Understanding music?

[Ten thumbs]

Impressionism is a softer approach to art, n'est-ce pas?

ZB

Softer than what?
Interestingly, Fanny was affected by the myth that losing her virginity might detract from her creativity. Thankfully, it did not, and thankfully there is nothing soft about her music. She was of course renowned for her interpretation of Beethoven and not because she played him softly!

[Shrunk]

Certainly a different role, but lesser?  Must have been wacky tabaccy in that old cigar of Freud's she was smoking.

Well, women carry the child for nine months, go thru labour and delivery, can provide the infant its sole source of nourishment for several months, and even today are generally more involved in the raising and direct care. That seems to me to be a greater role than the male generally has.  You may disagree.

[Daidalos]

Well, women carry the child for nine months, go thru labour and delivery, can provide the infant its sole source of nourishment for several months, and even today are generally more involved in the raising and direct care. That seems to me to be a greater role than the male generally has.  You may disagree.

Didn't you know? Man-seed is pure Ambrosia.

[Ten thumbs]

Well, women carry the child for nine months, go thru labour and delivery, can provide the infant its sole source of nourishment for several months, and even today are generally more involved in the raising and direct care. That seems to me to be a greater role than the male generally has.  You may disagree.

Ah! so this is why women have had less time to compose. Post-natal depression must be their creative impulses hitting back. That and housework, of course. Bring me my slippers.

[B_cereus]

What the heck do y'all mean by "understanding music?"

Maybe it's like Dead Poets Society 

"Understanding Music", by Dr A Hurwitz-Lebrecht, PhD. To fully understand music, we must first be fluent with its meter, rhythm, and thematic structure. Then ask two questions: One, how artfully has the objective of the music been rendered; and two, how important is that objective. Question one rates the music's perfection; question two rates its importance. And once these questions have been answered, determining a music's greatness becomes a relatively simple matter...

 

*gets up from desk and draws on chalkboard*

[longears]

Nice ground shifting.  Have you considered a career in politics or public relations?  Or as a trial lawyer?

[B_cereus]

I am not very good at being humorous  Maybe I should change my log-in to B_uncereus.

[longears]

I am not very good at being humorous  Maybe I should change my log-in to B_uncereus.

I thought you were humorous.  I loved the idea of a calculus to "objectively" measure quality in music.  And I recall a once prolific poster here who presented the idea in all earnestness!  That was hilarious--though he, tragically lacking a sense of humor, failed to see what was funny about it.

I, too, was being humorous.  I thought you did a great job of shifting the ground from "understanding music" to "determining a music's greatness," and could easily envision those dull enough to think you were serious arguing among themselves about how much weight should be given to various elements of music that they fail to notice the change in goal!

Alas, with Nigel gone there are but 3 or 4 left who get my wit.... 

[karlhenning]

I got the chuckle.

[Ten thumbs]

National anthems are important. That's why they are so great.

[Kullervo]

So, is this like, going to be on the test?

[karlhenning]

Man, is that from a "pre-quel" to The Wonder Years?

[Cato]

Throughout the years I have used classical music as much as possible in my foreign language classes.

Students (ages 14-17) have asked in all seriousness e.g. "Why's it get real soft and then real loud?"  "Why's it speed up and slow down?"  etc.

It is difficult to answer these questions, which are not really rudimentary in one sense: why in fact does Composer X decide to play something softer or faster at bar 110?!

My usual response was: for whatever reason, the composer felt that the music led him to a point where it needed to be proclaimed, or to be whispered, or to be played by a clarinet instead of an English horn, and when he heard it that way in his mind, he received a sense of completion, of "rightness," and so the work becomes soft or loud, etc. at those spots.

One student once asked: "What do you mean 'the music led him' ? How can the music lead the composer when he's doing the composing?"

My response was to give an analogy from literature: a great writer resembles God, in that he creates characters and gives them free will to interact and create a story.  Hack writers give their characters little or no free will, because they have a preset formula they are following, or because it's just easier to avoid the complexities of literature, when all you are trying to do is entertain a brain being fried on the beach or under a hair dryer at the beauty parlor.

In the same way, a great composer creates "music with free will," and it will flow in a certain direction, if he allows it to do so.  Lesser composers - in general - follow preset formulas, or do not realize that they have less than proper material to express what they want.

Schoenberg famously criticized his own tone-poem Pelleas und Melisande for having "weak material" at some points, but went ahead and tried to make the best of it.  That could indeed explain the struggling frustration which the entire work exhibits.

And on "preset formulas" Bruckner supposedly told his students to follow the rules in his classroom.  But if they came back after graduation and showed him a work that was still following all the rules he would chase them away!   

[locrian]

My response was to give an analogy from literature: a great writer resembles God, in that he creates characters and gives them free will to interact and create a story.  Hack writers give their characters little or no free will, because they have a preset formula they are following, or because it's just easier to avoid the complexities of literature, when all you are trying to do is entertain a brain being fried on the beach or under a hair dryer at the beauty parlor.

I hate when characters just want to sit on the sofa and smoke cigarettes.

[JoshLilly]

I'm trying to figure out how imaginary people can have a free will. They're not even people at all. They don't have brains, or any kind of nervous system. Words on a page don't have brains. They're not people. They're not animals of any sort. What kind of will do they ... wait a minute, there's not even a "they" to talk about. I don't even know how to ask. I don't even know what I would be asking about.

[Cato]

I'm trying to figure out how imaginary people can have a free will. They're not even people at all. They don't have brains, or any kind of nervous system. Words on a page don't have brains. They're not people. They're not animals of any sort. What kind of will do they ... wait a minute, there's not even a "they" to talk about. I don't even know how to ask. I don't even know what I would be asking about.

Very good, grasshopper!   0:)

The character has a certain personality, and following the character's background, situation, personality, etc. the author will know what the character will choose to do or say or whatever, because ultimately of course it is the author's free will which is creating the story.  The great author in a sense has multiple personalities, which he freely latches onto and releases, as opposed to the clinically insane person where the personalities latch onto the person!

The hack writer has cardboard cutouts for people who go through a marionette play.

Soundsponge wrote:

I hate when characters just want to sit on the sofa and smoke cigarettes.

Sometimes a sign that the author is waiting for his character to decide what to do! 

Or a sign that he is paid by the word!   0:)

[locrian]

Soundsponge wrote:

Sometimes a sign that the author is waiting for his character to decide what to do! 

Or a sign that he is paid by the word!   0:)

Or the author didn't have a good idea to begin with.

[jochanaan]

I'm trying to figure out how imaginary people can have a free will. They're not even people at all. They don't have brains, or any kind of nervous system. Words on a page don't have brains. They're not people. They're not animals of any sort. What kind of will do they ... wait a minute, there's not even a "they" to talk about. I don't even know how to ask. I don't even know what I would be asking about.

...The character has a certain personality, and following the character's background, situation, personality, etc. the author will know what the character will choose to do or say or whatever, because ultimately of course it is the author's free will which is creating the story.  The great author in a sense has multiple personalities, which he freely latches onto and releases, as opposed to the clinically insane person where the personalities latch onto the person!

The hack writer has cardboard cutouts for people who go through a marionette play.

Have you guys done much creative writing?  Because I have, and I can verify that sometimes a character we create does things that surprise his/her creator.  That's because much of the creative process happens "under the radar" of our conscious minds.

[JoshLilly]

The nonexistent "character" didn't do anything, surprising or otherwise. There is no physical body with which to do things. It means you did (or wrote) something to surprise yourself. Which is kinda creepy. Stay away from my dog.

[karlhenning]

Not doing anything is one reflection of the real world.