"Romanticism's transition into its "late, late" phase called modernism can be gauged by noting the mounting hostility towards performers as the twentieth century reached its middle. For Arnold Schoenberg, whose career actually enacted the move from late romanticism to late-late, performance was at best a necessary evil, of value only to those lacking the skills required to derive the full experience of a musical composition from silent perusal of the score. {Pierre Boulez, in his bomb-throwing youth, actually declared performances obsolete for contemporary music, since the only information of interest to intelligent musicians was the kind that notation conveyed to the eye, and the eye to the mind. Hearing added nothing. Even Brahms, more than half a century before the peak phase, voiced a kindred thought when he turned down an invitation to Mozart's Don Giovanni with the remark that if he sat at home with the score he'd hear a better performance."
Taruskin, Richard. "Early Music: Truly Old-Fashioned At Last?" The Danger of Music and Other Anti-Utopian Essays. University of California Press: Berkeley, 2009. (130)