James Anderson5 said:I agree with you regarding modern music; Dylan is definitely at the top. But honestly, I think anyone with even a basic understanding of classical music would pity you for not seeing how Mozart and Beethoven operate on an entirely different level. It’s just like how fine art stands above photography, even if both are valuable ways to express ourselves...
If we were sending a space probe out with humanity's greatest achievements or things that truly represent us as a species, do you really think someone would pack Bach and Mozart versus Bob Dylan?
Rock and pop belong to different categories; they have value, but they are inherently secondary to peak classical music. Besides, Beethoven has been performed in concert halls for 250 years, and I seriously doubt anyone will still be playing Dylan in those same venues centuries from now, regardless of what people think today. Even looking back at the music from the '20s, '30s, or '40s, so much of it is already forgotten. Very little survives the test of time, whether it's books or music...
It’s like comparing LeBron to Jordan, or maybe Picasso to Rembrandt. To me, the gap between Dylan and Mozart is just down to timing—purely fate. Everything happens when it's meant to. Art styles shift, and an artist is always shaped by their era, but they aren't trapped by it. Even Tolstoy didn't write for the stage, but that doesn't make him any less of a genius than a folk singer.
The whole painting vs. photography comparison feels right on the surface since they look similar, but it’s total nonsense once you actually dig in. They aren't even playing the same game. Painting is about building a new reality from scratch, whereas photography is basically just stripping down what's already there. A feature film is more like a painting than a documentary is—and a documentary is closer to a photo than it is to a movie, at least in terms of how they communicate. Trying to force that analogy is like comparing apples to oranges. It's as pointless as trying to compare Mozart to Bob Dylan.
James Anderson5 said:I agree with you regarding modern music; Dylan is definitely at the top. But honestly, I think anyone with even a basic understanding of classical music would pity you for not seeing how Mozart and Beethoven operate on an entirely different level. It’s just like how fine art stands above photography, even if both are valuable ways to express ourselves...
If we were sending a space probe out with humanity's greatest achievements or things that truly represent us as a species, do you really think someone would pack Bach and Mozart versus Bob Dylan?
Rock and pop belong to different categories; they have value, but they are inherently secondary to peak classical music. Besides, Beethoven has been performed in concert halls for 250 years, and I seriously doubt anyone will still be playing Dylan in those same venues centuries from now, regardless of what people think today. Even looking back at the music from the '20s, '30s, or '40s, so much of it is already forgotten. Very little survives the test of time, whether it's books or music...
Hopefully he can find room for both. Wouldn't want him sending over an 8MB memory card from a PlayStation 2 or something.
Your question doesn't even make sense. You’d send the music over anyway, even if it was just some indie rock instead of Dostoevsky, knowing damn well some random Martian isn't going to translate the prose, let alone read it. They can at least listen to the tunes. Doesn't mean American folk-rock is better than classic literature, or that the band is somehow bigger than the author.
James Anderson5 said:I agree with you regarding modern music; Dylan is definitely at the top. But honestly, I think anyone with even a basic understanding of classical music would pity you for not seeing how Mozart and Beethoven operate on an entirely different level. It’s just like how fine art stands above photography, even if both are valuable ways to express ourselves...
If we were sending a space probe out with humanity's greatest achievements or things that truly represent us as a species, do you really think someone would pack Bach and Mozart versus Bob Dylan?
Rock and pop belong to different categories; they have value, but they are inherently secondary to peak classical music. Besides, Beethoven has been performed in concert halls for 250 years, and I seriously doubt anyone will still be playing Dylan in those same venues centuries from now, regardless of what people think today. Even looking back at the music from the '20s, '30s, or '40s, so much of it is already forgotten. Very little survives the test of time, whether it's books or music...
More apples and pears. Purely aesthetic stuff. Would you even show up to a concert hall to hear Dylan if he wasn't the one playing? Modern artists create for themselves—Dylan creates for himself—just so he can step out on stage and actually perform it. He isn't doing it for some hired guns scattered across the globe like they do in classical music. And what about those playwrights whose works have been on stage for centuries? Does that automatically make them better than novelists whose books just collect dust on a shelf? The "test of time" thing is kind of a wash. You can look back 500 years and find something decent from pretty much every single year. You’ll find something signed by Hemingway, maybe some Twain or Oscar Wilde. They all passed the test, and there's zero reason to think Dylan—basically the GOAT of modern music—won't. We aren't even talking about Joy Division here. So, the test of time doesn't really tell you who belongs at the absolute top. Honestly, the most objective way to judge an artist's impact is looking at how much they mattered when they were actually relevant—kind of like how soccer legends are judged by how they dominated their own era.
