Ligeti---Stockhausen---Boulez? What do they have in common? No music lover apart from a few Juliard graduates and conductors needing to establish their bona fides as friendly to "challenging" programs can remember even a single passage from their collected works. Stanley Kubrick, perhaps the most musical of directors, provided memorable musical sound tracks to his works. Who can forget the Strausses, Richard and Johann in "2001"? Who can remember Ligeti? Who can forget the Handel Saraband, the andante from the Schubert Trio, or the German Dance from "Barry Lyndon.... or the heart rending song by the poor German girl at the end of "Paths of Glory"...Beethoven and Henry Purcell from "Clockwork Orange"...or "We'll Meet Again" as the coda to "Dr. Strangelove"? That Kubrick stole from Ligeti, if true, was the best complement he could pay him. The point is that all art, no matter how skillfully contrived, must be memorable in order to have any lasting claim on our attention.
On the other hand, anyone who said that Stockhausen should be locked up can't be all bad. Maybe I should give him another hearing.

"The point is that all art, no matter how skillfully contrived, must be memorable in order to have any lasting claim on our attention."

I believe the "our" in that sentence is missing a "y."

I, for one, count the part of 2001 that utilizes Ligeti as pivotal in my understanding of what is possible in both film and music.

I have trouble matching music to composer, but I find Boulez's La Visage Nuptial instantly identifiable. I have no idea what people study in music school, but if they really don't listen to Boulez, I think that's sad.

you see, the self-titled music literates want to distinguish themselves from the populance, and what better way than embrace the Stockhausen of the world, while disdaining the Strausses of the world for being too successful with the bourgeoisie.

You're absolutely right. Music should be accessible and easy to remember. Anyone who doesn't think so is only putting on airs in order to show their elitist credentials. Who can argue with the following quote about another "modern" composer?:

"This composer goes his own path, and a dreary, eccentric, and tiresome path it is: learning, learning, and nothing but learning, but not a bit of nature or melody. And, after all, it is but a crude and undigested learning, without method or arrangement, a seeking after curious modulations, a hatred of ordinary progressions, a heaping up of difficulties, until all the pleasure and patience are lost."

Except that it's coming from a 19th-century critic who was convinced that Beethoven's music was too difficult for its own sake. It was not a unique opinion of Beethoven's music either; for the next century or so after his death, the Ninth Symhony was considered to be tainted by its composer's deafness and not worth the trouble to perform. Now it's played at the Olympics every four years.

None of us who love Ligeti's music (or Xenakis', or Schoenberg's, or Bartok's, or Messiaen's) believe that their music will be equally beloved someday. But it's false, reverse elitism to claim that no one actually listens earnestly. And we didn't all go to Juilliard, either. I know Kubrick sure didn't.

If you're not sure about Ligeti, try his horn trio (there's an excellent recording on Bridge coupled with a very good rendition of the Brahms horn trio, so even if you don't like the Ligeti you'll have the Brahms). I am not a professional musician but I listen extensively to classical music from all periods, and this was the piece that persuaded me Ligeti was a great composer.

The "S" I lug around next to my name is for five poems published by Slate over the past five years or so. I have no formal connection with Slate.

I think great popular music should be memorable. I think the experience you have with art (or "classical") music is far more complicated.

I had an incredible, mind-blowing experience seeing a performance of Reich's Music for 18 Musicians recently--an incredible sculpture in sound. I really doubt I could hum it to you.