Was Music Ever Meant to Be Permanent?

[Anderton]

Music was born evanescent. Recording has been able to make music "permanent" for only 0.0007% of humanity's existence.

Music is of its time, and it's all about context. Imagine it's 1800 in Vienna. You hear about some guy named Beethoven who was taught by Haydn, and some say he's going to be the next big thing after Mozart. But there's no file-sharing, no recordings, no leaks. You don't know what to expect from his first symphony. Maybe it will suck.

You go past gaslights as the sound of horse hoofs hit the cobblestones. It's April, the dawn of a new century, and you're a little chilly as you file into the concert hall.

You're hit with a unique, bold style you've never heard before. It was every bit as heavy as heavy metal could be for its time, with sforzandi that was off the hook, and woodwinds given an independence they'd never had before.

No one will ever experience that sensation again. Nor will we ever truly understand what it was like to experience the Brandenburgs for the first time, with what could only be described as its almost multi-dimensional harmonies.

While it's a gift that the music of Bach and Beethoven has survived, the context hasn't...and it can't. More recently, no one will ever hear songs from the 60s with the backdrop of the social unrest, the hangover from the assassinations, the kids with love beads saying "spare change" in the streets, listening to a stereo system with a black light on and bong smoke in the air, and people throwing bottles at the long-hairs in the streets below.

Music is a marker in time. When the time passes, so does the context...which is why we have to keep producing music that's part of the time in which it is made.

 

[Notes_Norton]

While I agree that music needs to be made in the context of the time in which it is made, I also feel that music has the potential to be timeless. Especially instrumental music that has no dated language attached to it.

 

Music has to be made for the time because it is made by people of the time. Even if a great composer wanted to write another J.S.Bach type piece of music, he or she would still be influenced by the present time and all the newer music that person has ingested. And nobody can really write for a future time because the future keeps moving away from us in unpredictable ways.

 

While I can't experience the cobblestones, gaslights, and political climate of the day, I can experience profound emotion when listening to Beethovan's 4th or 7th symphony, Dvorak's 7th, 8th, or 9th, Suk's Asrael symphony, Shostakovich's 7th Symphony and I could go on and on.

 

I was a child and not worldly at all when Stan Getz's Focus, Jazz Samba and Jazz Samba Encore came out, same for Dave Brubeck's Time Out. These and many more still tickle my inner soul. Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Stan Kenton, George Gershwin and others were before my time and their music gets to me as well.

 

Did Bach and Mozart write their music so that it would be enjoyed in the 21st Century? Probably not, they wrote what they felt at the time. But for some reason much of their music stood the test of time.

 

If anyone knows how to make music that would last hundreds of years, they should go into the consulting business, because the industry folks would spend big bucks to know that.

 

So the music is made for the era, and most of it is gone.

 

But it's that kind of an art form. Stan Getz made a few dozen LPs, but gigged many thousands of times more hours on the bandstand. Those notes are gone, enjoyed for the moment, and vanished into thin air. Same for Miles, Zoot, Monk, Silver, Bird, Dizzy, etc.

 

I've been gigging since the 1960s, it's what I do for a living, and if I got paid a penny per note, I'd be a very, very, very rich man by now. (especially if you count glissandos )

 

Great solos, mediocre solos, brilliant moments, routine moments, wrong notes, great saves, stunned audiences, sonic wallpaper, everything else and on cruise ships, in concerts warming up for headliners, in seedy bars, in show clubs, in 5 star hotels, in retirement homes, in yacht clubs, in animal clubs in quite a few US states and a few other countries, all gone, faded into the atmosphere never-ever to be heard again. But thoroughly enjoyed in their moments.

 

And I would say that the output of most musicians is as temporary as mine.

 

But it was a pleasure of the moment, like a good meal, a great sunrise, sex with a loved one, a vacation, a party with friends, and life itself the pleasures of life are fleeting.

 

Having the joy is enough, it doesn't have to last forever. I'm relatively sure that it makes no difference to Beethoven whether or not his music is playing while he was decomposing in his grave. He may have wanted that when he was alive, but after you are gone, life is gone (or 'this life is gone - I don't think anyone knows for sure) and all you did matters not to you anymore because you aren't here.

 

Although I've done some studio work, it's a minuscule fraction of a percent of the time I've spent entertaining others. The rest is all gone, and even some of the 'sax for hire' work in the studio has surely disappeared by now.

 

I remember my first studio gig. I did a sax part for a girl who wrote a song called, "Me And My Little M.G" (referring to the sports car -- "driving down Avenue C"). I never heard it again. Same for a most of the others.

 

The art form by it's nature is vaporware, here for a second, enjoyed in the moment, and gone forever.

 

And that's good enough for me. I'm having a happy life, every gig is new, and even doing many of the same songs they seem new, get a new improvised solo, and a new audience. Just as you can't walk into the same river twice, you can't play the same song twice. I've heard Dvorak's 9th live probably more than any other symphony, it's a crowd pleaser and IMHO the greatest piece of music ever written on American soil. Yet, I've never heard it done the same twice. So even though it's written, it's not permanent, it evolves through time. New instrument technology, and whatever mood the conductor and orchestra finds itself in that day.

 

The closest thing to permanent is the recording, and that probably represents less than .0000000000000000001% of the music made since the dawn of human music. And those Stan Getz recordings I have on LP don't even sound quite the same as the same ones on CD.

 

Insights, incites, and perhaps too much musing by Notes

 

[Notes_Norton]

Reading the title again, music was never meant to be anything. It just "is".

 

If human made music is meant for anything, it is solely to create enjoyment and/or communication between performers and both other performers and the audience and nothing more.

 

At least that's how I feel about it today.

 

Insights and incites by Notes

[1001gear]

All true; doesn't mitigate crappy commercial music.

[Anderton]

Reading the title again, music was never meant to be anything. It just "is".

 

If human made music is meant for anything, it is solely to create enjoyment and/or communication between performers and both other performers and the audience and nothing more.

 

That was kind of what I was getting at. Music isn't a finite resource, we can always be generating new music. Some will stand the test of time - possibly by accident! - and some won't. But I guarantee there are people who had transcendent musical experiences in the past that could never be reproduced for anyone today. So it's up to us to make today's transcendent experiences for those who are listening now.

[AlamoJoe]

Perhaps the bigger question is...Where did music even come from?

Was it a early human trying to emulate birdsong with their voice? A Hominid inspired by thunder, beating on a hollow log?

The first of us that whistled, by accident, then decided for themselves, or by companion accolade, that it was pleasant?

 

Music will always be with us, in some form. What intrigues me most as I age..is it's Genisis...........

[Anderton]

Interesting question...maybe one day Og discovered he had a voice, and then when he got pitch involved, women would flock to him.

[Luke17]

Perhaps the bigger question is...Where did music even come from?

Was it a early human trying to emulate birdsong with their voice? A Hominid inspired by thunder, beating on a hollow log?

The first of us that whistled, by accident, then decided for themselves, or by companion accolade, that it was pleasant?

 

Music will always be with us, in some form. What intrigues me most as I age..is it's Genisis...........

 

How about Genesis?

http://bestanimations.com/Careers/La...ated-gif-6.gif

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[davd_indigo]

Sounds like a fascinating, bong inspired, college dorm conversation.

 

Music surely must have originated (i.e. I figure it did) as a social experience. Maybe guys were banging a stick on some form of hollow stick or log. Later someone accidentally discovered he could get 2 or 3 different pitches from blowing over a hollow bone from a large bird. The bone flute in it's day, was something of an innovation. Later when someone came up with some sort of primitive notation on parchment, he created a method to record the musical blueprint someone(s) came up with.

 

The huge innovation from Thomas Edison gave us the means to enjoy music made by others in a non-social setting - that is to say we could listen to music in a non-performance setting. It may not be how music was intended to be enjoyed when music developed, but most of us would be much poorer musically without the benefit of recordings. Those of us NOT growing up in places like New York City, Chicago, London etc. would generally have developed without the opportunity for exposure to some really great music during our musical development. At the least, we'd have had more limited opportunities.

 

On the other hand, music developed being played on something - some physical object. It's easy to lose this in the sonic barrage we encounter daily (recorded music played wherever we go). Playing music, with fingers, voice and musical mind engaged should not get lost in all the noise.

 

 

 

 

 

[blue2blue]

Well, I suspect that starting around the first time Thog and Ogg were jamming counter rhythms with a pair of rocks and came up with a killer syncopation, musicians longed to be able to somehow preserve or at be able to recreate those transcendent musical moments. From that various notation systems ultimately evolved and, beginning in the mid-late 19th century fostered the invention of the phonograph and its offshoots.

 

But, of course, while we may hold modern recordings in our hands and play them when we want, we know the real magic is in the musical moment.

 

We, as a culture, are more than a bit like that ancient emperor of fable who fell in love with the song of a nightingale singing in the darkness -- and then commissioned his most clever artisans to create a singing, mechanical nightingale so he could 'own the moment.'

 

[Mark L]

Good Lord, it's blue2blue!!

[Notes_Norton]

I plan to do that at our gig tonight. It's a repeat gig, and they always have been a great audience.

[Notes_Norton]

I remember reading an article about the oldest definite musical instrument found (so far). A flute made out of a bear's thigh bone and interestingly tuned in a pentatonic scale.

 

That tells me it wasn't version 1.0

[RockViolin]

There is only what was, is, and will be, and perhaps the question of what, if anything, can or should be done about it.

 

Meant to be = anyone's guess. The *meant to be* hat fits positive outcomes conveniently well. It seems to come off in a hurry for the negative.

 

Humans have probably done as many things with which to be horrified and embarrassed as we have to trumpet and parade about, IMO.

[davd_indigo]

Yeah ! Welcome Mr. Blue. Good to virtually see you.

[Anderton]

Part of what got me thinking about this is seeing how many people of a generation that had nothing to do with Pink Floyd still digs "Dark Side of the Moon." Alienation has never gone out of the style, so the context is still alive and kicking all these years later.

 

Bach wrote for God - and I assume also for the paycheck - and regardless of what you believe or don't believe, it doesn't matter. The quest for something bigger than us is a context that will always exist, whether it's Bach, John Coltrane playing "A Love Supreme," or the Who playing "Tommy."

 

Perhaps music that is congruent with the context of the times has a much better shot at permanence than one-hit wonders that were of a moment that was never to return...does anyone think "Disco Duck" has a shot at a resurgence?

 

[Anderton]

Well, I suspect that starting around the first time Thog and Ogg were jamming counter rhythms with a pair of rocks and came up with a killer syncopation, musicians longed to be able to somehow preserve or at be able to recreate those transcendent musical moments. From that various notation systems ultimately evolved and, beginning in the mid-late 19th century fostered the invention of the phonograph and its offshoots.

 

But, of course, while we may hold modern recordings in our hands and play them when we want, we know the real magic is in the musical moment.

 

We, as a culture, are more than a bit like that ancient emperor of fable who fell in love with the song of a nightingale singing in the darkness -- and then commissioned his most clever artisans to create a singing, mechanical nightingale so he could 'own the moment.'

 

Welcome back my friend, to the show that never ends...we're so glad you could attend, come inside, come inside

[RockViolin]

Part of what got me thinking about this is seeing how many people of a generation that had nothing to do with Pink Floyd still digs "Dark Side of the Moon." Alienation has never gone out of the style, so the context is still alive and kicking all these years later.

 

Bach wrote for God - and I assume also for the paycheck - and regardless of what you believe or don't believe, it doesn't matter. The quest for something bigger than us is a context that will always exist, whether it's Bach, John Coltrane playing "A Love Supreme," or the Who playing "Tommy."

 

Perhaps music that is congruent with the context of the times has a much better shot at permanence than one-hit wonders that were of a moment that was never to return...does anyone think "Disco Duck" has a shot at a resurgence?

 

I'm not sure it's the context that is keeping up interest there. Or a universal theme. DSOTM has a certain celebrity to it. And celebrity seems to have a life of it's own. DSOTM is rite of passage for those who are getting 'experienced'. And while there may be a date to it, and a context, they nailed it so hard and so well that it doesn't matter. It's quintessential.

 

Pachebel is a one hit wonder for his Canon. Who can name something by Bizet besides "Carmen"? Yet it gets done again and again because....well there's betrayal. But it's catchy music as well. "My Shararona" and "Black Betty" are likely still on some classic playlists. Again, catchy.

 

Catchy stands the test of time well, can move "dated" out of the way for the most part, and makes context of the times in which something was written rather secondary, I think.

[Ernest Buckley]

Music is meant to communicate emotions. When music fails to do that, it will cease to exist.

[davd_indigo]

Music is meant to communicate emotions. When music fails to do that' date=' it will cease to exist. [/quote']

 

I'd say that music can express emotion. But in my view, music is meant to communicate interesting sonic constructions. The emotions are responses that we develop over time thru cultural conditioning. It might be some African drum ensemble, or Louis Armstrong or whatever.

 

Hearing rhythms that move me might make me want to wiggle my butt (I'm thinking of something like "Fat Man In The Bathtub" by Little Feat). It brings me joy. But it's a byproduct of my perceiving and making sense of what I'm hearing.

 

What emotion is expressed in Bach's C# minor Fugue ? Maybe after someone invested a good bit of psychic energy and time in learning to comprehend it on some level(s) they might feel some emotion of joy. But it's not inherent in the music.

 

What emotion might be communicated by Ornette Coleman in "Street Woman" ?

 

I'm just saying that all there really is , is what you hear. The organized noise and sounds the musician(s) came up with and projected into the air is something objective. The emotions are projected onto it. Unless of course there are lyrics giving everything away. But that would be a whole different animal.

 

The C# minor Fugue begins at 3:14 into the video.

[video=youtube;zdD_QygwRuY]

 

 

Ornette Coleman "Street Woman"

 

Little Feat "Fat Man In The Bathtub"

https://youtu.be/S1AWV3F8muI

 

Louis Armstrong "West End Blues"

[Ernest Buckley]

 

I'd say that music can express emotion. But in my view, music is meant to communicate interesting sonic constructions. The emotions are responses that we develop over time thru cultural conditioning. It might be some African drum ensemble, or Louis Armstrong or whatever.

 

Hearing rhythms that move me might make me want to wiggle my butt (I'm thinking of something like "Fat Man In The Bathtub" by Little Feat). It brings me joy. But it's a byproduct of my perceiving and making sense of what I'm hearing.

 

What emotion is expressed in Bach's C# minor Fugue ? Maybe after someone invested a good bit of psychic energy and time in learning to comprehend it on some level(s) they might feel some emotion of joy. But it's not inherent in the music.

 

What emotion might be communicated by Ornette Coleman in "Street Woman" ?

 

I'm just saying that all there really is , is what you hear. The organized noise and sounds the musician(s) came up with and projected into the air is something objective. The emotions are projected onto it. Unless of course there are lyrics giving everything away. But that would be a whole different animal.

 

The C# minor Fugue begins at 3:14 into the video.

[video=youtube;zdD_QygwRuY]

 

 

Ornette Coleman "Street Woman"

 

Little Feat "Fat Man In The Bathtub"

https://youtu.be/S1AWV3F8muI

 

Louis Armstrong "West End Blues"

 

Music is subjective.

 

Bach fugues do little for me and I`m an organist... however, put on a Beethoven string quartet and you have my attention.

 

As I get older, I find my musical tastes are expanding. I grew up listening to classical music but then expanded to the modern rock I grew up around... think 80s and 90s. Then in my twenties I got into jazz. In my 30s I expanded a bit towards electronica, now in my 40s I am drawn to more avant garde... why? I`m not sure.... I think part of me is bored with Western harmonic structure and rhythms. I also find myself drawn more to the sound of a piece of music... its part of the reason I switched from using software synths to analog synths... something about that sound that I find more appealing. And yet for many, especially kids, they enjoy the polished pop music of the day.

 

Again, its extremely subjective and unless the listener gets an emotional response from the music, they are not listening to it.

[Etienne Rambert]

They say the emperor Nero was quite an accomplished songwriter and performer.

 

Sadly, nobody remembers any of his songs today. They just remember one gig in particular that didn't turn out so well.

[Geoff Grace]

If you consider entropy, then nothing is permanent, not even the universe. On the other hand, if you look at each moment as a point in time/space and consider the theory that time is simply a sensation of traveling through time/space, then everything is permanent.

 

Getting back to our sense of reality, it's true that no recorded music can be heard entirely in the context of its time because we always listen to the recording after it was made, even if it's only minutes later. But in a broader sense, we are still listening to 60s music in the larger context of its time in that many of us still have memories of that period; and for those who don't, there plenty of other media around that can help increase the sense of reality about it. And as a society we're still not too far removed from the '60s. We're still facing some of the same problems and listening to somewhat similar music. We even have some lingering context from Beethoven's time in that civilization is less removed from that time period than we are from prehistoric times, for example.

 

Certainly though, once we've heard music from a particular period and the music that followed, there's no way to hear it fresh again.

 

Best,

 

Geoff

[Voltan]

sorry, i agree that music is that, but to say it is nothing more is in error from my perspective, citing over 17 years as a music therapist, my perspective is that it is far more than simple entertainment... and there is a simple matter of 17 years worth of data backing up what i claim... you can disagree, but personal feelings dont mean a thing in the face of documented evidence... a bit shallow out of the both of you, im surprised.

[elsongs]

In many cultures, especially indigenous ones, music, like folklore and other cultural traditions was passed on from elders to younger people, and when those young people grew old, the cycle repeats.