Life as status

Where were they showcased, who played their music, which publisher issued their works. In science, there is an impact factor ranking the publications in journals. In art, it is not that formalized, but not fundamentally different, and when applying for an arts professorship or a grant, it is indeed important, where you were showcased, by whom your music was performed, and which publishing house prints your books.

Now, the selection processes behind these agents are not extraneous, and there is an aspect of quality assurance in this. And they are not new. For sure, Monteverdi rightly got his position in Venice and Bach's appointment in Leipzig was just.

But there are also many problems with this school of thought and judgement that is geared to ranking. The first problem is that the focus on the higher or lower ranked institutions deflects attention from the individual pieces of work. Following this logic, search committees, in spite of their self-conceived independence and competence with respect to artistic value, are left with nothing but copying off career paths from CVs. And at least for some time, success is like an infection: if you've been here, you can also get there.

The second problem is that yound composers are tempted to try and get to places that look good on the CV. That also means not asking: "What do I want to compose and how can I get a possibility for that" but asking: "How can I be played at festival X or by ensemble Y." This question is not about the music, but about status and what is displayed in the biography. Both motivations do not have to be mutually exclusive, but when music is not any more the most important driver, what has set in would be called corruption in the sphere of politics.

The third problem is rather fundamental. How do we look at each other? how much is it a view of who is higer, who is lower? do we always follow the paradigm of sports and think of an arts version of a Champions League, a National League, a Regional League? Is there quality that is expressed by independent categories?

In his stories of the Chassidim, Martin Buber recounts (p. 661 of the Manesse edition):

Rabbi David von Lelow hörte einmal, wie ein einfältiger Mann beim Beten nach jedem Vers den Gottesnamen sagte. Das kam daher, dass am Schluss jedes Verses zwei Punkte übereinander stehen: jeden der beiden nahm der Mann für den winzigen Buchstaben Jud oder Jod, und da der Gottesname in der Abkürzung durch zwei Juds dargestellt wird, meinte er, der Name stehe am Schluss jedes Verses. Der Zaddik belehrte ihn: "Wo du zwei Juden nebeneinander, gleich auf gleich, findest, da ist der Name Gottes. Wo es dir aber scheint, dass ein Jud über dem anderen steht, das sind keine Juden und da ist der Name Gottes nicht." [Rabbi David von Lelow heard the story of a simple man who said the name of God after each verse. This was because there are two dots on top of each other at the end of each verse: the man took each of the two dots as a tiny letter Yod, and since the name of God can be abbreviated as two Yods, he thought God's name was written at the end of each verse. The Zaddik pointed out to him: "Where you find two Jews next to each other, same to same, there is the name of God. But if you find one is above the other, these are not Jews and there is not the name of God.]