I guess what I’m saying is that recorded music is a different thing. I guess this is obvious. But it’s the character of the difference that could be described a bit more fully. The points that you make, @Piper_Brianmind and @DominicX, are well-taken.
I’m not arguing that there is no worth to recorded music. Certainly it provides access to compositions that one could not have access to in any other way. In addition, the process of recording and playing recorded music allows for things that can’t be done with acoustic instruments or in acoustic spaces, or with non-electronic instruments of any kind.
Electronic instruments have their own character, and sound musicians can deconstruct sound into various component parts and then rebuild it in ways that can not occur naturally. At least, not naturally and still be perceivable by the senses humans are born with. (Radio waves occur naturally, but without special equipment, humans can’t detect them).
As to ability—that’s one place where I would like to critique the culture of music as we know it. However my critique extends to other aspects of our culture besides music. The whole idea that ”I don’t have the ability to compose music in the way the great classical composers composed or play music the way the great musicians played” is what disturbs me.
In the world I want to live in, people would not hierarchisize abilities, at least in the arts. We would say there are differences, but not that one is better than another; at least not to the degree that we do now. The arts are a mode of expression. With speech, at least in most nations, we expect freedom to say what we want. We expect to be able to express any idea we want without being thrown in prison for it.
In the arts, we throw ourselves into prison before we ever even start. This is because most of think we are not good enough to even participate in the conversation. I would argue that if you can’t participate in the conversation, then you can’t understand what is being said.
So what my argument is about, essentially, is that we should find ways to empower people to participate in the conversation. There are several things blocking people: the hierarchy of expertise, the belief that one must have a basic level of expertise to even participate; the exposure of so many people to “high” level art; and the concomitant demise of art as an aspect of daily communal expression.
Hierarchy of expertise is a problem everywhere. In the past, when recordings were unavailable, nearly everyone could participate, and did participate in the conversation. If you had a community gathering, everyone participated in the music or the dance, many simply by clacking sticks together. But there was no judgment, or little judgment about the capability of various members of the community. Everyone could dance. It didn’t matter what you looked like. And, no doubt, there were probably very few people who couldn’t keep rhythm. Why? Because of their participation in the making of the music. The only way to learn and gain capability is to practice. There is no concept of “talent” because everyone has the same training, and at least the same basic level of talent. The concept of zero talent is just not possible, as it is today.
However, hierarchy in politics lead to a hierarchy in the arts. The best art became that which was patronized by the humans with the highest status. In fact, art became a way to gain status in court—in France, courtiers had to know how to dance, and the better they danced, the more status they had. This practice lead to the form we now know as ballet.
In this way, albeit over centuries, art was taken away from ordinary people and made into the province of high status people. Indeed, the only democracy in art and the idea of the purpose of art was that it was (and is) one of the best ways of raising oneself from the peasantry into the aristocracy. The arts have thus moved from the province of all of us to the province of the few, the elite, and in the process, excluded most of us from the conversation. Not only does this hurt people in their own lives—people believing they have no talent—but it deprives society of much, perhaps of importance, that might be “said.”
Recordings probably have a mixed record here, both in imposing the hierarchy, but, due to the reduction in cost of the technology, it is proliferating more rapidly, leading to a slow democratization of ability to participate in the conversation. Yet, this democratization occurs only amongst the technologically literate, and other people also have plenty to say.
It is this attitude that art belongs to an elite that I would like to destroy. I think the proliferation of recorded music is one of the causes of this attitude. We have too much exposure to the experts. This cuts off people, because they censor themselves, believing there is no way they can compete with the experts. The conversation changes from something that everyone can participate in, to a competition devoted to identifying those who can express themselves the best.
However, in art, there is no absolute standard of expertise or what speaks most clearly. To some extent, language is arbitrary, and what we like has a lot to do with what we are exposed to. However, it is true that some art is more in tune with our physical structure than others.
Certainly, in music, it seems likely that there are tonalities that humans are better attuned to. We respond to scales with intervals that we can detect and where the notes have certain specific relationships in terms of frequency. Major chords make us feel one way; minor chords another. These things work beyond consciousness—at a physical level. Resolution of a musical phrase leads to a feeling of completeness in our bodies.
Never-the-less, there is much room for variance in expression, and to the extent that what we appreciate as a society is arbitrary, judgmentalism kills a lot of what might be said. It takes a special person who doesn’t care what others think to continue to remain true to their “voice” in the face of much negative criticism.
From birth, we most of us have an instinct for music and art. Until our parents or teachers tell us to stop, we play with rhythm and movement and color. Kids scribble on walls. They bang pots. They dance riotously. Until people tell them to stop. Part of the reason they want their kids to stop is because they find the expression to be discordant. Part of it is because they don’t believe their kids have any talent.
I want us to stop using expertise and talent (or lack thereof) as an excuse to not participate in the conversation. This requires an attitude of inclusiveness. Perhaps even a constitutional amendment about freedom of artistic speech. Court cases already have supported that, but what I mean is a special amendment (a metaphorical amendment) that would serve to encourage people to participate in the conversation as part of their civic duty, so to speak.
From participation, skill will arise. More ideas will appear. Individuals benefit. Society benefits. People are happier. Less depression. More diversity of expression, and more inclusiveness. To the extent that recorded music works against these things, it makes me unhappy. I don’t want my voice to be stomped on. I think I have a lot to say, and I’m willing to listen to others if they are willing to listen to me.
Composing members:
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Composing members:
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