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Music. . .

darcito
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Posted 07/17/06 - 08:44 PM: Subject: Music. . .	#1
I absolutely adore music. But what is music? It's such an opinionated thing as to what "good" music is, but really what is music in the first place. I've heard some electronica/new age stuff that's basically just a series of clicks and weird water noises etc, is this actually music? Technically "music" is just noise, it does not have to be a combination of notes neccessarily, it's simply sound waves put to a rhythm, but technically ever things has a rhythm. If you hit a pencil on a desk "randomly" three times, you're actually making some sort of rhythm if you broke those hits of the pencil down into a double dotted 132nd followed by a dotted eigth rest followed by a 64th.. . and so on, you would be able to break it down into a rhythm no matter what. That's the "technical" view of music, however in my opinion, music is something you can tap your foot to. Along with that comes all the amazing and wonderful complications. The seven notes all laid out before recorded history along with the work done by Ptolemy to creat the cycle of fifths and perfect fifths by combining string lengths of a ratio 2:3, or major thirds of 5:4 ratios. And in India they created a completely different form of musical scales and ratios. (and this is why to so many westerners, East Indian music sounds awful) (I'm also not knowledgeable of how East Indian musical theory works) It always baffles me that 7 notes (along with the 5 sharps/flats) have come to make every piece of western music you and I have ever heard. Those 7 notes can be put in an infinite amount of combinations and rhythms put to an infinite amount of beats and an infinite amount of lyrics to form what we know as music. This is exciting because I'm addicting to song writing and it's refreshing to know that no matter what you can make something up that, quite possibly, no human being who has ever lived on Earth has ever heard before. (Of course those infinite amount of combinations don't all sound GOOD, but still. . .) Don't know if I'll get any replies, seeing as I haven't really posed a question or problem, just writing about something I enjoy.
one cloud is enough to eclipse the entire sun.

aykay
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Posted 07/23/06 - 07:55 PM:	#2
Music is organized noise, and sometimes it's not organized.

Kali Uma
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Posted 07/25/06 - 07:27 AM:	#3
Y'know, musicians are strange folk... they've actually experemented with "white noise" (no sound at all) and is that's still music, beats me. Otherwise, if SOMEBODY likes the song, then he can listen to it and call it music.
I have defeated my greatest fear, and now call myself thus. (what to do next? check up what kali uma means !)

anti-ism-ist
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Posted 07/27/06 - 05:45 AM:	#4
darcito wrote: I absolutely adore music. That makes two of us. But what is music? It's such an opinionated thing as to what "good" music is, but really what is music in the first place. Everyone agrees on a few basic things about it: 1. It is a form of art 2. It consists of sounds 3. Those sounds are organized in some kind of structured and analyzable fashion; although not necessarily completely regular 4. It communicates ideas using pitches and rhythms; not using natural noises are words or any form of symbols/signs (it can contain those, but they are secondary) And I add a couple o' my own: 1. It is expressive of some form of human emotion, or some kind of symbolic idea (this one's really vague.) 2. It has at least some recognizable pitches. It is not completely percussive. I've heard some electronica/new age stuff that's basically just a series of clicks and weird water noises etc, is this actually music? Just barely, depending on how you define it. I don't define that as music. I define it as irritating background noise. Technically "music" is just noise, it does not have to be a combination of notes neccessarily, it's simply sound waves put to a rhythm, but technically ever things has a rhythm. If you hit a pencil on a desk "randomly" three times, you're actually making some sort of rhythm if you broke those hits of the pencil down into a double dotted 132nd followed by a dotted eigth rest followed by a 64th.. . and so on, you would be able to break it down into a rhythm no matter what. That's the "technical" view of music, however in my opinion, music is something you can tap your foot to. Right. It can't just be any old rhythm--the ear has to "recognize" the rhythm and analyze it to mean some particular musical idea. Along with that comes all the amazing and wonderful complications. The seven notes all laid out before recorded history along with the work done by Ptolemy to creat the cycle of fifths and perfect fifths by combining string lengths of a ratio 2:3, or major thirds of 5:4 ratios. And in India they created a completely different form of musical scales and ratios. (and this is why to so many westerners, East Indian music sounds awful) (I'm also not knowledgeable of how East Indian musical theory works) It always baffles me that 7 notes (along with the 5 sharps/flats) have come to make every piece of western music you and I have ever heard. Those 7 notes can be put in an infinite amount of combinations and rhythms put to an infinite amount of beats and an infinite amount of lyrics to form what we know as music. This is exciting because I'm addicting to song writing and it's refreshing to know that no matter what you can make something up that, quite possibly, no human being who has ever lived on Earth has ever heard before. (Of course those infinite amount of combinations don't all sound GOOD, but still. . .) And the best combinations are the ones invented by Chopin, Shostakovich, and Gershwin, of course. Don't know if I'll get any replies, seeing as I haven't really posed a question or problem, just writing about something I enjoy. Hey, posting about anything you don't enjoy is a waste of time. Music is absolutely amazing, I'm glad you started this thread.
"Never let your sense of morals get in the way of doing what's right." --Isaac Asimov.

bukena
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Posted 07/27/06 - 08:14 PM:	#5
Wow guys... I can tell that you folks are not musicians. First of all... the definition of music is the well combine the three elements of music which appeals to the human hear. I guess I should state right now that I am a classical guitar concertist. What are the three elements of music?... please take some time to think about it before you continue reading... what are the three elements of music?. Most folks will come up with harmony and rhythm... harmony are the notes that accompany the melody and rhythms boils down to time (tempo)... fast, slow... you get the picture. But... what is the third element?... listen in your head to the beginning of Beethoven's 5th symphony... what do you hear?... you hear sounds... and time (rhythm)... but you are acutally listening to something else... which happens to be the third element. I use this example in my classes to show people that we know things that we are not aware that we know. The third element is silence. That's right... silence. Whenever an instrument is not playing... it's playing silence. Of course... you don't always have complete silence... but in my example (Beethoven's 5th) those pauses in the music are silence. Ok... we got that out of the way. White noise is not music... sorry, although somebody may claim it to be and there will be no arguing with him/her. Music is the HIGHEST form of human expression. Music can't talk about size, color or distance. The vocabulary of music is FEELINGS... sad, happy, extatic, mad... you name it. That's why whenever you are watching movies and you hear music come in... you know something is going to happen. Music triggers feelings anxiety, suspense, relief. Music is such an awesome gift to human, I am of the opinion that every single human being on the planet should play an instrument. I have never met a person who doesn't like music. Every single human being, upon encountering a person who plays a piece of music that one likes thinks: "God... I wish I could do that"... and I know that because I am a musician and I find myself saying that!. Somebody tapping a pencil does not represent music... sorry... neither does white noise". I could sit here and debate a lot of the points that you have raised... if you want me to... just say so. Music is the HIGHEST form of human expression. bukena Edited by bukena on 07/27/06 - 09:55 PM
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bukena
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Posted 07/27/06 - 09:44 PM:	#6
As an afterthought: We are conditioned to accept and even seek regular shaped forms, whether they are visual, acoustical, physical, etc. Man-made objects are for the most part regular-shaped. Whenever one encounters something irregular, we have the tendency to reject it. We find symetrical things attractive and unsymetrical things unattractive. THAT is conditioning. Applying this to music. Most popular music is in 4/4 or 3/4... look at these as squares and triangles. Whenever people listents to music (which I can argue that most people don't know how to listen... specially not music)in these shapes... they are fine with it... but as soon as a musician comes up with an 5/4 or a 7/8 for example... people will find it disturbing... and that is just because we are conditioned to seek regular-shape things. It takes an "enlightened" mind to be open enough to accept irregular shapes... in every sense of the word. bukena
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anti-ism-ist
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Posted 07/28/06 - 11:11 AM:	#7
bukena wrote: Wow guys... I can tell that you folks are not musicians. First of all... the definition of music is the well combine the three elements of music which appeals to the human hear. I guess I should state right now that I am a classical guitar concertist. I'm a musician, so your intuition (if you were referring to all of us) was wrong. What are the three elements of music?... please take some time to think about it before you continue reading... what are the three elements of music?. Pitch, color (or timbre), and rythm. But that's not the definition of music, it's just a convenient way to break it down into smaller elements. Most folks will come up with harmony and rhythm... harmony are the notes that accompany the melody and rhythms boils down to time (tempo)... fast, slow... you get the picture. But... what is the third element?... listen in your head to the beginning of Beethoven's 5th symphony... what do you hear?... you hear sounds... and time (rhythm)... but you are acutally listening to something else... which happens to be the third element. I use this example in my classes to show people that we know things that we are not aware that we know. The third element is silence. That's right... silence. Whenever an instrument is not playing... it's playing silence. Of course... you don't always have complete silence... but in my example (Beethoven's 5th) those pauses in the music are silence. Aren't those silences just another part of the rhythm? Or, alternately, just another part of the melody, as they consist of rests? Music is the HIGHEST form of human expression. Music can't talk about size, color or distance. The vocabulary of music is FEELINGS... sad, happy, extatic, mad... you name it. That's why whenever you are watching movies and you hear music come in... you know something is going to happen. Music triggers feelings anxiety, suspense, relief. I basically agree with you here. Music is such an awesome gift to human, I am of the opinion that every single human being on the planet should play an instrument. I have never met a person who doesn't like music. Every single human being, upon encountering a person who plays a piece of music that one likes thinks: "God... I wish I could do that"... and I know that because I am a musician and I find myself saying that!. Again, I couldn't agree with you more. (Everytime I listen to a Horowitz recording, I suddenly have a pressing need to go downstairs and practice piano for several hours--because I've got this idea that I ought to be able to play like him one day!) Somebody tapping a pencil does not represent music... sorry... neither does white noise". I could sit here and debate a lot of the points that you have raised... if you want me to... just say so. It would be easier if you just defined music instead of listing examples of what is or is not. Then we could just decide whether or not we liked your definition, and nobody would have to debate anything. Music is the HIGHEST form of human expression. Er, says the musician. I wonder what a painter would say to that...
"Never let your sense of morals get in the way of doing what's right." --Isaac Asimov.

Morgan Sutherland
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Posted 07/29/06 - 04:58 AM:	#8
Ok... we got that out of the way. White noise is not music... sorry, although somebody may claim it to be and there will be no arguing with him/her. Sorry to be "that" guy, but musicians and ordinary people often make a generalization that bothers me. They assume that things such as "melody", "harmony", and "rhythm" are intrinsic to music. On the contrary, there are thousands and thousands of pieces created with absolute disregard for these elements. The truth is that music is sound with intention applied. Many people sort of automatically say "oh, well if there's no melody or rhythm, i'm not interested anyway, so i'm going to chuck it out of my argument/world-view". Music is the HIGHEST form of human expression. Music can't talk about size, color or distance. The vocabulary of music is FEELINGS... sad, happy, extatic, mad... you name it. That's why whenever you are watching movies and you hear music come in... you know something is going to happen. Music triggers feelings anxiety, suspense, relief. There is a lot of music which is devoid of emotion (or has little in comparison to "normal music"), but is instead more like visual art; either a manifestation of personal reality, some sort of expression, or a tool for thought/action provocation (depending on how you look at it, how it's created etc. etc. bla bla) Although I very much enjoy melodic music, I listen to a lot of a-melodic music, sometimes with rhythm, sometimes without. If you're going to break music into parts, timbre is just as important as melodic, harmony, and rhythm. Saying that "silence" is an element of music I consider erroneous. Silence is part of rhythm. A "rest"? There's a whole lot of music out there that pays much more attention to timbre than it does to melody/rhythm. A movie can make you think and another can make you cry; same deal with music. Edited by Morgan Sutherland on 07/29/06 - 05:06 AM

Chandler
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Posted 07/29/06 - 11:04 AM:	#9
I could go on about the definition of music as you all have already stated, but i think im going to go along and say what i bellieve about what makes music "good" and "bad" in terms of oppions. Good music, to me is what i can relate to. Whether it be the artist's lyrics or just the change of pitch and tempo. Fast being excited, energetic tempo, and slow being Calm, or relaxed tempo. Then of course you have thousands of other elements, including what type of instrument you play yourself (if your a mussician) and will only think of good music if it includes the instrument you play. I try to listen to things that make me think, such as classical. It amazes me how century old music still sounds good to listen to, when music created today can get old and dull after only a few months. Bad music being, to me, things i can not relate to. This usually also includes things that may seem to me as just noise. (once again, an oppinionated desision) And things that include naive, ridiculous, or useless lyrics. To me, rap is really the most uninteresting form of "art" to me in the world. But this all rest on your desicions. What you like is what you like, and what you hate is what you hate. Chandler
---->Long winded replies, are not always correct replies. ----> An artist tries to copy things in nature, but can someone be a true artist when they are never exactly correct? (Edgar Allen Poe)

bukena
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Posted 07/29/06 - 11:49 AM:	#10
The definition of music is the well combine sound, time and silence agreeable to the human hear. Of course the agreeable part is totally arbitrary. Silence is not a part of melody, melody is the lineal flow of notes. Harmony is the vertical notes... harmony accompanies the melody. Silence is the absence of sound. Keep in mind that you might hear a multi-instrument piece or song and you might never hear a pause in music, but whenever an instrument is not playing sounds, it's playing silence. Silence, just like sounds are timed. In musical notation one writes the notes and silences. The notes indicate what note has to be played (sound) and how long is has to last (time). Silences indicate that no sound should be played and how long one is to keep silence, which of course is time. The opposite of sound is silence. And yes, I assumed that everybody who had posted were not musicians... because musicians understand that music is a combination of sound and silence under a timed structure. bukena PS. Can anybody tell my what that little green sphere that appears on the left side under the thumbs up/down mean?
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