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JollyJoker
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posted November 18, 2014 09:37 PM |
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Well, yes, you need a certain virtuosity to play/sing the compositions and so on - but of course the compositions must justify the amount of virtuosity involved (which is what you say in your last paragraph: showing off is no justification for anything). Meaning, the result should warrant the amount of effort. It gets more complicated when you consider that art which is APPRECIATED only by a small minority is doubtful in itself. It's elitist, and elitist - today - means suspect.
Which is probably a very complex way of saying that virtuosity in itself is nothing, because just because something is difficult to "do", it's not automatically of greater value; technical mastery may just be a cover for emptiness or a lack of originality.
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artu
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posted November 18, 2014 09:49 PM |
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A lot of art is appreciated by a small minority because they take more time to comprehend and require effort to grasp. Weren't you the one who said Zappa was always less popular because he was too complex for the ordinary listener? How is Zappa too complex and Schubert is not? That's not elitism, saying "that is elitism" is populism.
And as I said, if you look at classical music reviews or admirers, the most appreciated performers aren't praised because of their technical skills, that is already a given, in classical and most jazz, everybody plays well anyhow, on the contrary, they are praised because their performances are exceptional. But unlike Rock or Pop, a higher level of familiarity with the genre is required to realize that.
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JollyJoker
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posted November 18, 2014 10:41 PM |
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That's not what I mean with "small minority". Zappa is known to a RELATIVELY large part of "interested" music listeners, that is, people who actually spend money on music (as opposed to people that don't). People who call Schubert great are certainly not elitist. If only a small minority of the people who ever listened to Schubert would call him great - that would be elitist.
The other thing is somewhat more controversial.
I don't think, familiarity with the genre has a lot to do with anything. I mean, things are not happening in an empty room OR to fulfil strange criteria only a few will understand. Art is supposed to reach people in some way. The ... conditions or ... environment in which things take place shouldn't be too complex.
Take The Haiku
There's a lot of fornal discussion, but ultimately the art is in the merge of form and content (and a Haiku is something that shoud be quite simple).
In the end, my point would seem to be, that art NEEDING higher familairity with the specifics is in no way superior to art that doesn't, because art should transcend this. Meaning, there is a limit on the intellectual dimension.
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artu
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posted November 18, 2014 11:23 PM |
bonus applied by Corribus on 28 Jan 2015. |
Edited by artu at 00:33, 19 Nov 2014.
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But it doesn't work like that. I'll give myself as an example, I was listening to Rock as a teenager and from the solos and the covers, it naturally led me to the Blues, this made me familiar with things like horns in the rhythm section, the blue notes as they call it, a much subtler sense of rhythm compared to the grunge bands of the decade etc etc. So now, I started buying a few Jazz albums, mostly Classical Jazz and bluesy repertoire (still my favorite style), then, once intensely listening to Jazz naturally trained my ear in a few years, I started to hear the relationship between the instruments on a whole other level. It was another dimension and I started to have a higher standard of liking the sound or style of music whether it's rock or folk, I was hearing more. After digesting classical Jazz, I got to enjoy Bebop Era and beyond... If someone who never heard of Jazz before hears someone such as Thelonious Monk for instance, out of the blue, they most probably wont like it because the musical expressions and conventions will be alien to them.
You can also observe this on a cultural level, where as we easily like American or Latin American music or European classical music because we are more familiar with it, a folk song of Indonesia may feel distant to us, we may even not be able to differentiate if it's a sad song or just a calm one.
Now, of course, in every genre (except things like Death Metal etc) there are works what I referred in the previous posts as "beyond genre" works. Such as the popular classics like the Four Seasons or Stan Getz playing Girl from Ipanema or Yesterday by the Beatles. Melodically very catchy pieces that "invite you" to the genre, they relatively require less familiarity but it's still required. There are people in my country who dont listen to Western popular music at all and to them all rock songs are the same noise just like to some people all Jazz solos are a waterfall of irrelevant notes, kind of like the "all Chinese look alike" mentality. In Classical music, the familiarity required to appreciate an exceptional performance is higher because the differences are subtler. As I once mentioned, I listen to it quite often but sometimes I still fail to see the difference in a very praised performance and a regular one, like I can grasp Glenn Gould plays very good but I cant fully comprehend what makes him GREAT. In Jazz, I reached that level in time, I know what makes Johnny Hodges one of the best sax players ever. It's not like, you go through listening exercises deliberately, your taste simply matures and evolves. Think of yourself, isn't there a difference between your taste in music as a 20 year old and 40? Aren't there songs that you appreciate now but wouldn't back when you were 17? Some people invest more time and energy in music (on a listener basis) and their tastes mature more. Some only have 10 Cd's home and it's stuff like "Greatest Hits of 80's" because that is what was playing during their prom.
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JollyJoker
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posted November 19, 2014 08:32 AM |
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Artu, your last post is about people, not about music; people are different, so are their brains, their upbringing, their ears, their tastes.
To savour something, it's not necessary to (be able to) analyze the whys and hows. It's just so, that IF you DO savour something it's highly likely that you will take an interest and start looking into it. So the process is always the same. You take an interest in something, NOT deliberately, and when your interest is piqued enough, you start to dig, deliberately.
With me, it's so that there has never been music I would NOT hear, when I was young. There was the popular music, but also Rock'n'Roll, Rhythm and Blues, Swing (which I was fond of), and even Easy Listening (I was pretty hooked on Bert Kaempfert). I adored Bach and his Organ work, and the prospect of hearing an actual Church Organ would actually get me going to church and to Sunday Mass for a time. There was Blues and there was Jazz, and some more - but in the end not all of this was equally fascinating or piqued me to really delve into it and explore the genre and the whole art, and I'd say that is purely personal taste. I also think, I know the foundation for this: while I'm more fond of some instruments than of others, in the end I need drums and percussion in lasting music (there is no problem with a-capella renditions and drum-less music, but I wouldn't want to hear that continually, only as an exception).
Now. Talking about Metal and talking about development. Take these two:
Black Sabbath - Snowblind (recorded in 1972, played in 2013)
Megadeth - Five Magics (recorded 1990, version played in 2010)
Those two are examples which symbolize this. Worlds between them in musical development, but kids would grow up, listening to (among others) Black Sabbath, grab an instrument and start from there to take it to new borders.
Same with audience or listeners. They would grow up with Hard and Heavy and would listen to what was developing.
(I could put this in between:
Motörhead - Overkill (recorded in 1978/9, played in 2004); delivers the speed)
Now, sure, Five Magics has one instrument more which makes a lot of difference when it comes to sophistication; it's quite varied, with radically different songparts; it's sophisticated, virtuoso play with breathtaking parts ... in short, it's brilliant.
Snowblind also has radically different song parts, but you can't say it's sophisticated or virtuoso play - but it's still breathtaking in its own majestic, heavy way, much simpler, but powerful.
(Same is true for Overkill, except it's not majestic, but a stampeding horse that plunges ahead, a racing machine with brutal horsepower.)
Would I actually LEAN TO something here?
No, I wouldn't. It's all great in its own way.
Which is how it is with music. What IS good, keeps to be good, just look back to the classics.
And that's the only difference: beginning in the last century we have an explosion in music (and art in general: just look at how many books are written), and everyone with an interest has to filter out for themselves what they like and what not (and that may change over time, with experience). And while it's true that you can analyze music in so many ways, it's still difficult to RATE music (and art)based on that.
And in the end, it's not even necessary to do so. I mean, you may agree that Five Magics has "quality" - but you may just not like it, and that will trump it.
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artu
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posted November 19, 2014 04:51 PM |
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Edited by artu at 17:16, 19 Nov 2014.
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The explosion you talk about is in quantity though, not necessarily quality. And it's simply because now, we are recording the music of the common folk and industrially replicating it with the capitalist principle of selling more and more. Even bootleg recordings have anthologies now. Imagine you could listen to every folk music performer and bard in every village in the past and you will have something close to popular music of today. (Pop, Rock, Funk, Soul, Hip-Hop, Country etc etc.)
I can relate to both of you but I think you and Sal are at the opposite edges of a long spectrum. While he can be overconservative sometimes, you end up in an absolute subjectivity where the only measurable difference between Bon Jovi and Rachmaninoff is what instruments they use. That is not the case, and I'm not just talking about structural differences here, I'm not a professional musician and I can not explain this to you by chords, notes, graphics of polyphony etc etc. But take into account these:
In Classical and Jazz, the parameters of "making it" is still overwhelmingly musical, if not purely. On the other hand, in popular music, people can get places by their looks, stage show, costumes, life-story, political spokesmanship, one-hit-wonders... In terms of "market share" while the first one is directed at adults, popular music's many branch is directly produced for a 13-23 year old target audience. What's about personal emotion is, once you love a piece of music, you keep on loving it even if it's a children song.
And mentioning upbringing is quite beside the point because that's like saying the quality of education you have is about the country you are born in, it still doesn't make all education programs equal. If your upbringing was African tribal hunter, you would only be listening to tam tam drums, and if you were an aristocrat in the 18th century, you could be awakened by a string quartet in the mornings, I'd take the string quartet. 
On a more personal, subjective level, when it comes to Heavy Metal, although I have my exceptions, the reason I generally dislike it is not primitive structure or anything like that. I find the mannerisms and the whole psychology grotesquely teenagerish. I could have tolerated that if I was captured by the music itself but I consider it a downgrade from actual Rock, they lost the groove. Okay, that made me sound like a hippy from the sixties but what word is there? I'm talking about what Chuck Berry describes as "my heart beatin' rhythm and my soul keep singing the blues." They lost the raw-deal, the motherlode of what makes that music good. And without that, it's basically just angry man screaming.
I'm a sucker for easy-listening, too btw. It's really easy to listen.  And when it comes to drums, nobody makes them sing like Gene Krupa
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JollyJoker
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posted November 19, 2014 05:48 PM |
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artu said:
I can relate to both of you but I think you and Sal are at the opposite edges of a long spectrum. While he can be overconservative sometimes, you end up in an absolute subjectivity where the only measurable difference between Bon Jovi and Rachmaninoff is what instruments they use. That is not the case, and I'm not just talking about structural differences here, I'm not a professional musician and I can not explain this to you by chords, notes, graphics of polyphony etc etc.
In this case you fail to see the point, which is that there is no UNIVERSAL quality standard for music. There are many reasons for this, but fact is, there is none. There is no OBJECTIVE standard, and so rating is simply SUBJECTIVE - all the more so, since music is no purpose in itself, but it wants to delight PEOPLE.
That means, of course there is a measurable difference between Bon Jovi and Rachmaninoff - but who is anyone to tell anyone else this or that would be better? In the end, there isn't even something to win in such comparisons.
Ultimately, everyone has of course their own SUBJECTIVE quality ideas - which is a rationalization of what you like and what you don't, for some part.
So subjectively - for me - the King Crimson link I gave a lifetime ago is QUALITY. Corr thought it was awful.
Now, even if I COULD tell him scientifically WHY that's quality, it would be of no use, because he'd STILL not like it better, even with that knowledge.
Which is why quality discussions about music make no sense, since everyone has their own ideas, and rightly so: if there WERE objective and true ideas about quality, then everyone should be able to acknowledge them, that is, the highest quality should appeal to everyone or most - which isn't the case.
So simply forget it. It's just that people like to think they have a refined taste, while others are boorish. If a song is simple like bread and sells just as well, it MUST be good, otherwise it wouldn't sell. That you or me wouldn't like it and think it was primitive or repetitive, doesn't change this - or taste is different, but certainly not "better" in any OBJECTIVE sense. It may indeed be more refined, but that's beside the point of art.
Think Ulysses by James Joyce. Yeah, great work - except that no one reads it. So that can't be it.
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artu
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posted November 19, 2014 05:56 PM |
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As I said, where I differ from you is not replacing lack of objectivity with an absolute subjectivity. I dont think that's missing the point but from here on, we'll indeed start running in circles. It was a good discussion though, made me re-contemplate about some aspects of the issue. Well, as Markkur would say, "cheers and see you later. "
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Salamandre
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posted November 19, 2014 06:11 PM |
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In fact, JJ stance is "I do not understand, therefore nor you".
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Galaad
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Li mort as morz, li vif as vis
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posted November 19, 2014 07:37 PM |
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Edited by Galaad at 19:39, 19 Nov 2014.
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artu said:
I still fail to see the difference in a very praised performance and a regular one, like I can grasp Glenn Gould plays very good but I cant fully comprehend what makes him GREAT.
I would say mainly his interpretation. Of course you will also be considering that during the 60's his piano modernism met strong opposition, indeed, Glenn Gould, for his unconventional attitudes, could only displease conservatives (it is braced on his keyboard or plays long silences that aren't on the partition ie). It is interesting to compare some version from Sviatoslav Richter of J-S. Bach's Well-tempered Clavier and Glenn Gould's one (in this case Prélude&Fugue BWV 853).
While the Richter's one may allegedly be one of the most faithful to Bach's composition, Gould's break the patterns, and his approach really proposes something else, than any other version, so beautifully played may them be, already existent. So even though I love with all my heart Richter's version, I cannot be indifferent to the richness of Glenn Gould's more unique artistic proposition, and I think that this is what makes him not only good but also great.
In a metronome set to the music world, he gathered all the elements needed to make him a living legend and also his death, sudden and violent, probably helped ignite the passions.
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artu
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posted November 19, 2014 07:48 PM |
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Edited by artu at 19:48, 19 Nov 2014.
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Well-said Galaad. For example, like many people, one of my favorite Bach pieces is the Prelude No. 2 in C minor from the Well-Tempered Clavier and personally I don't prefer the Gould version, I hear a fluency, a "flows-like-a river thing" which I adore in that piece and Gould's version seems to give up on that with breaks.
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JollyJoker
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posted November 19, 2014 07:59 PM |
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No offense, Sal, but you sound like you'd speak about God or a religion, and you were the enlightened.
But you didn't read properly. Everyone has their own understanding, is what I say, and who are you or me or whoever to say that yours is wrong and mine is right or vice versa?
@ artu
Quote:
As I said, where I differ from you is not replacing lack of objectivity with an absolute subjectivity.
That should sound strange in your own ears. If there is no objectivity, then all that's left is subjectivity.
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artu
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posted November 19, 2014 08:22 PM |
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No, there can still be things that are not classified in the same category and there can be differences of depth, sophistication and subtlety between genres of art. Of course, they can have exceptions but just because there is no single, objective norm or a single school of thought that determines what a good drawing is, we don't treat a Garfield cartoon the way we treat a Picasso painting.
You can subjectively like King Crimson more than Beethoven but to say it's easily on par with the Classics is another thing. Subjectivity on that magnitude equals something that is decided completely arbitrary and that is not the case. That's like claiming we might have been created five minutes ago with fabricated memories in our head, on theory it looks fine but the praxis is never applied in that fashion.
Although, there is not a single, perfect, ideal taste that everybody should arrive at, some people's tastes are indeed more refined than others, to deny that in the name of political correctness and labeling it elitist is ignoring a very observable fact. I have presented you factors both socio-historical and musical about how we can compare different genres. The good ol' "it's all subjective" wont cut it, it's a topic with many parameters, not just subjective taste. Nobody denies subjective taste is a very important part of the equation but you are reducing everything into that.
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Salamandre
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posted November 19, 2014 08:23 PM |
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JJ,based on your remarks, no one can say what is better or not. So how then you create institutional structures for those who want to learn? On which base? How a guy, for example, is hired at Oxford to teach literature, and not another random guy? Why am I payed to teach art reading if all this is so vague?
Because the goal, in such structures, is to educate the student to the point he can make the difference between quality and not quality; humanly speaking, we can't nor have the time to analyze, read or listen to everything. Also the purpose of art is not to please you, me or others, as you say. The purpose of art is to be able to communicate emotions properly, and most of time this requires long training and meditation. About yourself, about everyone, about our fate and destiny. Some choose to express their daily empiric emotions, as "this chick is hot, I'm in love", or "I'm sad, she quited me".
Others may try to find a purpose to our metaphysic existence and ignore their miserable individuality, therefore raise high echoed universal questions. When you go so deep and interrogate your soul, the fact that others may find the answer pleasant or not is the last of your concerns. In fact, art, ultimately, is a form of self torture and it boils to who is having the guts to reach abysses the others weren't capable, then bring back the light they found. This is what you see when looking at Michelangelo, when listening Bach or when reading Dostoevsky.
My feeling is that art should be able to speak about all of us, at any moment. When someone uses its techniques it to reach individual goals and create a self show from, I call it what is it: show, entertaining moment.
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artu
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posted November 19, 2014 08:36 PM |
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Edited by artu at 20:38, 19 Nov 2014.
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Two questions Sal:
1- Don't you think expecting every art work to be a timeless masterpiece of the magnitude you explain above is a little over the top?
2- How many Classical composers do you think achieved that or even tried to achieve that? They also had artists who were simply just good at their work of creating compositions and didn't care about the philosophical aspect you take into account. I'm sure many of them composed now considered masterpieces with the motivation of money or popularity, just the same.
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Salamandre
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posted November 19, 2014 08:40 PM |
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artu
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posted November 19, 2014 08:44 PM |
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artu said:
I'm sure many of them composed now considered masterpieces with the motivation of money or popularity, just the same.
The intention of the artist is not necessarily noble. A musical piece can simply be remembered because... it's a great musical piece. It doesn't have to intentionally try to decode humanity.
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Salamandre
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posted November 19, 2014 08:52 PM |
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I don't try to bring art down to a voluntary intellectual process. I have not the slightest problem with anyone liking metalica or whatever, I have a girl friend who is composing her melodies in 5 minutes while eating pop corn, then a whole gallery is in awe when listening, so I gave up on searching why humanity went so low.
But there is one thing I can't stand, is those JJ like reflections on all public platforms, as we see them by millions: potts is as good than Pavarotti, gaga is as good than Mozart, Bieber and Beethoven are soul brothers.
I mean, say you like it and we're fine. But don't use "as good as", which is a qualitative adjective measuring technical and skills achievement, when you have not the slightest clue about how to create a good voice, or a correct musical structure, or a correct interpretation.
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JollyJoker
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posted November 19, 2014 09:23 PM |
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I was actually trying to start an answer based to your longer post, Sal, but reading your last nonsense I'm quite pissed, since you are just polemic:
Quote:
JJ like reflections on all public platforms, as we see them by millions: potts is as good than Pavarotti, gaga is as good than Mozart, Bieber and Beethoven are soul brothers.
Potts and Pavarotti are comparable, since they PERFORM. It's like comparing two gymnasts doing the same jumps and turns and whatnot. Of course you can compare them, but in this case there is something OBJECTIVE: The musical piece they sing.
Which is what we are talking about here. Not about performances, but about compositions. About music originally invented - not reproduced and the quality of the reproduction.
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bloodsucker
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posted November 19, 2014 10:01 PM |
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JollyJoker said:
Potts and Pavarotti are comparable, since they PERFORM. It's like comparing two gymnasts doing the same jumps and turns and whatnot.
The problem is: they are not doing the same jumps but you are incapable to see the difference.
Think about something you are good at and compare performances u see on TV or something (I would go for surfing or inline/ice skating). Try to speak about it with two friends, one who has never done it and one that is more or less at your level. That's what Artu and Sal are talking about: the detail your first friend can't understand even when you point it to him.
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This thread is pages long: 
