Are all melodies taken?

[jancivil]

the way you would even begin to try to demonstrate such a thing is to show how a melody is derived from another melody by a process, a particular machination. Then there is the slight problem of that being a viable model per se, for all cases. But to impose 'by the accepted structural manipulations' is ludicrous.

[aciddose]

shh, you'll lose an awful lot of jobs for an awful lot of lawyers. you don't want to go making enemies of the law, do you?

[jancivil]

the real problem with even suggesting there could be a limited font for melody is RHYTHM. You can maybe find a limit per sets of combinations of tones, but rhythm takes it practically into the infinitesimal. And once you venture very far outside of a tonal, harmonic framework it's going to be hard to make such a wager as well.

[dalor]

Most melodies are composed in 4/4.
There might be more space to experiment in 3/4, 5/4 beats.

[jancivil]

ok. 4/4. Here's one:

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/18778361/density.pdf

what pre-existing melody or melodies is this melody (or melodies) derived from, and how.

I rest my case.

[dalor]

Can't read note scores but I guess you talk about transposing a 3/4 melody into 4/4 and 5/4?

I guess its easier to transform from lower to higher such as 3/4 to 4/4, or 4/4 to 5/4. But I think you lose alot if you try to transform 5/4 to 4/4 (or lower) since you might need to compress more notes into smaller space(?)(might depend on the melody though!).

Here is a good example that does not work IMO: "Take Five" in 4/4? Nothing beats the originals

[jancivil]

I am just offering up some melody to show the problem of the assertion in the OP. You mentioned 4/4 as though somehow restrictive. This is in 4/4. This is 'a unique melody' in my estimation of it. Someone believes there is no such thing, then prove me wrong, show us the precursor per se to this [ie., you can show that in and of itself it is] .



I'll make it easy as can be; that melody, and I would argue that is one melody, refers to, and even has particular things in common with:



Bui I think it's problematic to make it into a derivation per se. One could say reasonably that Varese copped a couple of licks off it, but...

[aciddose]

break the melody into sections. in general you'll only need a sub-set of possible values. (my list could never be entirely correct as i haven't spent enough time on this problem. also it would depend upon genre and so on.) you can even build blocks out of more commonly found mixtures. take the offsets into account for each block, but don't count those toward uniqueness. also, ignore rhythm and quantize everything. i can play happy birthday in a million different ways and you'll still identify the delta pattern blocks.

so, now you've got something that looks like:

A2U7A2b6, C2G7B2b6,
A2Z6A2b6, c2F7h4b4,

once you've got that it's pretty clear that the melody is simply composed of a simple alphabet and can be broken down in any way you like to find identical patterns of this alphabet in other melodies.

for example, BbA may occur in a million different melodies.

of course my example is 100% nonsense, just an attempt to describe what a result might look like in an established system, if it were to exist. i'm sure it does but i'm not aware of any specific systems.

[jancivil]

as I indicated before, & let me spell it out: there isn't much to say about 'a melody' without looking at the rhythm. "Ignore rhythm" is cheating.

Density 21.5 vs Syrinx. There are definitely similar building blocks. The melody is a whole object. A part isn't the whole.

[aciddose]

unfortunately it's a simple fact that melodies can be recognized regardless of rhythm. there are some cases that it matters, but that doesn't apply in all cases.

the other unfortunate fact is that the definition of melody includes both rhythm and/or pitch. they are not both required, but they both count. if any melody by it's pitch component alone matches another, rhythm is irrelevant. for rhythm however this does not apply.

(otherwise i'll sue someone for ripping my 4/4 beats)

there is a very good reason for this too which seems in direct opposition to the point you're trying to assert. rhythms are all too limited in their variation in our music. the majority of highly complex rhythm is undesirable.

[jancivil]

'the point you're trying to assert'. I'm offering a demonstration of my thinking. I'm even posing that so it can be argued against, to facilitate the demonstration of the point I'm arguing against. Here is a work with derivative features... I know what they are specifically. I also believe there are things in the later work that are not derived from the earlier work. I don't know what they would be derived from particularly. Hence, 'unique' insofar as I know. I am saying 'prove me wrong'. And providing objects to do that with! By posing this particular, real scenario, I have rested my case. I am now helping the other side prove me wrong. I know my money's on my case.

'melodies can be recognized by _' Ok, but so what? You have 'the majority of _ are undesirable' These are more complex than you might be comfortable with but they have not been shown throughout the years to be so undesirable. They are standards of the repertoire. I would argue the later is more rhythmically complex than the earlier work. It makes a difference. Even though I know where the intervallic relationship is derivative and how it could be argued - and I could make the argument myself - that I recognize one vs the other [EDIT: one v. the other Motif] lies in the rhythm and in the ordering.


http://dl.dropbox.com/u/18778361/Debuss ... flute_.pdf

[jancivil]

in general
it would depend
but don't count those
also, ignore

are not signs of a strong argument.

[dalor]

unfortunately it's a simple fact that melodies can be recognized regardless of rhythm.

Absolutely - and it sounds extremely awkward in most cases (BUT recogniseable as you said!) There is a strong relationship between note-delta's and time-deltas (stating the obvious).

IMO the limitation of melodies already starts by the bass/chords and progression. In western pop music there are only of couple of progressions that are 'acceptable' and constructed with a certain receipe like SAW did. Sorry for this bad example

[Xenobt]

Many melodies are stolen, not taken!

Just watched 1982's "Something Wicked This Way Comes" for Halloween, and James Horner, a respected film composer was "influenced" by a movie from five years earlier... See if you can tell which one. It's at :32, 1:02 and 1:20.



And oddly, the new Martin Scorsese bio of George Harrison omits his "My Sweet Lord"/"He's So Fine" lawsuit, even though it was big news at the time. So if even Beatles "borrow"...

I'm also reminded of a quote about western music I read from John Cage, "There's only twelve notes in all of it."

So true!

KVR/esoundz: Xenobt

[aciddose]

in general
it would depend
but don't count those
also, ignore

are not signs of a strong argument.

boo-hoo. unfortunately this is the one which seems to be set by united states case law.

essentially case law in the united states says anything can be derived from anything else if you're willing to pay your lawyers enough.

in reality both true/false of the argument are valid, which shows the argument itself is flawed - it isn't based upon a valid foundation.

the way the law works is by a basis of identifying unjust enrichment, or detriment.

if it can be shown that composition of a specific melody was simplified in some way when compared to the general case the author has been unjustly enriched. the general case is impossible to define itself, but let's take a random generator as the general case since it's better than nothing.

so, if you were to apply any sort of rules during composition where the properties are not completely random (actually, equally distributed) then you might argue that the result is based upon that set of rules and so is a derivation of that fundamental set which it shares in common with any other melody derived from that same set.

the set including "random" would be identical really, there is no logical reason to exclude it.

since that set includes all other possible sets, it is shown that all things derive from all other things.

at the same time, noting that all possibilities belong to the "random" set, it's possible to produce any melody with zero derivation. one-thousand monkeys and so on.

Q.E.D.

so, we can see that the law is completely f**ked, obviously, just like this whole discussion.

you can't say this because i said it first.

(what it comes down to is subjectivity. since the problem is impossible to solve objectively, the determination of whether one melody is derived from another is completely a subjective issue decided by the individual making the judgement. in case-law, the subjectivity is limited in it's scope by applying the rule that similarity must be qualified based upon the mean subjective similarity. that is to say that if a majority of average listeners judge that one melody is a derivation from another, then it is fact as such.)