Was Liz Phair, now Olafur Arnalds

I was totally going to talk about Liz Phair tonight, but I listened to the BBC on the way home, and think instead I'm going to talk about an Icelandic ex-thrash metal drummer turned classical composer, named Olafur Arnalds.

Some of his music was played on the radio, and I managed to track it down when I got home- he apparently released a song a day for a week, and it's collected on an album called Found songs.

The music is deceptively simple, usually a piano, and a couple of strings - a violin, maybe a cello.  I'm not sure if he recorded it himself, or what, but judging by the constraints imposed (song a day) it seems likely.  What's interesting to me (besides the stark, haunting, beautiful music) is how this music is kind of punk version of classical music.

Arnalds said in the interview that he left his composition program in college after a year, partly because of his career taking off, and partly because they didn't like his kind of thing.  He sees modern classical music as too complex, as trying to be so complicated that it's only written for other music students; he on the other hand wants to make music anyone can listen to.

In some ways, this is the reverse side of my pro prog rock argument.  He champions music that isn't challenging, isn't too complex for people to listen to.  But I don't think so, actually - this is exactly what prog rock is about: taking classical music and putting it in a context that is more accessible.  This is still about the genius of the amateur, and while not too challenging, it isn't punk.  This is instrumental, still somewhat classical music.  It is, in fact, much more "classical" than much of what gets labeled as such.  The Classicists saw the Baroque period as overwrought, and were trying to bring some starkness and simplicity into the picture.

I thought for a long time that more classical musicians should take rock music seriously, and one of the things I thought they should try is simpler melodies, and shorter songs - embrace the rock attention span, in other words.  These songs on Found Songs are two to three minutes long, and the lyricism of some of the melodies is breathtaking.

So, a classical musicians tries to buck the classical trend, and records simple, accessible music.  I'm still trying to figure out if this is highbrow or lowbrow.