626
PARTISAN REVIEW
poll, any nineteenth-century masterpiece would win out over any
eighteenth-century one - which would be to judge works of art as if
they were political candidates. Surely there is no shortage of people
who favor the eighteenth-century classical literature . And what of
the recent proliferation of fans of the baroque- Vivaldi in particu–
lar?
If
we are to play the numbers game, it might be a good idea to
have statistics and a clearer definition of the different audiences.
There is no reason to assume a monolithic public. Lipman, as a
former concert pianist, evidently has in mind the audience for piano
recitals , where nineteenth-century music is naturally played more
than anything else, since it was not until that century that the piano–
forte , which came into existence in the middle of the eighteenth
century, was fully developed.
Composers are perfectly aware (most of them) that their audi–
ence is a minority. As a consequence they are necessarily under
attack from any critic who writes from the point of view of the main–
stream. They should ideally have their own spokesman with an inti–
mate knowledge of the musical scores (often the only substantial
access to their music nowadays), instead of being at the mercy of
critics whose preoccupation is performance , and who justify a total
abnegation of the role of mediator between composer and public by
acting as if it were demeaning to deal substantively with anything
that does not have the stamp of an assured "masterpiece ."
If,
how–
ever, criticism arose out of a genuine engagement with the new
music itself, the obsession with whether a new work is or is not a
"masterpiece" would cease obstructing the sources of information. To
be told whether a new work is or is not a masterpiece is not really
substantive. There are many more cogent things a listener should
know about it besides this .
Lipman does not make it altogether clear how the nineteenth
century is to be used as a model , but his warm treatment of Rach–
maninoff (a composer who is admittedly undervalued) provides a
hint of the direction in which his predilections lie. Any composer, of
course, should be free to use the nineteenth century in any way he
pleases . He should be equally free to find his inspiration in any other
period, but when he does he inevitably brings down the wrath of the
purveyors of the decline theory, who in such cases find the reliance
on the past unnatural . For over half a century now, critics have been
attacking the neoclassic works of Stravinsky for their alleged absence
of stylistic integrity, and Lipman , who grants that Stravinsky's
"absolute mastery is never in doubt," keeps this incredible legend
