orzie said:When I was a kid, this music actually gave me adrenaline and I wanted to go to gym immediately[/url]. The visuals accompanying it also made a great impact. The falsecord (fry) vocal technique is a somewhat rudiment of animal grunting which was inherited from the times when human was much closer to animal.
And when I was kid, I was fascinated by this music because it revealed to me why we are no longer any close to animals.
Now, basically, what you say is: the last 40 years of music, experiments and bollocks are the musical reality today, and if you deny that, you are nothing but an arrogant prick.
I deny that, because I don't say that. Even when you look at contemporary music there is a development - blues is older than 40 years, obviously. There is Jazz, there is Swing; there are 20th century componists. There is also more than 500 years. Folklore, say, Spanish Flamenco music, the Indian and Chinese stuff.
Correct me, if I'm wrong, but no "classic" used the sitar.
Quote:And when I was kid, I was fascinated by this music because it revealed to me why we are no longer any close to animals.
We are still animals and are driven by physiology like them.
Sal, don't be an old ass. Music must give people emotions - this is what it is for. Any kind of music is accepted for this noble purpose - different music gives different emotions, including classics, ambient or chaotic hardcore.
artu said:Well, maybe so, especially when it comes to folk/popular, it must be something else to dance to a tarantella on your wedding as a peasant in medieval times, listen to Jimi Hendrix as a teen in Woodstock back in 1968 or dance to the new, crazy jazz in a 1920's speakeasy. But I think that aspect of it becomes less end less significant when we're talking about music that it is considered "high art" and composed as music for music's sake. Yes, there is still that, we wont know the feeling of dancing to a brand new waltz, in a palace in 18th century as the emperor's guests. We cant receive Bach's church music like a 17th century Christian etc, but these are much less significant things when you compare it with the historicity of literature.
That's getting into the apples and oranges territory. Literature is generally less accessible than music, it requires effort and literacy (the pun is built-in ) while music requires only ear so it's no surprise that the latter is easier to process than the former. They also work on different levels - literature targets the mind much more than the "soul" while music does the opposite. You can often find yourself in a situation when you like some tune but can't find the exact words to explain why because it operates on a much more basic level, where words don't even exist (hence why animals too can "like" or "dislike" music); on the other hand literature requires your mind to work to be appreciated - even if the appreciation is actually disgust or boredom - and thus has some prior "training" prerequisites which music doesn't have. Of course one can argue that appreciating good music also requires "training" but that's a slippery slope leading to the chasm of subjectivism, if I can say it in a pompous way. Additionally, due to the need for mental processing, literature is prone to many mind traps which music is immune to - like (self-)censorship, prejudices, insufficient knowledge and so on - all of which affect the final perception. In the end, I don't think you can compare the two in general because there is no real common metric except the very vague "I (dis)like" which could mean countless of things.
At the bottom of it, music isn't "art", but "entertainment". Even Bach's music, who composed and played for god's glory is entertainment, because "church music" has been entertainment, be it "gospel" (people singing songs) or church organ mass music. An opera is a piece of entertainment, first and foremost, written by a very few able to for the pleasure of a very few, but those very few wanted top have fun. The minuet is a dance - at court, of course, not a popular one.
Two things have changed the character of all this and that's recording technology and radio, making music 1) readily availale 2) for the whole of the population, changing the dominant character from elitist to popular.
Now, there are of course different kinds of understandings of "entertainment": putting someone to the sword in a public execution, a boxing fight or throwing people to the lions - or watching a movie where all kinds of things are blown up and people die in scores, all that qualifies as entertainment; as does eating drinking, listening to a couple of musicians while having a serving wench on or at your knees - or being at a heavy metal concert and headbang the crap out of it.
However, what about the "finer arts"? Reading a sonet to a quiet audience? Listening to a symphony or a piano concerto? Is that a somewhat BETTER entertainment (more "cultivated") or is it just a DIFFERENT kind of entertainment?
Isn't this just the same thing as when they started to make a difference between romantic (pure) love and bodily, sweating, down-to-earth sex? Isn't that all a load of bull?
There is a very complex relationship between entertainment and intricacy, and the more intricate things get, the less people will enjoy it, because the less people will be able to follow, be it a story or a piece of music or even a work of architecture and so on. I don't think it makes sense to rate things for their intricacy or complexity. The REAL art - and that is MY opinion - is to let complex and intricate things APPEAR simple: a good teacher is able to explain complex things with simple words. However - what about the opposite? Letting simple things look complex? Fractals are an example.
In the end, what matters is FUN. The more intelligent people are, the more complex a puzzle has to be to be fun to solve. But aren't the really entertaining puzzles those that don't need immense computational abilities, but maybe more of an unusual "out-of-the-box" thinking?
Imagine 4 points as in the corner points of a square. link all points with 3 consecutive lines, ending at your starting point without crossing lines. Virtual out-of-the-box thinking necessary to solve that one.
Can noise be entertaining? Of course. Not just for everyone. But what WILL do that?
@Zenofex
You can compare various platforms of creativity and conclude one trends to be more abstract than other.
@JJ
I wouldn't call church music exactly entertainment but let's just say, in the beginning of each genre, there is usually some other function than "creating art" alone. It can be entertainment (balls, weddings, dance parties, carnavals etc), worship (religious music such as gospels, choir music, ceremonial songs), stimulation (work songs, love ballads, folk songs that complain about troubles of life) or even lullabies. The 1920's for Jazz and the 1950's for Rock, the early 17th Century for classical is this period of beginning. They are there to make people dance, relax, whatever, they are part of a social activity other than merely listening to music. Then, some "founding fathers" come along and transform things one step further and we have an era of genesis. In Jazz, Louis Armstrong (not as a popular singer as he became known for later on, but as a trumpet player in the late 1920's and early 1930's), Duke Ellington with his sophisticated big band arrangements are perfect examples. In Rock (and Roll), Chuck Berry with his more melodic guitar solos and semi-political lyrics that says something other than "do woop - do woop, let's dance) fits the description rather than Elvis Presley who was an excellent performer but not a creative force such as Berry. In Classical, among some others, Bach is considered the most important foundation bringer. (Sal can fill in details with greater accuracy and detail for the Classics if he wishes to.) Now, once the new genre comes along, everything is fresh and waiting to be discovered and it is followed by a Golden Age where the masters of the Genre come along, rising on the shoulders of the founding fathers, spurting out masterpiece after masterpiece. In Jazz, that would be the 1930's and 1940's where Big Bands ruled and many jazz standards became the standard that they are. It's kind of like the Jurassic age of Jazz Bands, they were unchallenged. In Rock, it is, of course, the 60's with immortals like the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Cream, early Led Zeppelin, Jimi Hendrix. In Classical, the period is mostly defined by the great Mozart. So, now that the audience is hungry for more and amazed and willing, the sky is the limit and people keep looking beyond the horizon. And eventually, there is a shift to a more sophisticated phase, artistic expression and abstract ideas take over entertainment, the music becomes less and less favorable for dancing. In Jazz, this is the rise of Bebop with Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie and so on, in Rock, it is the "Progressive Rock" period where solos keep getting longer and longer (beginning to sound intolerably long to some), the possibilities of studio recording are tested to the last drip. 70's Pink Floyd is the perfect example when it comes to Rock. In Classical Era, Beethoven is the key figure for the transmission from Classical Era to the Romantics. Note that, this is also the time when new genres start to rise, taking over the entertainment function from the old, what Rock n Roll did to Jazz, Disco did to Rock (and Roll). This is followed by a phase when the conventions and limits of the genre seem to come to an end, "this had been done already" people start to say. New works begin to become more and more about intellectual experiments, they lose touch with the crowds even more, in a much more significant way. Most of 20th Century classical music, Coltrane in his free-jazz period or Ornette Coleman, maybe late King Crimson in Rock or groups like Yes.... But now, we have the other genres popping out ready to go through the same cycle. Who knows what will come after electronic music?
I know this would be an oversimplified way of looking at how things evolve/devolve if you go into specifics and find divergent examples from each genre and you can find many. But this is how things flow in general according to me.
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Are you pretty? This is my occasion. - Ghost
And here you lost me, because when no distinction is made between pleasure and entertainment, everything is worth everything, granted it amuses you 1 second, 1 minute, or one day. Reading Kafka is amusing, reading Crime and Punishment is fun. You confound marketing request with creator motivation.
For you, just because Bach music was payed by rich oligarchs to fill their free time means that Bach composes with the goal of entertaining people.
No surprise then that links to classical music in the "what you listen to" are about 1% or less; if the motto is that music must amuse, then I understand a Beethoven or Chopin aren't very comic, thus will be skipped.
Erm, "worship" is kind of an entertainment as well, in the sense that people COME TOGETHER or congregate and CELEBRATE something, whether it's the birthday of a person or a god or a momentuous event. Music, then, is part of that celebration. Singing together raises the spirits. If someone plays (like the church organ), there is an audience to listen, the congregation, which is PURE entertainment. Think about it: music and singing is completely unnecessary for the purpose, it just makes it much more enjoyable event.
In the end, when "entertainment" becomes "art" a kind of abstraction takes place, but art that doesn't entertain is ultimately boring, and for boring things there is no place, because they don't entertain. You have to be careful with abstractions because it's never the pure intellect that savours something. If your spirits are raised because of an uplifting piece of music, you are happy for the uplifting effect as well. Savoring "beauty" is something ultimately irrational and quite subjective.
On the other hand, headbanging can be very satisfying as well, like putting everything into workout or something like that.
I thought I was clear enough earlier but apparently I wasn't. Yes you need to educate your ear to be able to enter all the subtleties and polyphonies with counterpoints for instance in classical music but you also need to educate your ear for metal, or for jazz, actually for any kind of music you have to (aside maybe electro and a few others). But metal moreover, two people here say they hear noise from the bootleg video posted by Orzie when I clearly hear a Metalcore song with defined structure and breaks and other musical elements and I can tell you, I've seen bootlegs with sound quality much worse than this. Of course to someone who is not into metal it can appear as pure noise, but it's not, it's music whatever you think or like, if you can hear only noise, it only means you just don't listen to metal because you don't like it and as a result your ear has not the proper education in that domain, but it starts to get wrong when people claim it's not music. However, I can understand if someone doesn't accept it as music and is his perfect right. FYI real noise exists as a (rather unpopular and understandably so) music genre and it's nowhere close to metal. Orzie's vid is music because there is a form, rhythmic figures, melody and harmony, whether you hear it or not.
Look, I will use a very rough example for our estimated pianists out there, I quickly wrote this rhythmical figure, almost a cliché in metal, let us say the guitar will be playing this:
So, the guitarist starts to play that in loop for practice and the drums will enter, adding groove. Fast enough along with the bass, all three will start to make some variations around it and simply play together, have musicians interactions. Insofar even if I didn't add any key signature we could assume we're playing in G, probably minor, synth (if any) could add whatever harmony it wants to, and influence on the G note played by the guitar eventually (or ultimately) changing its function.
If you play these two measures with full band and you play tight like a tiger, it will sound massive with proper amplification and assuming drummer has double pedal, and what will be the result in the crowd of listeners, people will start handbanguing, not because there are stupid fans, but because it is what this kind of music does and what one feels when it reaches him, all same as you will close your eyes and feel like a god while listening to Der Fliegende Holländer, or start dancing the swing while listening to Count Basie.
Also I don't like the assumption that a music style will mean nothing if it's not 500 years old, may I recall you got blues -solid foundation of almost everything that came after- through slavery (not lightweight history!), that jazz which came later on and bebop, a music following meticulously harmony (when you're in C, you play C, but harmony allows C to go beyond C, and it depends on the function, if you're on a dominant chord, you can ie simply consider your V as its triton and play the II of that triton on top of it or in simpler words play G#(m) on G7 and if correctly executed it will sound super bop). Only with free jazz and albums like Coltrane's Interstellar space focus will change and break everything and interaction between musicians will take the upside. What would have been the reaction from people first listening to IS at that time, probably something like “Uh? What is the form? Why is not the drummer doing chabada like everyone else?”. Besides, most jazzmen praise Bach to the skies and some pianists just screams of Chopin sometimes, so there is a chain.
I spent over 25 years of my life studying classical piano, did metal for over a decade, and been studying jazz since a few years and all I say is from my personal experience. I pay my rent by teaching and am also a composer and have some releases out there and occasionally do gigs (even classical ones). I can assure the most skeptics that classical music, as rich as it is (and incredibly richer to other genres in some areas), does not contain ALL the elements and keys to let you access to any kind of music, we speak about metal, but even jazz isn't that accessible for someone stranger to it.
I can absolutely say, even the way I work is different. I've been defending classical music in front of people into popular music (almost burnt that dude who told me a synth could substitute classical piano, well he was a trumpet player, so I told him to come back at me after he plays with a plastic trumpet), and I'm now defending popular music in front of people into classical (and I perfectly understand the stance). There is no universal truth here, music is pure mathematics as even if the composer or interpreter doesn't know it this will sound good or bad because of that, there is harmonic explanation for everything, as long as there is a pulsation, the poorest rhythmic figure and most bland harmony ever, it is music, regardless of the sound production. One can consider it barbarian (and to some extent it can be) but it doesn't mean it should be forbidden from a thread about musical discussion, IMO, and just so you don't get me wrong, I can call out a BS song when I hear it.
And about entertainment, yes Mozart entertains me greatly and so does AC/DC or Charlie Parker. And all three of them I can study, although Mozart and Parker take more time on the musical side, but that doesn't mean AC/DC shouldn't get the respect they deserve.
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So finally you end making same kind of classifications as those you accuse me of: when art is not entertaining, is boring by definition and has no place in history. The thing is that different cultural backgrounds can sensibly expand and transcend the shallow term of "entertaining", and what is boring for one, can sound very passionate to another, when he masters the tools to better comprehend it.
You can repeat ad infinitum that art must remain simple, this claim is based on nothing but your subjective desire to avoid effort. It can be simple, it can be also complex, there is no rule about except in your mind.
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hey Galaad and artu, of course I had not in mind folklore extensions and variation as blues, pop, country, jazz, those are styles I enjoy as much as classic.
I was mainly talking about the billions of "new styles" born in the last decades, punk rock, piss rock, metal the rock and other noisy manifestations which need a whole visual show around to hide the void their inner material is made of.
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Quote:No surprise then that links to classical music in the "what you listen to" are about 1% or less; if the motto is that music must amuse, then I understand a Beethoven or Chopin aren't very comic, thus will be skipped.
The percentage didn't change. The rest of the people didn't listen to music at all.
Quote:I was mainly talking about the billions of "new styles" born in the last decades, punk rock, piss rock, metal the rock and other noisy manifestations which need a whole visual show around to hide the void their inner material is made of.
These "new styles" are very much divided by accompanying factors like the auditory, the subculture, the lyrics, the emotion put inside. And I don't see any problem in the show nature of that music: it's liked all over the world even if played from mp3 player. Moreover, they may very well include many elements of mentioned blues, jazz, folk, whatever you say. The idea to put the constant beat belongs to jazz, not rock. The things you don't understand are not always crap. Just let it go, good old Sal.
Salamandre said:And here you lost me, because when no distinction is made between pleasure and entertainment, everything is worth everything, granted it amuses you 1 second, 1 minute, or one day. Reading Kafka is amusing, reading Crime and Punishment is fun. You confound marketing request with creator motivation.
For you, just because Bach music was payed by rich oligarchs to fill their free time means that Bach composes with the goal of entertaining people.
No surprise then that links to classical music in the "what you listen to" are about 1% or less; if the motto is that music must amuse, then I understand a Beethoven or Chopin aren't very comic, thus will be skipped.
You seem to have strange ideas about what entertainment means. An entertainer isn't a comedian, although a comedian tries to be an entertainer.
Art without an audience is worthless. Shakespeare wrote his stuff to be played on stage, before an audience TO ENTERTAIN.
Bach composed and played to honor god and for the recreation of the mind - that's what he said himself - and the last one means, for entertainmnt or ENJOYMENT (of an audience).
JollyJoker said:Erm, "worship" is kind of an entertainment as well, in the sense that people COME TOGETHER or congregate and CELEBRATE something, whether it's the birthday of a person or a god or a momentuous event. Music, then, is part of that celebration. Singing together raises the spirits. If someone plays (like the church organ), there is an audience to listen, the congregation, which is PURE entertainment. Think about it: music and singing is completely unnecessary for the purpose, it just makes it much more enjoyable event.
In the end, when "entertainment" becomes "art" a kind of abstraction takes place, but art that doesn't entertain is ultimately boring, and for boring things there is no place, because they don't entertain. You have to be careful with abstractions because it's never the pure intellect that savours something. If your spirits are raised because of an uplifting piece of music, you are happy for the uplifting effect as well. Savoring "beauty" is something ultimately irrational and quite subjective.
Actually no, you're pretty far off regarding Church music, "entertaining" church music is a blasphemous abomination of the modern age, but originally Church music was made with a two fold reason, the first being making something that would be as great as men could do to get closer to God, the second was to memorize prayers and psalms, entertainment was out of the question, that's the reason people would say that old Church music sounds like a boring lament, while more modern music is made for people to participate in the celebration, while the previous was not intended to be sung along by the ensemble.
Organ music was made for a similar reason, as it could reach lower tones than voice, so that it would boost the darker tones, then, composers thought that the organ could be used as a new interesting instrument for music, but that's something different from celebration music.
Listen to this:
Is it entertaining? Would it galvanize a crowd?
Keep in mind this is the kind of music used in Medieval movies when they need to make a scene where the negative is shown.
Unless I'm misunderstanding you when you say something is entertaining.
EDIT:: Fixed the video...
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Noli offendere Patriam Agathae quia ultrix iniuriarum est.
You can repeat ad infinitum that art must remain simple, this claim is based on nothing but your subjective desire to avoid effort. It can be simple, it can be also complex, there is no rule about except in your mind.
You seem to enjoy simplification yourself, your problem is, you lose authenticity when you do it, because that isn't at all what I said, and I'm actually not that surprised you didn't understand a word of what I said.
But let's remind everybody that I'm a pretentious ultra-traditionalist Catholic first!
You think that though, I've showed more examples like that to a lot of people, and that's just an example, did I say you wouldn't like it? ____________
Noli offendere Patriam Agathae quia ultrix iniuriarum est.
You have a too modern understanding of the word "entertainment". Take any choir of young children. Would that be entertaining? Probably for the parents, maybe for the children.
Every kind of congregation celebrating something that includes music is entertainment - just think about what an amazing instrument a church organ is and how it sounds in a cathedral or big church, then imagine people listening to that. Then imagine a virtuous musician like Bach playing on it and what you have is a concert.
This thread is pages long: 
posted November 10, 2015 01:33 AM
) while music requires only ear so it's no surprise that the latter is easier to process than the former. They also work on different levels - literature targets the mind much more than the "soul" while music does the opposite. You can often find yourself in a situation when you like some tune but can't find the exact words to explain why because it operates on a much more basic level, where words don't even exist (hence why animals too can "like" or "dislike" music); on the other hand literature requires your mind to work to be appreciated - even if the appreciation is actually disgust or boredom - and thus has some prior "training" prerequisites which music doesn't have. Of course one can argue that appreciating good music also requires "training" but that's a slippery slope leading to the chasm of subjectivism, if I can say it in a pompous way. 
Additionally, due to the need for mental processing, literature is prone to many mind traps which music is immune to - like (self-)censorship, prejudices, insufficient knowledge and so on - all of which affect the final perception. In the end, I don't think you can compare the two in general because there is no real common metric except the very vague "I (dis)like" which could mean countless of things.
