is that this ensemble and another youth orchestra from California are co-commissioners of the work, together with Bruges.[2] In this blog post I will focus on the Bruges premiere. It’s not a review that we have in mind, or at least not a ‘re-view’ in the traditional sense. Rather than an evaluation (objective value judgement) of the composition and its performance, I will take my individual interpretation and appreciation (subjective value judgement) as a starting-point for a reflection on the aesthetical experience of premieres, its prospective stage in particular. Therefore a difference has to be made between the intrinsic qualities of the piece, the way it appealed to me and the way the audience reacted, once more, according to my assessment. This explains at the same time why I waited to put it online until after the Birmingham concert: I was hoping for a review with which to confront my opinion.