Justice & Law Quote by Brian Ferneyhough

Ferneyhough’s line reads like a dry aside, but it’s also a quiet act of boundary-setting from a composer whose name is practically synonymous with pushing technique to the brink. He’s talking about an arms race: a compositional device that once felt volatile, even revelatory, becomes a shared currency, then a cliché of virtuosity. The punch is in the economic metaphor. By invoking the Law of Diminishing Returns, he frames aesthetic innovation as something that can be over-invested in until the marginal gain collapses. That’s a coolly unsentimental way to talk about a scene that often treats complexity as moral achievement.

The intent is twofold. On the surface, it’s modesty: others have gone further; he hasn’t “won” the contest. Underneath, it’s a critique of further-for-its-own-sake, a warning that escalation can produce not intensity but noise. For a figure associated with New Complexity, this isn’t a disavowal so much as a reminder that difficulty is supposed to buy something: sharper perception, heightened form, a different kind of expressivity. If the audience only experiences the headline (impossible rhythms, dense notation), the technique stops paying rent.

Context matters: late 20th-century modernism rewarded novelty, and certain techniques became status markers within academic and festival circuits. Ferneyhough’s wit acknowledges that this ecosystem can turn craft into competition. The subtext is almost paternal: go ahead, surpass me, but don’t mistake “further” for “better” when the returns are already falling.