Should I study in a music department?

One of the dilemmas that young people have is whether or not to study in an academic institution. There could be several thoughts against the idea of doing so: (1) ‘Learning academic stuff will ruin inspiration. Music should come from the heart and too much theory is problematic in this aspect.’ (2) The music field is a hard one and the academic career is even harder. Mama says: ‘go and learn to be a computer programmer and make a living.’ (3) ‘Will the studies help me at all? Why not study only what I feel that I need privately or from books?’ In this post I will try to challenge these negative thoughts and argue that for some people it is indeed worth while to study in certain academic musical institutions.

Heart vs. Brain in music

I do not believe that music should come only from the heart. Composers and performers work considerably with their eyes and hands. It is true that there are cases of people who do not know to read notes or studied only from hearing and playing. However, there are also many examples of great musicians who attended music schools and learned much in order to do what they did. I guess that it actually depends on what kind of music you want to do and which connections you wish to establish. Try to check where the musicians that you admire studied and see if you can study there too. Another practical advice would be to seek information about the teachers teach in the institute that you wish to study in, and see whether you like what you find. If you have a teacher who you wish to study with see if he or she are still there. A person told me that he once moved from Israel to London in order to study with a certain professor which he believed to be part of a certain department. Only after he arrived there he discovered that the professor was an emeritus professor – he already retired.

Learning academic stuff will ruin inspiration

Schools can destroy inspiration and one should be aware of it. If you have teachers that have a negative or too critical attitude, or if the institution does not encourage creativity, than this atmosphere might stick also to you. Try to choose the teachers and courses that inspire you and avoid (or visit less) the ones that do not. It is good to keep in mind that there is no perfect music department. If you have 60% of good teachers than you are very lucky. On the other hand, I remember that when I did my PhD in Royal Holloway, University of London, I had a discussion with a student from the Czech Republic who moved to London to do his MA in this department. He said that while in Brno he had both good and bad teachers, in RHUL’s music department the teachers where all excellent. Yet, this is perhaps true for only the top music department in the world.     

Keep a positive attitude

I think that if you come with a positive attitude to study music than you will learn a lot. I had a terrible teacher in my BA who taught me several theory lessons. I truly suffered from his lessons since he had a tendency to repeat everything he said about 600 times. The problem that he said the same things in ALL lessons! Two years after I finished my BA I was living in Prague and one day, while walking on the beautiful streets of this city, I suddenly thought about something that he said (I cannot recall just now what it was). And I said to myself: ‘this is one thing that he said that is really interesting!’. A positive attitude that I would like to advocate is one that argues that you can learn from anyone. Come to every lesson with the knowledge that you will learn something valuable from it, even if you are not crazy about the teacher.

Why not learn from books?

The idea of going to a music school is that you meet interesting people. Yes, you can learn all this through the web or from books. However, it is much more fun to learn from people. Enjoyment is one of the things that make learning more effective. I would suggest combining an autodidactic approach with the normal learning process. Spend lots of your time in the library and be active in search of information and musical experiences. Scan thorough books, learn to know where the different books in the library are, listen to CDs and records, and watch videos. Do this from your first day in the music department. Time passes fast and you will soon discover that you finished your studies there. Simultaneously, spend time with people: perform with them; eat with them; and talk with people about music. This will shape your world, give you access to valuable information and establish connections that will help you in the future.

How to choose a music department?

Talk to teachers and talk to students. Ask whether they are happy there and whether it is a good place to study in. Ask about both positive and negative things that are in the music department (there are always also negative aspects in each and every place). Try to learn as much as possible about the stuff and program.

Learn music and lose money

So your mother is worried that you will have no serious job after you graduate. She is right. Consider this carefully. When I taught in an academic music institute I told my students that life is far from being simple after one graduates. People who study music are sometime rich, but usually quite crazy. They know that life will be hard, but they do it anyway. They simply love music and want to learn everything about it. This is why I did it, and this is why I still do it today.

It will help you in the future – wherever you’ll be

At the end of the day it is really your feeling that should guide you. Examine all positive and negative considerations and then let your mother decide from you (just kidding). If you are talented and love music, you will probably find you way. Moreover, you can always do something else after you finish you studies. At the moment I live from managing a translation company and language school. I love my job. It is hard but it inspires me. I still do research on music and write in this blog. Actually, since I worked in this company I have more money to spend on music then if I were a music teacher. Moreover, I worked in the past in computers and also as an academic music teacher. So it is very possible that I will teach also in the future somewhere. It is clear to me that my life is not going in one clear path. I think that this enriches my life and makes it more interesting. I have different perspectives than most musicians when I write about music; and I use my academic training to learn things, analyze and make decision as a general manager of my company. I also use my knowledge in computer programming in order to build and promote this website. This is perhaps the best argument for going to learn in a music institute: learn whatever you can, be focused and look, criticize and value what you study. You can be sure that it will help you in the future – wherever you’ll be.

For people who are able to fit in institutions – at least partly, for those who are curious, it is possible a good idea to go and study in a music department in an academic institution. Remember that when you are in an academic institution there are many other department and libraries that can be visited. Use this opportunity. Whatever you decide, remember that it is not irreversible. You could always go to another department in the middle of your studies. I started learning composition, switched to orchestral conducting at my second year and add also musicology to my curriculum at the fourth year (I already had many courses in musicology in my program). This turned out to be an important decision since at the end I did a PhD in musicology. The decision was simple. After I took several courses in the musicology department in Tel-Aviv I say that I am learning there more and that I am enjoying there more than in the composition and conducting class. On the other hand, one should keep in mind that if you change an institute in the middle of your studies, you might find out that they are demanding you to learn many courses or even a whole academic year that you would not have to do otherwise. This is there way of arguing that they are better than your previous university, and this is their way of making more money.

I hope that you found this post interesting and perhaps even helpful. Feel free to comment in the form below.

Being a young music scholar in Israel is almost impossible. In other counties it is also very hard. A few words about the situation in Israel, which could serve as a case study. There are only five small universities: Hebrew University in Jerusalem, Tel-Aviv University, Haifa University, Ben-Gurion University in Beer Sheva, and Bar-Ilan University in Ramat Gan. There is only one musicological department in Jerusalem which has only four scholars who are there on a permanent basis and there is something almost non existent in Bar-Ilan. In Tel-Aviv the department was closed about two years ago because some, of I have heard, played with the University’s money and lost it in the stock exchange! Haifa and Ben-Gurion have no department of musicology. Moreover, the tendency to cut budgets in social sciences makes the future not very optimistic.

How young scholars react

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Teach music for Money

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06 Hanns Eisler — Elegie 1939, poem by Bertolt Brecht

Hanns Eisler - Nonett nr.1, Variationen

Giving a successful conference paper is not an easy task. I have seen more people fail communicating during conferences than people who presented their arguments in an affective manner. In my Review of the IMS conference 2008: what there is and what there is not to read in Hebrew in Music I promised to write about how to give a conference paper. In this post I will give several tips that might help improving a conference paper thus achieving better communication and a stronger effect.

Practice make perfect: read your paper before the conference and measure
Most papers are limited to twenty minutes (with additional time for questions). It is not uncommon to see scholars who do not finish their paper reading on time (I am speaking now about conferences that one reads from a paper). A simple way to avoid this embarrassing situation is to read the paper you plan to give a few days before the conference takes place, and measure the duration. If you measure the time it takes to read the paper you can decide to make changes accordingly. Take into consideration that the pace of reading during a conference is usually different than when you are more relaxed at home. It is better to leave two-three minute spare so that you do not feel in a rush during the reading. This will also give a more relaxed impression during your reading and motive more people to listen to you. I saw some experienced scholars to write on their papers instructions what to leave out in case that the time will run out.

Present your paper before family and friends and record it
It is very effective to gather a few people that you trust their opinion and read the paper before them. This could be an excellent way to prepare to the conference. Ask these people to tell you what they understood from your paper. Try that the audience will include people who have a potential to understand your paper and others who are not from the field of your study (perhaps even not scholars at all). Receiving feedback can help you understand how you look and what is actually being communicated to others. Recording the session can help you see how you are talking and this will surely help you improve.

Body language
Some people argue that eighty percent of what one communicates is body language. When you prepare your paper you can add performance signs that will refer to body movements that you would like to use in order to underline, illuminate or express the things you say. Take into consideration that movements are an excellent way to keep your listeners listening to you. With one an unexpected movement you might gain the attention of people many people who are otherwise lost, dreaming, or asleep. Yet it is important not to be rude or too sudden – you do not want to achieve listening, yet cause a bad effect on your lecture!

Using power point
If you decide to use power point or any other visual presentation of text, make sure that the text size is greater than 18 and that there are a relatively little number of words that are presented. The power point presentation (unlike the hand-out) is useful for two reasons: (1) it gives the listeners an orientation in case that they get lost during your lecture (trust me, this happens all the time); (2) it gives you structure to your lecture. Do not present table with lots of data that no one will see. In other words, keep your power point text very short.

Check that everything is working before the lecture
Make sure that you will have time before the paper giving to come to the place and check if everything is working. Check whether people can hear you. Check whether the person at the last row can read your power point presentation. Check whether people can hear your sound examples. Make sure that you feel at home (as much as possible).

Keep your ideas simple
Take into consideration that when one reads a text, one can stop and think about it, change the pace of reading, return to the text, etc. During the paper you give, people will not have the possibility to do so. This is why keeping the ideas simple and even repeating them (something that you would like to avoid in an article or a book) is important.

After you give the paper
Do not forget to speak to people that heard your paper in the conference. You will learn an important lesson on what you actualy managed to communicate and what not. Ask more than one person so that you will be able to receive more than one perspective.

Relevant posts:
The difference between a poor critic and a good scholar
How to write good texts about music

Please believe me when I write that it was one of the best conferences that I have attended. Due to traffic jams I missed the first hour of so of the IMS conference. I heard two papers: one by Shulamit Marom and the other by Alona Sagi. Both were very interesting. They made me think, and this is something that I cannot say about many of the papers that I heard in other conferences. Moreover, they both presented sound recordings, and this is something that is often absent from discussions about music. You probably all know the lectures that speak about music in a highly detailed manner, assuming that everybody knows about what performance you one is speaking about, and neglecting the act of listening to the recording with the audience.

Shulamit Marom made a distinction between “Mandate songs” that were written in Tel-Aviv and other that were written in the “Yeshuv” (elsewhere). David Halperin suggested that making a distinction between the two categories will not stand scrutiny in many cases. I have little knowledge about Zemer to know whether Halperin is right. I did wonder whether our contemporary thinking of Tel-Aviv as a “bubble” that is disconnected from the rest of Israel, especially in relation to the territories and the second war in Lebanon, affected the categorization that Shulamit Maron suggested to us in her research. Anyway, Shulamit Marom’s presentation was very clear and enjoyable. It is possible to see that she is a very gifted lecturer.

Alona Sagi examined the improvisation of Miles Davies in “Walkin’” during the 50s and 60s. She observed that as time passed there was a change from “vertical thinking” to “linar thinking” on the one hand, and a tendency towards “free jazz”, on the other hand. She mentioned the presence of young and experimental musicians in the 60s as something that stimulated this change. Sagi’s transcriptions were impressive and it was fun reading them while listening to the music and hearing her comments. I am using the word “fun” on purpose, since enjoying a paper is something that should be taken for granted. It was a pity that she did not manage to finish her paper due to time limit. Although she blamed it on technical issues of handing the CD, I think that a well prepared paper would predict such problems and avoid them. In the next few days I plan to write a post on “How to give a paper in conferences: useful tips”. I wondered whether there are more social and cultural issues that affected the technical change that Sagi described in the performance of Miles Davis. I enjoyed listening to this music after so many years.

After that session, there was a general meeting of the society. It was sad to see how much money was spent on the internet site of the society. Prof. Edwin Seroussi rightly argued that three years ago it was reasonable to pay such sums for buliding a website, while today websites (at least ones on the level that was presented) are constructed almost for free. I plan to write a post about the IMS website and what I see as possibilities for the future.

The second part of the conference was devoted to “what there is and what there is not to read in Hebrew in Music”. I could not stay until the end of the conference. I had to leave an hour earlier so I did not manage to hear the paper given by Prof. Judith Cohen and people that spoke thereafter. This session was simulations very interesting and disappointing. It was fascinating to see how people deeply care about the miserable situation that there are almost no books to read in Hebrew (most of them are not updated and out of print). Some of the comments were truly illuminating (I will come back to them in a moment).

The “paper” given by Gila Flamm was disappointing. It was mainly an improvisation that amounted to a presentation of “facts” by browsing through items in the National Libraries catalog. There was little information given on the nature of the books that were mentioned, and of the frequency that people read them. There was no attempt to categorize the types of readers and the various manners that people read Hebrew books on music. There was no discussion on the history of institutions approaching the library for such books. Is this information not available?

The paper given by Elisheva Rigby had few interesting points. She said that we must be able to explain to ourselves why writing about music is essential to Israeli culture if we wish to convince others. Her argument was based on the idea that any knowledge and culture are based on discourse. She mentioned the myth of the composer at the top of the creative musicians, the performers as those who could not compose, the conductors as those who could not play an instrument, and the musicologists and critics at the bottom of the hierarchy, the perfect impotents, as those who could not do anything but talk. This myth, as Rigby said, is based on the idea of “originality” that is initiated from one source. Postmodern views demonstrate how the construction of meaning is done in a social network. In other words, the hierarchy is different and every cultural agent contributes in potentially significant ways. It seems to me that the myth of the “genius composer” is, unfortunately, sustained also among many musicologists in Israel and the world. This is why performance is regarded by many as a marginal and unimportant activity in relation to composing. The composer Zippi Fleisher said in the conference something like “what can one do, it all starts with the composer, and then one performs it, and then one writes about it”. This is an old fashioned and anachronistic view of what is happening in musical culture. Beethoven would never be famous if it would not be for music critics and musicologists who wrote about him and elevated him as a Romantic icon. We would not hear Beethoven the way we do, and he would not symbolize what he does, without the words that were written on him.

In my blog there is a poll asking why there are almost no books on music in Hebrew. Many people blamed it on the academy who demands that books will be written in English. Prof. Don Haran speculated in the conference why is it possible that the French and the Italians would never think writing in a language different than their own, and we seem to find it natural to write in English. This comment was thought provoking.

Prof. Yoash Hirshberg explained how disappointing it was to find that his book on Paul Ben-Haim is not available anymore. He was especially disappointed that his publisher Am-Oved did not find it important enough to keep a few copies of the book. He compared the Israeli publisher with Oxford University Press that published one of his books in two prints and then kept an electronic copy for anyone who might be interested. There was bitterness in his voice from the attitude of Am-Oved, whom he called “a commercial publication house” and he ended his comment by saying that in the present situation he has no motivation for writing anything more in Hebrew.

As mentioned about, I could not stay for the last session. The first session of the second part, which I just described, was not well organized. The speakers were not well-prepared (in England it is considered not serious to give a paper without reading from a text that was prepared in advance). Elisheva Rigbi gave herself too much liberty in commenting on the comments of others, something that took too much time of the session.

This session, was however, successful. It was interesting for me to hear the comments that some of them I have mentioned above. One of the fascinating comments in this session and the one before, were made my Prof. Ruth Katz. She stressed again and again that we must define our goals before we take action. It is useless to speak about low attendance of members and that fact that there are almost no students who find it important to attend the IMS conference (I agree that they must be forced to attend by making their presence obligatory for finishing their studies), if the IMS in general and Min-Ad in particular do not define their goals. With goals well-defined much can be achieved with limited energy. Without it, one is lost. It was wonderful to hear that an evening is organized in honor of her 80th birthday.

The conference, it seems to me, was successful. I wounder if any practical points for action were defined during the last session. It would be useful that in future conference smaller groups will be organized in round tables so that there will be more space for interaction. In any case, it is wonderful that Elisheva Rigbi, Rivka Elkushi and others initiated and organized this conference on around this important theme.

I will be glad if anyone who attended the conference will comment on it or on what I have written above. I am especially interested in knowing what happened in the last part that I could not attend. One of the reasons that I opened this blog is to attribute to the Israeli discourse on music. My assumption is that if we want a discourse to occur we must actively contribute to it. So please take a few minutes and comment by filling the form below or by sending me your comment for publication in this forum.

Related posts:
Here it comes מה יש ומה אין לקרוא על מוסיקה בעברית
Call for papers “What there is and what there is not to read about music in Hebrew”
Response to Dr Elisheva Rigbi’s second comment: are we normal?
Why my Blog is in English: an answer to Dr. Elisheva Rigbi
We seem to fail doing the very same thing in music

See also
Article on the conference published in Achbar Ha-Ir

Do not forget to subscribe to the blog in order to receive future posts. If you need help with subscribing or commenting in this blog please contact me now.

One of the purposes of this site is to collect useful links for music (and other) scholars in Israel and the world. I have recently added a category to my research links page. The new category is called: “Postgraduate scholarships“. This page contains links to many very useful postgraduate scholarships. As usual, I tried not to make a list of everything, but to collect only the most interesting and helpful links. You can find in this site information about how to write a research proposal that may enhance the chances that you will receive one of these scholarships.

I think that anyone who cares about his work should strive to be an excellent scholar. Here are some thoughts of how one might achieve it.

Keep your contacts
I read somewhere (a few years ago) that I well known musicologist (I forgot his or her name) one suggested that a scholar should keep his contact book well organized. This piece of advice is worth gold. If I have achieved a few things in the past few years, it was a lot due to contacts that I kept. Yes, you must know to do the work. However, keep in good contact with people that are aware of your work, can recommend your work to others and might offer you things when they turn up

Think about your goals
Know what is interesting for you, what is important in your eyes and to where you are heading. Excellent scholars are long run swimmers. All your work should be structured around your goals. It is good here and there to reexamine your goals and to let yourself do things that are completely unexpected or unrelated to your goals. This might help your creativity and it might help you benefit from new discoveries. However, a scholar without clear goals is like a ship without a captain. Keep this in mind when you prepare a research proposal.

Methodology
When you read the works of others think not only about what they say but also about the methods they use to do research and to present it. Methodology is a big issue. Good methodologies are the key for major discoveries and achievements.

Pray to God
It is true that one needs to work hard to be an excellent scholar. Luck however is also very important. You should be in the right place and in the right time, and speak to the right people. Go to conferences. Be friendly. But most important, pray to God.

In my post “Musicology, Science and Postmodernism” I asked:

So what is the difference between a poor musical critic, who may speak about food when writing about music, and a musicologist who is supposed to transcend personal subjective metaphors and speak with slightly more authority?

This post is an attempt to answer this question.

Solid Evidence
Scholars are supposed to support their arguments with solid evidence. The more solid it is the better job you do. Try to attack the problem from various angles and show that your arguments is working well from all (or most) of them.

Usually, an argument is built from several sub-arguments. Try to show that authoritative scholars around the world support various part of your argument. Authoritative scholars are those who are famous and usually are being quoted by many other people.

Making the extra mile
It is hard work to find solid evidence to your claim. You might need to contact archives and libraries on the other side of the planet. You probably need so spend much time in libraries and archives. You will need to write research and grant proposals in order to obtain scholarships for traveling to distant places (archives, libraries or field work). A good scholar makes the extra mile. Most people usually give up too early and do not know how close they were to success.

Dealing with criticism
A scholar is supposed to predict criticism and welcome it. Criticism is something that most people find hard to listen to. Yet, criticism is something that may help you support your argument or change it so that it will be more solid. One should find ways to overcome one’s defense mechanisms and learn from criticism.

Writing with authority
Make it clear from the outset of your document what you plan to deal with in this work and what is out of the game. Declaring the frame around your work his helpful in order to make your arguments solider and defense them from criticism.

Write with authority. Use less words that show doubt like “possible”, “I think”, “perhaps”; use more sentences that claim to say something very clear about how things actually are, according to your argument.

Having said this, do not present things as fact when they are not. It is completely fine to present things as partial of as issues that need further research. If you write with too much authority about issues that are not clear, you can be sure that other people will attack your conclusions.

Writing style
Constantly pay attention to the way experienced scholars write. They usually pay great attention to small details. Some people suggest to convert passive voice to an active one, or to eliminate redundancy. It is also useful to break up excessively long sentences. All this is true. However, there are many other tips that you can learn concerning your writing style. Read not only what people write but how they present it.

Have fun
Different people define “fun” is different ways. Nevertheless, if your readers will not enjoy reading what you have to say, that means that you have less chances to gain authority in their eyes. Be kind to your readers. Take into consideration their time and respect it. I do not suggest that you should write jokes in your research. On the contrary, non-formality is usually interpreted in a negative way. Yet you would prefer that people will enjoy reading what you write. If people enjoy doing things they usually learn from it more and interact with it in a more productive manner. This is why it is always good to choose a subject that you love for your research.

Critic vs. Scholar
I opened the post with the question concerning the difference between a poor critic and a good scholar. The truth is that it is not black or white. A good scholar is also a critic. Scholars say their opinion about what they write. They do not pretend to be scientists in an age where humanities are understood as something that must transcend “objective” inquiry. Moreover, a good critic is not just a person who spreads his or her subjective view. A good critic knows how to write well and how to build an argument. The best critics also know the scholarship related to their criticism. In other words, a good critic must also be something of a scholar, and a good scholar must be a critic.

There is something annoying about being a musicologist and a postmodernist. As a musicologist one is expected to be a scientist, to reach an objective truth and to say things with authority. As a postmodernist, one is expected to doubt the idea of one truth, to show various perspectives of a phenomenon and to deal with the elusive thing called: meaning. Being a musicologist and a postmodernist may seem a contradiction in terms.

There is something extremely attractive about science. It tells us stories about the truth: one truth. It gives us a sense of revelation, almost a religious one. It gives us miraculous power to control the world and to dominate it. It cures illness (often creating new ones) and promotes technological progress (are we happier?). For me, the notion of “progress” is nothing more than a superstition. Glenn Gould was aware of it, as are many others.

In the realm of music, many are still worshiping idols. It may be the romantic notion of the composer-idol. It may be a cold notion of cognition, by seeking the “grammar” behind the music. The common act of this idol worshipping is that it bypasses the concept that music meaning is something that is affected by performers, listeners and the social and cultural contexts that they live in.

Dr Flora Jersonsky-Margalit kindly pointed out an article that is relevant to this discussion. Avshlom Alizur wrote what seems to me as a simplistic article about postmodernism. I will not spend my time demonstrating why it is simplistic. Who ever is interested in reading a more comprehensive understanding of postmodernism in welcome to read first chapter of Religion Without Illusion (in Hebrew) by Dr. Gili Zivan. דת ללא אשליה

It is shocking how much time is spent on teaching how music is built while ignoring how it is experienced. A music student learns hours of harmony, counterpoint, and ear training (of the type that teaches you how to identify simple building blocks of music). The music student learns about the history of the composers (less about the history of music). Music analysis often focuses on analyzing what the composer did in his score. A better way to do things is to teach how harmonic grammar changes its meaning in different contexts. How context affects the meaning of counterpoint rules in the music of Bach and others (yes, also other composers used counterpoint…). How the same chord receives different meaning in different contexts and how very different chords sound the same in certain contexts (the music theorist Edward T. Cone wrote in 1967 a wonderful article called “Beyond analysis”).

It is true that some students start learning music with the aim of becoming composers. Yet, others simply want to play music or learn more about it in order to further enjoy it. As Eric Clark suggests in his recent articles, the crucial question is what music means. In order to deal with this question one needs to speak about performance. Performance is something social. It is a scene where certain things become more important than others. Performers, no matter whether they admit it or not, no matter whether they are conscious about it or not, always emphasize things in their performance.

Dealing with performance is one of the ways to deal with musical meaning. It is not by chance that performance studies became such a vibrant and important field in the world, when much of the academic world is increasingly influenced by postmodern thought.

Why does one cry from music? Is it because of Schenker? Is it because of the score? The score has something to do with it. However, it is only one important factor among many that play a role in the creation of musical meaning in performance.

It seems to me much more reasonable that students should compare recordings with the score and discuss the issue of interpretation. Why one interpretation is good and one is bad (the postmodernists will not like this…). Not only whether the performer is “faithful” to the score, but whether the score is “faithful” to the performer. I find both questions slightly ridiculous.

Musical meaning is a negotiation between cultural signs that are interpreted and reinterpreted. The scene is fluctuating and the “truth” depends on the performers and listeners. We can write all day about the “structure” and the “rules” of perceiving it. Yet, if one redefines in performance what in fact the structure is, than how “objective” can one be a priory to performance?

So what is the difference between a poor musical critic, who may speak about food when writing about music, and a musicologist who is supposed to transcend personal subjective metaphors and speak with slightly more authority? I will deal with this question in one of my forthcoming posts.

Lady R (who wishes at the time being, not to reveal her real identity) wrote: “I enjoy reading all your arguments (with some of which I also agree, but not with the ‘monologic’ tone…) […] you tend to suggest that there is one correct way, which is the so called “new” one. I do agree with you that there is a lot to correct and improve, but that - in addition to the “old” ones, not instead (you should be in a dialogue with the others). Anyhow, it’s good that you steer the minds a little…”

Dear lady R,
Thank you for your comment. I am glad to steer the minds a little. I hope that also other will contribute comments to my posts and to the comments of others, so that a discussion will move forward. I am glad that many people decided to subscribe to my blog. However, I hope to convert more people to be active participators and not just passive readers. I think that the internet gives all of us a precious stage which could contribute to everyone – no matter what your opinions are.

We both know and respect each other for sometime now and we are interested in many similar things. As you know from reading some of my publications, the tone that I use there is different than the one that I use in the blog. The way I see blog writing, is that one can afford to express oneself in a more provocative manner than in an article. A blog is like a diary. One is not expected to be as “politically correct” as in formal publications. My aim is my several last posts, was to question the way Israeli musicologists think about their goals and methods.

What should we write? There can be several answers to this question and mine is not necessarily the right one. I have attacked Schenkerian research although my one PhD supervisor (Prof. John Rink) and one of my PhD examiners (Prof. Jonathan Dunsby) are highly influenced by Schenker’s work. It is a pity that the young Schenkerians in Israel did not respond to my posts. Perhaps they agree with every word… (-; Perhaps they are simply scared or are unable to debate issues of methods publicly. There are up-to-date research methods that are influenced by Schenker. Why no one came to defend them? It seems to me that this is a symptom to the sleepiness in our local quarters.

I do not think that “there is one correct way, which is the so called ‘new’ one” (although I must admit that Prof. Dalia Cohen too, suggested that I am monologic (she did not use this exact term) on our phone call). There are many ways. Yet we should be careful from cheap relativism. Not all ways are equal and they do not all lead to Rome. Some lead to Jerusalem and some lead to boring results. This is way I insist that the most important question is “what are our goals?” After one knows that, one can think about how to get there. The call for papers does not reflect a concern with this question. Perhaps I am wrong and we will see a live discussion on this matter in the forthcoming conference.

If books in Hebrew are supposed to make a lasting effect on Israeli culture than they should be present in the book shops and they should be up-to-date as in other fields.

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