read w/ caution - elec. music and theory?

[Polite Company]

Polite - I agree that saying "more" innovative might be tough but I found Toxikator's argument to be compelling in that he has at least made a good point that they are at least as innovative as John Cage and the like...

I found his thinking refreshing because in a sense it seems that looking to melody/harmony for innovation puts innovation in an unnecessary box...

Right, I wasn't saying that they aren't as innovative as Cage and ilk, I was just arguing against them being labeled as more innovative because they flipped the melody/harmony vs. rhythm/timbre paradigm. I'm a big RDJ fan, I think he's one of the more interesting minds in modern electronic music.

[burritosdaily]

I just was able to listen to RDJ and am very intrigued... found him thanks to shamann.

[herodotus]

Polite - I agree that saying "more" innovative might be tough but I found Toxikator's argument to be compelling in that he has at least made a good point that they are at least as innovative as John Cage and the like...

While I approve the sentiment expressed by Toxikator, I am afraid that his characterization of John Cage is quite off.

Cage was experimenting with ways of altering instruments, tunings, scales, and rhythms (and silences) to create unique rhythms, melodies, and harmonies.....

....the key factor? He was still interested in melodies, rhythms, and to some extent harmonies......

....So Cage was writing music that was rhythmically supported with melodic leads (just weird rhythms and leads). DnB is supported by amelodic and aharmonic tones, with drums as the lead element....

Cage's 'Imaginary Landscape number 1' is dated 1939 and employs "2 variable-speed phono turntables, frequency recordings, muted piano and cymbal; To be performed as a recording or broadcast by 4 performers".

Cage's 'Imaginary Lanscapes number 4' is dated 1951 and employs "Twelve radios, 24 performers and conductor".

I could go on, but these two two seminal works are more than enough to prove that Cage was certainly not just 'writing music that was rhythmically supported with melodic leads (just weird rhythms and leads)'



Nonetheless, I do agree with the idea that electronic dance music is a different kind of animal than could ever have been imagined 120 years ago.

[shamann]

Steve, you namedropper you

I know, I'm shameless.

I could go on, but these two two seminal works are more than enough to prove that Cage was certainly not just 'writing music that was rhythmically supported with melodic leads (just weird rhythms and leads)'

Yeah, my first thought was "Go listen to Williams Mix." Not how I'd describe Cage's output, which would be very hard to do in a comprehensive manner anyway, since Cage had many five-year periods of cohesive work that were often disjointed from the previous five years. For example, really hard to musically (and at times philosophically) draw lines between what he did in the early 50s to what he did in the early 70s.

[mayan]

I'd throw Robert Rich and Terry Riley into the mix. I also got an intersting CD from the Just Intonation Society (or something like that ) by a guy by the name of Bill Alves, I think, who does a lot of work with synths, manipulations and microtones. Very interesting stuff.

[tee boy]

Not at all. I think that, outside of high society, there wasn't nearly the appreciation for Haydn (perhaps Mozart is an exception here) in the common sector as people believe.

Absolutely. But I think what you are describing is all down to cultural change. I mean, just think of inconceivable changes that occured during the C20th! Its hardly surprising that a mish mash of musicial development resulted.

Id like to think that now our modern societies are more established, that the C21st might be a little more consistent. But who knows, with the amazing communications we have today, perhaps national musicial styles will die out completely?

I really dont know, but as a musician, it has to be one of the most amazing times to be alive!

TB

[tee boy]

Toxikator, I agree for the most part but it seems like there has been a "dumbing down" in regards to appreciation for experimentation. I hope I'm wrong here... but it feels as though the audience for "new" music is dwindling in a way that is disproportional to the audiences of the 17-18th centuries that you mentioned.

I guess what I'm trying to say is don't you think Hayden, Mozart, and Beethoven would have had a larger audience for their "experimental" music that what would gather for a contemporary composer today?

Im not sure that Beethoven's more experimental music was so well received as his popular stuff. Its it always the way that the TRUELY great artists are never fully appreciated until after their time?

TB

[tee boy]

If I had to take a guess, I would say that the most 'serious' compositions are being churned out in film

Yeah, I should probably have defined what I meant by serious, as even to me it could have meant many things in a variety of contexts!

In this instance, Im talking about music which is following in the Western traditions yet forward looking and taking into appreciation what is culturally and technologically significant of the day.

I say that I feel film is an interesting area, because it appears this is an area that not only preserves but also builds upon the Western tradition. There is ofcourse the generic idioms, cliches what have you, as there has always been. I mean, the Classical sonata was a creative canvas for some, a blue print of others! The same is certainly true today in film.

But we cant ignore that composers in film are certainly doing modern day, cutting edge 'classical' music. We are all aware of the music of composers like Thomas Newmann, and Im sure none of us would deny that his works are without doubt modern day classics.

My point was that, Im not sure where else this kind of development is active? In academia, Im not aware of anything that is of great significance MUSICALLY. There seems to be a lot of cool electro acoustic experimentation going on, but Im not sure Id consider to be work following in the Western tradition.

Some might disagree... I mean, didnt the whole serial thing go very 'calculated'?

TB

[shamann]

We are all aware of the music of composers like Thomas Newmann, and Im sure none of us would deny that his works are without doubt modern day classics.

Wow, really? Modern day classics? I've no doubt the score for Desperately Seeking Susan is fine on many levels, but a modern day classic?

Really the only score of his I can actually remember is American Beauty, and while it's well-suited to the film and it certainly doesn't offend me in any way (well maybe a little too precious and fey for my tastes, but eh), modern day classic wouldn't be the term I'd reach for when describing it.

And so, by "great significance MUSICALLY" you really mean "I place little significance on music if my nan and I don't enjoy the tune"?

[tee boy]

Wow, really? Modern day classics? I've no doubt the score for Desperately Seeking Susan is fine on many levels, but a modern day classic?

Oh, I absolutely would, yes.

Lets not forget that the greatest composers have always wrote music in the popular mediums! It seems to be a relatively modern phenomenon to wish to offend you audience

I see the music of people like T Newman to be pretty fine stuff. His theme from Joe Black was a stunning piece (although clearly influenced by Debussy's Clair de Lune). If you go through his work you will find classic cue after classic cue... imo, atleast.

And he is not alone. There are many fine film composers who do indeed develop upon the Western music of yesteryear. Take Elliot Goldenthal, and his score for Alien 3. Much of that stuff sounds like it was a development on Penderecki's early works. I really like that score alot.

I know alot of people slate film composers for stealing ideas... but hang on a minute... thats always been the case!

And so, by "great significance MUSICALLY" you really mean "I place little significance on music if my nan and I don't enjoy the tune"?

Now that would be putting words into my mouth a little would it not?

The composer I mention has a great universal appeal, no doubt. But I could just have easily mention composer's far less likely to appeal to masses.

As it is though, I dont go for this 'it has to make your ears bleed for it to be cutting edge' view that some people seem to have. I remember these guys at uni who really we so blinkered. They had these hypocritical views about listening to anything remotely main stream, about it being purely for the closed minded sheep of our world. Ironically, it was they who lacked the open mind - dismissing anything that wasnt made up from circuit bent 303s, played by the neighbours dog after a nostrals worth of dope!

I tend to like music that is both popular and very challenging. I like good music! Be it Scriabin or Mozart, whatever. So when naming a composer, my mind instantly went to a universally popular composer whom I believe fits the criteria.


To clarify about 'great musicial significance'...

I guess this opens rather a can of worms, as it requires us to define 'music'!

But here I meant music which I feel developes positively on our Western traditions (be it with fusion with music from other cultures). It appears to me that alot of electro acoustic music is focused purely on timbral development alone, with less emphasis on actually communicating anything!

Ofcourse, now I am contradicting arguments that Iv made myself in the past - that perhaps timbre is the next frontier of Western music. It seems that many of the forward looking 20th century composers were way more into timbral concerns than those of the past. Penderecki, again, made composition that are seemly based almost entirely on the exploration of texture and timbre.

So in that light, perhaps it is the crazy academics who spend their time making computers squeak who deserve the acclaim? Maybe they are doing more to take Western music forward than any mainstream film composer who merely dwells on 'safe' and well established musicial turf.

That is a discussion entirely beyond the scope of this post!

But please know that I attempt not to blinker my mind in the slightest. But if we are talking about the development of the Western traditions, Im not sure that there is a medium more involved than film. Where else do you hear such a fusion of past and present, developed in interesting and unique ways, purely for the purpose of making the audience 'feel' something?

TB

[shamann]

I guess this opens rather a can of worms, as it requires us to define 'music'!

I don't think it's our definitions of music that have conflicted here, rather our definitions of concepts like "challenging" and "feeling." I've gone and listened to excerpts from the Meet Joe Black score, and similar to American Beauty, I wouldn't ever say it isn't good, but it doesn't meet my idea of challenging art. I'm a firm believer that if we are to consider it challenging, art should challenge our principles and preconceptions, ask us to see things differently from the way we are most comfortable. Being complacent in life is easy, art is a useful mechanism to shake us from our complacency.

While I can appreciate the craft that goes into music made by Thomas Newman or BT, neither one of them asks me to broaden my scope of knowledge and understanding, they both make music that falls strictly inside what one can comfortably expect from music. Harry Partch asked me to listen to music as an extension of our actual, physical selves, music filled with our voices, our bodies and our stories. Morton Feldman asked me to listen to music as a function of time, attacking the comfort memory provides in music. Thomas Newman asks me to listen to pretty music which accompanies pretty pictures and which is reminiscent of pretty music written by Debussy.

I suppose if you view the concept of challenging in the same way you view a game of Sudoku, in which you are presented with a form complex enough to require 15 minutes of your attention to decipher its underlying structure, I suppose then you could safely say that challenging music is all over the place, especially at the movies.

I don't think music needs to make your ears bleed, and among the big list of names I presented earlier, only 2 or 3 of those people have ever made music that did so. But in defence of music that does make your ears bleed, it does challenge the natural assumptions and expectations of most people familiar and comfortable with the European tradition. It asks you to consider allotting room for noises in a theoretical form that has ignored them for a long time. It asks you to consider something that at first might repel you. It asks you to consider music exclusively as a physical experience. It asks you to think a little differently from the status quo.

In fact the communication inherent in those forms of music seems obvious to me, as they aim often to communicate concrete ideas in a deliberate manner. In music of abstractions like the 17th century Germanic tradition we now call "Western," the ideas communicated are generally hidden away, and mostly subjective outside of identifying how they've chosen to present our commonly held musical structures.

I actually don't believe that the best electroacoustic music focuses on timbre, I think that is a tagline often used by people familiar only with the common older forms of music, trying to make sense of new ideas exclusively on their own terms and within their accepted frameworks. It's an act of assimilation. But a lot of electroacoustic music is documentary, outlining variations of sound from many angles (not exclusively musical) within a given conceptual framework. For example, I was listening to an electroacoustic work of sorts this morning called Silo by Lauren Weinger. It was filled with sounds from and about the silo, not just the timbres inherent to the silo--like music played and echoing inside the silo itself--but also voices of the silo workers discussing things like the physical details of oats. Not music in the traditional sense, but certainly it is all presented musically, in that beyond simply being a radio documentary about grain silos, all the sounds are arranged and presented to reach a deliberate aesthetic end.

I take issue with statements on what is musically significant because they are at their core exclusionary tactics. They dismiss anything that falls outside of their given rules for hierarchy. They establish that one form of music is good and that only future music that works within that form will be worthy of consideration. But that's not very challenging, except in the way that state fascism is challenging. I can't speak for anyone else, but that is definitely not my idea of good.

[Toxikator]

I need Rachmiel in here.

The most important thing about a piece of music is "that it works". Period. Music should be judged aesthetically as a whole, not for some aspect of it exclusively.

Challenging music? that can be good. but it's not the requisite. Nonchallenging music can be brilliant.

[tee boy]

I'm a firm believer that if we are to consider it challenging, art should challenge our principles and preconceptions, ask us to see things differently from the way we are most comfortable.

Hmmm, perhaps this is where we differ?

For me, music doesnt have to challenge me in that sense to be greatly significant and powerful. Why? Well, because the unfamiliar is always going to be approached with a certain, ummm, trepidity I guess. If I were writing for film, I could probably use music possessing those qualities to portray something alien and maybe a little scary.

That hardly covers the full range of human emotion though does it? I think that many of our emotions require a certain 'safetly' to be fully arroused.

For instance, I could never imagine a soppy love theme being highly experimental - that just wouldnt work, for me atleast. But if the music has that affect on me, then it is performing its purpose - it is effective music!

This is how I tend to regard music, on its effectiveness to communicate. That doesnt mean it has to be easy, but it does mean that with the required work, you can 'get' what it is about.

Again, that brings us nicely back to the 'great artists are never appreciated during their day' theory! Perhaps music only becomes truly 'good' or 'bad' after it has been given time to mature and withstand critique from an audience who truly understands it.

If it proves to be so challenging that only a very small minority of people can 'get' it, can we really consider it to be good music? It would like a language that only a few can learn to speak, right?

I suppose if you view the concept of challenging in the same way you view a game of Sudoku, in which you are presented with a form complex enough to require 15 minutes of your attention to decipher its underlying structure, I suppose then you could safely say that challenging music is all over the place, especially at the movies.

Im sorry, I dont know if I gave you the impression that I find T Newman's music to be especially challenging? If so, then I must clarify that I havent heard anything of his that can forced me to work hard in the slightest. His music isnt challenging in that sense, not at all!

But in many ways, that its what I love about it - he successfully makes this highly effective music, that DOESNT require to much work from the listener. Given that he is working in film, thats probably a good quality Id imagine, as music should embellish the work, not distract from it I think.

Music that challenges me?

Well, I must admit that these days I find some of Scriabin's later work to challenge the hell out me. But within contempary music, I do find alot of academic music to be challenging... I dont get a lot of it.

What causes me to question it, its that alot of those writing and producing this music are doing it in the name of science, not art! Again, another can of worms... but I do think that alot of this music is focused further on the science than the art. But this is not a statement I would wish to debate at great length, as I really dont know enough about it to do so.

Please believe that this DOESNT mean I have not had a great deal of exposure to contempary experimental styles. Indeed, I produced alot of ambient sound design using Csound, field recordings, VST plug ins etc. Im quite fascinated in finding ways to make music 'statement' that rely purely on timbre and texture.

But I also have to acknowledge that what Im doing is FAR from being as tried and tested as the system of tonality. Just because I do something new, something that may well cause people to think, doesnt necessarily mean it is worth anything. To be honest, I used to marvel at contempary music, but the more time passes, the more retrospective my interests get.

I mean, the tonal system is just such a phenomenal thing! Im not sure that anything could ever compare to this.


I don't think music needs to make your ears bleed, and among the big list of names I presented earlier, only 2 or 3 of those people have ever made music that did so. But in defence of music that does make your ears bleed, it does challenge the natural assumptions and expectations of most people familiar and comfortable with the European tradition. It asks you to consider allotting room for noises in a theoretical form that has ignored them for a long time. It asks you to consider something that at first might repel you. It asks you to consider music exclusively as a physical experience. It asks you to think a little differently from the status quo.

In fact the communication inherent in those forms of music seems obvious to me, as they aim often to communicate concrete ideas in a deliberate manner. In music of abstractions like the 17th century Germanic tradition we now call "Western," the ideas communicated are generally hidden away, and mostly subjective outside of identifying how they've chosen to present our commonly held musical structures.

I take issue with statements on what is musically significant because they are at their core exclusionary tactics. They dismiss anything that falls outside of their given rules for hierarchy.

Mate, I seriously know what you mean!

I know I have probably come across as rather a staunch in this thread, but that would be misleading. Indeed, there were times when I could have been equally offended by the things that I myself have posted in this thread.

Its just that, these days Im beginning to wonder, what really defines musical significance? Who decides?

If a piece of music is produced that the vast majority of people dont get, cant get even, can it still be considered significant?

I really do think that alot of people get this idea that to be significant, you have to do something incredibly different, to make your audience question everything! Im not that is the case.

I guess the bottom of line of what Im saying is, Im with you in not dismissing the significance of ANYTHING. But at the same time, Im not going to assume the contrary. Its highly likely that the vast majority of music that people think is garbage today, will be thought no better of tommorow!

But who know, people are fickle creatures, right? And music is highly subjective. I tend to think the only real gauge of significance is the test of time - how popular is the music over time and how does it influence latter composers? But given that our music today is run by the dollar, Im wondering if the most significant music of our age will not be Britney f**king Spears, lol.

Again, I REALLY wish I could look forward and see where exactly music will go from here, and which composers and works from right now will ultimately be those who prove great worth.

Its a fascinating question, because at the end of the day, NONE of us can really judge what is significant and what isnt in contempary music! So you are probably quite right to question my statement

TB

[shamann]

An interesting answer and a fun read, TB.

[tee boy]

Mate, I should warn you that Im yet to construct a firm opinion! It is extremely interesting, agreed, hence my rambling internal monologues!

TB