Conductor and composer Pierre Boulez was one of the most articulate members of the French postwar musical avant-garde, but now many music lovers believe his compositions are sonic sewage. Boulez played a role in driving contemporary music into a cul-de-sac.
- Frederick Stocken
Pierre Boulez’s musical avant-garde radicalism was part of how he rose in the public consciousness in the first place. But only a part. Boulez was a figure who believed, passionately, outspokenly and uncompromisingly, in the relevance of art to today’s world. In doing so he was controversial, sometimes confrontational and he divided opinion – but the trade-off was that he, and his work, resonated far beyond that of most composers and conductors. And while recalling the more controversial of his comments, it’s also important to remember that many would first have had their ears opened to classical music through his teaching (itself unorthodox – such as his so-called Rug Concerts in New York), the institutions and ensembles he founded (IRCAM, Ensemble Intercontemporain, Cité de la Musique), or the clarity and advocacy brought by his recordings of 20th-century repertoire. This, music-making, was above all his life’s work and his legacy.
There are few classical music figures who do have that wider resonance. A quick mention of some who undoubtedly do – Daniel Barenboim, Sir Simon Rattle – makes it clear that you don’t have to be an avant-garde radical or set on shaking the establishment to be among their number. But what unites them all is that they are all uncompromising in their art: it is integrity, as much as personality, that counts – the belief that music, or all art, is part of how people understand and engage with (and challenge) the world around them and within themselves.
