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Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Kitsch or Art?
The performance is merely a superficial imitation of the song by Kansas yet at the same time there is an undeniable quality and skill to the performance itself. Even though the method or mode of interpretation is decidedly...unique .
I'll be straightforward: I lean most decidedly towards kitsch. However, the performance does leads me to the question what is role of the interpreter's skill in art. Is the label "art" inclusive to when the work is done with skill and beauty but decidedly derivative if not outright imitation? If not, how do artists inform and influence each other? Why is it still an "acceptable" expression of art to interpret classical music but not the popular form of rock of music?
Whatever the answers are, there is something ridiculously sublime about this performance.
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First impression: I'm really impressed. But not in an artistic way. I think that the emotion I feel when I watch this performance is similar to what I feel when I watch a gymnast. Is that an art? I don't think so, but it's a truly impressive display of skill. But as I think about it, the line between displayed skill and creative expression is a bit blurry. What constitutes an "interpretation", and what seperates that from a "show". For example, if I take Bach's "Prelude in C" and crank it up to 200 BPM, playing flawlessly, am I providing a creative interpretation of it, or am I displaying a finely tuned skill like a gymnast? I'm tempted to say the latter. But if I take the same piece and add a swing beat to it and perhaps an improvised descant, then it seems more like a creative interpretation (a form of art, I guess). What if I reproduce it perfectly as it was intended to be played, though? All dynamics, all rhythms as indicated on the page. Is that skilled? Yes, most people in reaction to such a performance would say things like "quite talented", but not "such an excellent Artist". In this case Bach is the artist. To me, I guess all performing arts are a pact carried out by balancing the skill and creativity of the original author/composer/playwright, and the skill and creativity of the performer. In the case of this particular video, I'm going to say that the only artist on the scene is Kansas (the composers), but the performer is certainly a very skilled technician, and there's nothing wrong with being just as impressed with skill as with creativity.
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