Liquid Performativities and Value Judgment in the Music[s] of the 20th Century

Abstract

Changes in the music of the twentieth century have usually observed from the perspective of the composer and little or nothing from the perspectives of the performer, the public and the music industry. It is from the production of the composer that canon has been constructed and aesthetic judgment has been applied. However, in these changes, the three links in the chain of music have also developed their own agendas, which we need to consider to make our valuation of twentieth century`s music and the subsequent canonical construction more fair. In this article, I focus on the role played by these three links from the second post-war, considering the gap between public and serial music, the rise of early music and its historically informed interpretation modes, the development of a concert popular music, and the definition of musical genre from the performance and the listening.