Get ready, folks!

Hey, you! Yes, I'm talking to you, dear steemit reader. Let me tell you something: as long as you find your own artistic values, that's the way to go. I don't even care about what you find "artistically viable"... That's a debate I'm a bit tired of.

But if you are interested in understanding the music around us, from baroque to pop-rock, then we're in the same path. And today, thanks to @classical-radio, we'll be diving into the music of György Ligeti. I must confess I'm a fan, but I'm just a mad crazy music teacher, don't bother to understand how can I enjoy this music. You probably won't. But if you do, please let me know!

You know who enjoyed Ligeti's music? Stanley Kubrick. Yeah, the badass from "The Shining" and "2001 A Space Odissey". A bit of a jerk if you ask me. That guy hired a composer for that movie and the score was ready to be used. While editing the movie Kubrik thought "ok, I like Ligeti's music better" so he ditched the poor Alex North's score and went on with Ligeti. Ligeti was not happy also, since he didn't personally authorize the music to be used.

_{You can hear this whole piece in "2001 A Space Odissey". The graphical score explains a lot of what is happening with the voices. "Lux Aeterna" means "Eternal Light" and it's part of the Requiem (funeral) mass}

Ligeti lived a damn fucked up life in Hungary (what's now Romania). Having a jewish origin, only he and his mother survived to the nazi labour camps, but he kept going and became a music teacher in URSS occupied Budapest. Somewhat managing to keep in touch with his fellow composer's work, he developed a musical language strongly rooted to his origins, pretty much like his fellow countryman's Bela Bartók. He then met some of the most influent composers of the century, namely Karlheinz Stockhausen, and did some electronic music as well.

_{Although he didn't write a lot of electronic music, I find it quite nice}

With the passing of the year, his music became a bit less chromatic, something he had been deeply exploring. For example, the first movement of "Musica Ricercata" only has one note, and with each movement he adds another note, thus ending with a straight-forward dodecaphonic piece. If you saw "Eyes Wide Shut" you should know the second movement from that piece:

_{Ligeti said "I wrote this like a knife in the heart of Stalin". The knife goes in when he presents the third note, precisely at 1.50min. He wants the player to play that note as loud as possible, with both hand's fingers in one key}

There's a lot of Ligeti music I'd like to show you. But I don't feel like spamming this post with embedded videos so do your own research. Hear "Athmosphères", where he brings chromatic to a whole other level; his opera "Le Grand Macabre" because of the African rythms he was obcessed with; the cello sonata because it's cello music and I'm a cellist... And yeah, go search for Stockhausen's music, Bartók and other masters of the 20th century!

_{Almost forgot to post the guy's face. Here it is. Source}

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