The Myth of the Hague School

— Cornelis de Bondt
[Photo: Ralph Kamena]

When goodness appears openly, it is no longer goodness, though it may still be useful as organized charity or an act of solidarity. […] Goodness can exist only when it is not perceived as such, not even by its author; whoever sees himself performing a good work is no longer good, but at best a useful member of society or a dutiful member of a church. […] Only goodness must go into absolute hiding and flee all appearance if it is not to be destroyed.
— Hanna Arendt ¹⁾

1 — Goodness that is named as such is destroyed in its name. This view of Arendt appears indebted to Kant’s ideas about morality: that we must strive for the good out of duty to the law. But not as a tendency. Kant gives the example of a merchant who calculates fair prices for his customers, so a viola-player can expect the same price as a composer. But, Kant wonders, does this merchant do so out of duty to the law, or because he ultimately benefits from it, equal prices being good for trade? The latter, of course, which means the honesty of the merchant stems from a tendency.²⁾ Arendt’s and Kant’s views also remind me of a statement by Aristotle about virtue. After rejecting the consideration of virtue as a ‘property’, he concludes that virtue is a ‘work’. Virtue, along with the good that follows it, takes place in the act.³⁾ This brings us to another pair of concepts, the contrast between objectwise and subjectwise.⁴⁾ The subjectwise takes place in an act, between subjects. For example, when I speak about one of the attendees in the third person during a meeting or discussion, instead of addressing him or her directly, that subject becomes an object. In a subjectwise act, such as a conversation, a lesson, a concert, or preparing a meal, the act itself is central. In an objectwise act, the end result is primary; the consumed meal serves to satisfy hunger, the concert must lead to a good review and ultimately preferably to immortal fame, and for the lesson, predetermined information must be conveyed and lead to a report or diploma. In an objectwise act, a person, but it can also relate to a subject or a process, is made into an ‘object’; into a ‘thing’. In the worst case, this can lead to a form of dehumanization. I call the ‘goodness’ of Kant’s merchant, who in his sales policy earned the name ‘fair prices’, objectwise.

2 — The primary form of historiography is objectwise in nature. Musicologists often divide the work of composers into a limited number of periods, for example: youth period, middle period, and mature period, and they classify certain groups of composers into ‘schools’. Furthermore, a specific period in history is given a name, for example, ‘Romanticism’, and specific characteristics are attributed to it. This allows the historian to grasp time. The group that came to be known as the ‘Hague School’ also fell into this trap, claiming, for example, that their school was ‘anti-romantic’ because they based it on some external characteristics. In the way my wife recognizes a car brand: by its colour. (Of course, that’s also one of the reasons I love her, but love isn’t always a friend of truth.)

The excellent book ‘Romantism — A German Affair’ by Rüdiger Safranski shows that it can be different. In the preface, he distinguishes between the concepts of Romanticism and the romantic. Romanticism is for him a ‘period’, the romantic a ‘state of mind’, which is not bound to a period. [The romantic] found its most perfect expression in the era of Romanticism, but it is not limited to that; the romantic exists to this day.⁵⁾ For Safranski, a statement by Novalis is the best definition of Romanticism: By endowing the banal a lofty meaning, the ordinary a mysterious respect, the known the dignity of the unknown, the finite an appeariance of infinity, I romanticize it.⁶⁾

3 — The subject of the so-called ‘Hague School’ is evidently unavoidable for me; I have often been confronted with the question of its definition. “What does this term actually mean?” It is usually associated with the music around Louis Andriessen and the group Hoketus. Indeed, I was (also) a student of Andriessen long ago, and I wrote the piece ‘Bint’ for Hoketus. There is often talk of a typical compositional style, which is akin to minimal music, though in fortissimo, with an ‘earthy sound’ based on electric amplification, and a harmony more related to European music (partly chromatic). With this connotation, I have never felt connected. I have never been ‘a member of a club’. The most striking thing one can say about the ‘Hague School’ is that it disappeared the moment the name was coined. Somewhere in the ’80s. It is not entirely clear who coined the term ‘Hague School’. In a series of interviews realized by Peter van Bergen for LOOS, Andriessen suggests that a staff member of a newspaper first used the term in a review. What is certain is that Andriessen embraced the term with satisfact, after which specific stylistic features were quickly associated with it. In addition to the aforementioned references to minimal music and fortissimo, the ‘anti-romantic’ attitude became particularly popular. And of course, every student of Andriessen who cloned him in their pieces was automatically counted among that ‘school’. The objectification of a practice into a brand is convenient for the market. However, Andriessen is ‘Hague School’, but the ‘Hague School’ is not Andriessen; a cow is an animal, but the reverse is not true. When we filter out the usual external characteristics of the concept of ‘romanticism’ and look at the ‘underlying form’, the conclusion is unavoidable that the concept of the ‘Hague School’ is indeed a typical romantic phenomenon. Calling something ‘anti-romantic’ is actually a romantic act.

Terms like ‘anti-romantic’ and ‘fortissimo’ are instruments aimed at myth-making. The use of fortissimo in some pieces of the so-called ‘Hague School’ has a structural, substantive reason and does not stem from a matter of taste; it is not emotion, decoration, or coloring. It is about addressing an ‘attack’, the moment when a sound (tone, or chord) occurs; the ‘carving of time’ requires fortissimo. You carve with a steel chisel, not with a velvet scarf. Thus, this fortissimo is not a characteristic of the ‘Hague School’; it is a consequence of something that can indeed be considered a characteristic: in this case, the investigation into rhythm and meter, into heavy versus light beats, but also into the relationship between notation and execution, between composer and musician.⁷⁾

4 — The essence of what later became known as the ‘Hague School’ lies roughly in the period from the 1960s to the 1980s at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague. We find it in the practices of Louis Andriessen, Kees van Baaren, Gilius van Bergeijk, Frans Brüggen, Reinbert de Leeuw, Misha Mengelberg, Dick Raaijmakers, Jan van Vlijmen, and in the ensembles Hoketus and LOOS, but also — and this immediately highlights the irrelevance of that name — in Beethoven, Monteverdi, and Stockhausen. This attitude has to do with the distinction mentioned above between subjectwise and objectwise, and ultimately between understanding that a practice is not a possession (an object) but an act (a use).

Dick Raaijmakers and Jan van Vlijmen were key figures; Van Vlijmen was the director of the conservatory who initiated various innovations in education; Raaijmakers was the head of the composition department, he had brought in the electronic studio with Jan Boerman and was the architect of the famous ‘May concerts’. Van Vlijmen founded the Early Music department, following the projects of Nicolaus Harnoncourt, first on Monteverdi, and later on Bach. He also brought the Institute of Sonology from Utrecht to the conservatory.

The influence of early music practice on new music cannot be overstated. Not only were many musicians from that practice also active in new music, I remember Frans Brüggen playing Louis Andriessen’s ‘Melodie’ together during a May concert. Brüggen was also involved in the opera ‘Reconstructie’. But probably even more important was the research into Baroque tunings. The mentality of both departments, of both old and new music practice, was the same: adventurous, investigative, curious, and open-minded. That is the core of what later came to be called the ‘Hague School’. It was absolutely not about some music style; it was about an attitude.⁸⁾

5 — This issue brings me to the controversy that unfolded between Claudio Monteverdi and Giovanni Artusi at the beginning of the 17th century. Artusi accused Monteverdi of excessively free use of dissonances. In a printed text, Artusi criticized Monteverdi’s madrigal Cruda Amarilli in the form of a dialogue between the master Vario and the student Luca. At one point, Vario says:

Even if you were to wish for the dissonance to become consonance, it remains necessary that it remains opposed to consonance; by nature, it is always dissonant, and, therefore, it can only become consonant if consonance becomes dissonance. This results in nothing but impossibilities, although these new composers may believe that they will one day discover a new method in which dissonance becomes consonance and consonance becomes dissonance.⁹⁾

Artusi predicts Webern. Unlike the critics of the second half of the 20th century, with the British philosopher Robert Scruton as a faded flag on a filthy mudboat, who believed that the concept of ‘dissonance’ was the equivalent of the taste judgment ‘ugliness’, Artusi’s criticism is fundamental and therefore much more interesting. He does not condemn the use of dissonances as such, but he criticizes the context, namely what he sees as Monteverdi’s incorrect application of voice-leading principles.

Of course, voice-leading principles are not universal principles for all existing musical styles, but within the musical styles to which they apply, they represent a general regularity. This regularity is rooted in both a sound (physical) regularity and a theoretical regularity against which composers can measure themselves. This applies to all artistic-theoretical principles; they are conceived and not eternal. This was the mistake Artusi made in his confrontation with Monteverdi, believing that the rules of voice-leading were God-given, eternal principles; objects, therefore. Monteverdi took liberties with the voice-leading rules, in this regard Artusi was right; Monteverdi allowed himself freedoms that went beyond the principles. He wanted to put music in the service of the text, and for him, it was necessary to allow himself those freedoms. The artistic principles, which are discursively formulated in theory, are essentially a continuously evolving mechanism, against which every brilliant composer establishes their position — as a composer, not as a theoretician. Despite the steady development of artistic style principles, three basic principles remain unchanged: concept, context, and consistency. The style principles are part of the context. Their development, Monteverdi’s deviations, everything is part of the context. Artusi’s criticism should not have been directed at Monteverdi’s deviations from the principles, but at whether these deviations were applied consistently

Any theorist or musicologist who does not understand this, or rejects it, considers art sacred, and therefore as an object; they resist the profanation of art and thus do not understand art. Art is not an object, but an act, a tragic act.

6 — As mentioned earlier, the coining of the name ‘Hague School’ spelled its demise. Foreign commentators had blindly adopted the link to Andriessen from their Dutch colleagues, and the myth was set in motion. Everyone talked about Louis Andriessen, and no one bothered to delve into the crucial role of Dick Raaijmakers, for example. As the expression goes: ‘You lie as though it’s written in stone.’ The school had become an object. But even among the so-called representatives of that ‘school’, this was commonplace. This led to ridiculous problems, because how could you reconcile the work of Raaijmakers or Van Bergeijk with the stylistic characteristics such as ‘minimal’ and ‘fortissimo’ that were commonly associated with it?

The end of the practice of that Hague school is indicative; the painful forced departure of Raaijmakers as a teacher in 1995 already hinted at how things would go. At my own farewell, those hints were already thrown out the window; the faculty of the composition department wanted to get rid of that ‘Hague School mentality’, which was bad for business. The obituary from the board on February 14, 2020, upon the death of Reinbert de Leeuw subtly shows where the school stood by then. The conclusion reads as follows:

[…] His passing, it seems, regarded the end of an era. To all who are inspired by him, the task is to continue his legacy.

The difference between the world of art and that of today’s neoliberal entertainment is only one comma:

[…] His passing, it seems, regarded the end of an era. To all, who are inspired by him, the task is to continue his legacy.¹⁰⁾

There are, of course, several factors that have played a role, in addition to the mentioned neoliberalism, certainly also the related Bologna Accords of 2006 and the system of accreditation requirements, which ultimately had a huge objectwise influence on education.

7 — We crave myths; the objectwise provides stability, comfort, and a safe haven. The convenience of a name, a plaque, a certificate, a diploma, the charm of myths — all of this is tempting. It boosts sales and leads to a higher degree of efficiency, and perhaps effectiveness, in bureaucracy. But, one might think, does all this objectwise, all this efficiency, and entrepreneurial spirit not lead to a form of false security, to a diversionary tactic of our brain to mask our mortality? And if this is the case, wouldn’t art benefit precisely from a subjectwise approach; and consequently, art education? Perhaps even education in general? How do we determine the balance between the objectwise approach and the subjectwise act? The subjectwise is extremely vulnerable, the objectwise devours it raw.

— Cornelis de Bondt, Bonnemort, February 14, 2024

Notes

1. Hanna Arendt, The Human Condition [Part II, chapter 6]
2. Immanuel Kant, Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals. [397]
3. See: Giorgio Agamben, Opus Dei, § 4.3
4. See: J. Chr. de Vries, Objectwise versus Subjectwise
5. Rüdiger Safranski, Romantik – Eine deutsche Affäre, Vorwort:

   [Das Romantische] hat in der Epoche der Romantik ihren volkommenen Ausdruck gefunden, ist aber nicht darauf beschränkt; das Romantische gibt es bis heute.
6. Rüdiger Safranski, Romantik – Eine deutsche Affäre, Vorwort:

   Indem ich dem Gemeinen einen hohen Sinn, dem Gewönlichen ein geheimnisvolles Ansehn, den Bekannten die Würde des Unbekannten, dem Endlichen einen unendlichen Schein gebe, so romantisere ich es.
7. See also: Cornelis de Bondt, The Fortissimo Misunderstanding
8. See also: J. Chr. de Vries, The Braking Lead
9. Giovanni Maria Artusi, L’ Artusi, ouero Delle imperfettioni della moderna musica [1600]
10. See: J. Chr. de Vries, The Comma