The Unanswered Question IV : The Delights and Dangers of Ambiguity

The Unanswered Question IV : The Delights and Dangers of Ambiguity 1976

9.00

This series comprised six lectures on music, which cumulatively took the title of a work by Charles Ives, The Unanswered Question. Bernstein drew analogies to other disciplines, such as poetry, aesthetics, and especially linguistics, hoping to make these lectures accessible to an audience with limited or no musical experience, while maintaining an intelligent level of discourse: Bernstein provides two distinct meanings of the term ambiguity. The first is "doubtful or uncertain" and the second, "capable of being understood in two or more possible senses"

1976

Saintly Sinners

Saintly Sinners 1962

3.00

Directed by Jean Yarbrough Ex-con Joseph Braden (Ron Hagerthy) has his car temporarily stolen by a pair of bank robbers who hide their loot in the vehicle's spare tire. After the car is repossessed, it's sold to the kindly Rev. Daniel Sheridan (Don Beddoe), who immediately sets out on a fishing trip. Not knowing that his new automobile was recently used in a heist, Father Dan gets the surprise of his life when he's suddenly stopped by a police officer.

1962

The Unanswered Question VI : The Poetry of Earth

The Unanswered Question VI : The Poetry of Earth 1976

9.00

This series comprised six lectures on music, which cumulatively took the title of a work by Charles Ives, The Unanswered Question. Bernstein drew analogies to other disciplines, such as poetry, aesthetics, and especially linguistics, hoping to make these lectures accessible to an audience with limited or no musical experience, while maintaining an intelligent level of discourse: This lecture takes its name from a line in John Keats' poem, "On the Grasshopper and Cricket". Bernstein does not discuss Keats' poem directly in this chapter, but he provides his own definition of the poetry of earth, which is tonality. Tonality is the poetry of earth because of the phonological universals discussed in lecture 1. This lecture discusses predominantly Stravinsky, whom Bernstein considers the poet of earth.

1976

The Unanswered Question I : Musical Phonology

The Unanswered Question I : Musical Phonology 1976

9.00

This series comprised six lectures on music, which cumulatively took the title of a work by Charles Ives, The Unanswered Question. Bernstein drew analogies to other disciplines, such as poetry, aesthetics, and especially linguistics, hoping to make these lectures accessible to an audience with limited or no musical experience, while maintaining an intelligent level of discourse: Phonology is the linguistic study of sounds, or phonemes. Bernstein's application of this term to music results in what he calls "musical phonology".

1976

The Unanswered Question II : Musical Syntax

The Unanswered Question II : Musical Syntax 1976

9.00

This series comprised six lectures on music, which cumulatively took the title of a work by Charles Ives, The Unanswered Question. Bernstein drew analogies to other disciplines, such as poetry, aesthetics, and especially linguistics, hoping to make these lectures accessible to an audience with limited or no musical experience, while maintaining an intelligent level of discourse: Syntax refers to the study of the structural organization of a sentence, or as Bernstein summarizes, "the actual structures that arise from that phonological stuff."

1976

The Unanswered Question III : Musical Semantics

The Unanswered Question III : Musical Semantics 1976

9.00

This series comprised six lectures on music, which cumulatively took the title of a work by Charles Ives, The Unanswered Question. Bernstein drew analogies to other disciplines, such as poetry, aesthetics, and especially linguistics, hoping to make these lectures accessible to an audience with limited or no musical experience, while maintaining an intelligent level of discourse:Semantics is the study of meaning in language, and Bernstein's third lecture, "musical semantics", accordingly, is Bernstein's first attempt to explain meaning in music. Although Bernstein defines musical semantics as "meaning, both musical and extramusical" this lecture focuses exclusively on the "musical" version of meaning.

1976

The Unanswered Question V : The Twentieth Century Crisis

The Unanswered Question V : The Twentieth Century Crisis 1976

9.00

This series comprised six lectures on music, which cumulatively took the title of a work by Charles Ives, The Unanswered Question. Bernstein drew analogies to other disciplines, such as poetry, aesthetics, and especially linguistics, hoping to make these lectures accessible to an audience with limited or no musical experience, while maintaining an intelligent level of discourse: Lecture 5 picks up at the early twentieth century with an oncoming crisis in Western Music. As these lectures have traced the gradual increase and oversaturation of ambiguity, Bernstein now designates a point in history that took ambiguity too far.

1976