Does Melody Even Matter??

[IncarnateX]

Wow. Methinks Jan may have something to add to all this, whatever it is about.

[Musicologo]

Well, if your goal is to have a large audience and please a ton of people, you have to mirror their values. Appeal to commonality, dumbing down musical materials. That's what Max Martin discovered basically or Pharrell Williams... Nice vocal tune with refrains and choruses, lots of backing vocals as well, harmonies almost non-existent (3-4 major/minor chords), and then sparse elements on the spectrum (kick, snare, bass dead center, some claps or snaps in the LR, some instruments riffs and chords LR, regular beat and usually played on time with the ocasional syncopation to spice up) and that's it. Respect energy curves- verses low and flat, pre-CH middle and stepwise, chorus high and spiked (large interval on the melody to make it memorable). More music than this and you're doomed. The rest is effects and prodution. Very clean in your face compreessed production that sounds BIG.

[vurt]

Well, if your goal is to have a large audience and please a ton of people, you have to mirror their values. Appeal to commonality, dumbing down musical materials. That's what Max Martin discovered basically or Pharrell Williams... Nice vocal tune with refrains and choruses, lots of backing vocals as well, harmonies almost non-existent (3-4 major/minor chords), and then sparse elements on the spectrum (kick, snare, bass dead center, some claps or snaps in the LR, some instruments riffs and chords LR) and that's it. More music than this and you're doomed. The rest is effects and prodution. Very clean in your face compreessed production that sounds BIG.

i see.

[IncarnateX]

I don’t

[Bombadil]

Max Weber was a musician?

'The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism - very catchy number, keep humming it at work.

Yeah, that's one of his greatest hits!

[vurt]

I don’t

not even at weekends?

[IncarnateX]

Wait a minute, you are right. It is weekend and I can allow myself a little more weed than usual, so give me 10 minutes, and I may catch something.

[IncarnateX]

Guess, I have to swallow this in small pieces, but I think I got something:

Most of the time non-musicians just talk about lyrical content and the way vocals are delivered and the image of the singer. They care about tune, not about music (as in harmonies, complex rhythms, etc).

Well, non musician or not, I find it a good practise to care about whether your instruments are tuned. Though I really doubt that is the only thing important to non muscians, but I haven’t asked any, so I wouldn’t know.

[IncarnateX]

i see.

You keep saying that, but why won’t you tell us what it is you see? Dying to know. Could be important.

[Musicologo]

IncarnateX Caring about "tune" is not caring about tuning.
Tune is a kind of melody. I guess this is just too much condensed information, but I couldn't find a better way to condense all these findings in a forum post. They result from reading myriads of scientific papers and books along the years, namely Alan Lomax, Timothy Rice, Tschmuck, Anthony Seeger and Bruno Nettl, but also the lectures of Bernstein...

[IncarnateX]

IncarnateX Caring about "tune" is not caring about tuning.

I know. I am just trying to be funny. But condensed, yes. You should split it up in more posts and help your reader to focus on one point at a time. Hard to decode the overall message and how it relates to the topic or previous posts.

[Musicologo]

Tune is a kind of melody. Bernstein in the video explains the difference between melody, tune, theme, motif, etc... and most people seem to care about "tunes".

[vurt]

i see.

You keep saying that, but why won’t you tell us what it is you see? Dying to know. Could be important.

hmmm...
it is.

[Bombadil]

Descendant of Freemasons, vurt is an Illuminatus!

[vurt]

i told you that in confidence