July 28, 2003
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Midnight Cowboy
A Last Hurrah for Harold C. Schonberg, New York Times music critic (not to be confused with Arnold Schoenberg, composer):
“His criticism of music he disliked could be harsh, and in a valedictory essay published at the time of his retirement as senior critic, he explained himself unrepentantly.
‘I thought the serial-dominated music after the war was a hideously misbegotten creature sired by Caliban out of Hecate, and I had no hesitation in saying so,’ he wrote. ‘Nor has it been proved that I was all wrong. Certain it is that the decades of serialism did nothing but alienate the public, creating a chasm between composer and audience.’”
The serialist composer Arnold Schoenberg, on the other hand, wrote:
“I believe what I do and do only what I believe; and woe to anybody who lays hands on my faith. Such a man I regard as an enemy, and no quarter given!”
Schoenberg
To which the appropriate reply is:
“Here’s a quarter, call someone who cares.”
– Travis Tritt, CowboyLyrics.com
Harold C. Schonberg
