Music: Let's Debate "Survivability and the Test of Time"

This whole discussion boils down to the level of abstraction you're willing to accept, nothing more.

If you believe culture is the predominant factor that shapes musical creativity and interest with the public, then you're right. This is one level of approaching the discussion. Though broadly speaking, this applies as SSC says to all forms of art and craft throughout history. There is no distinction to be discussed unique to music that does not apply globally to every other discussion of art.

If you believe that it goes deeper than this, that within the realms specific to music that there are features that apply to many different styles of music which, over time, lend to the survivability of not just the music but rather the artform as a whole, you are right. There is no distinction to be discussed that is unique to one given style or that cannot be applied globally to all music.

Either way, both are ultimately subjective arguments, and we would all do well to keep it in perspective.

Either way, both are ultimately subjective arguments, and we would all do well to keep it in perspective.

Social sciences - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Social sciences - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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Wikipedia editing tutorial - Welcome!

Wikipedia is a collaboratively edited encyclopedia to which you can contribute. This tutorial will help you become a Wikipedia contributor.

The following pages will discuss features of Wikipedia, giving style and content guidance, information about the Wikipedia community, and important Wikipedia policies and conventions.

This is a basic tutorial, not an extensive manual. If you want more details, there are links to other pages for more information. To read them as you go along, you can open them in a separate window or a tab.

There are links to "sandbox" pages where you can practice what you're learning. Try things out and play around! Nobody will mind if you mess up and experiment in these practice areas.

... Yeah, that's pretty much the case.

Inherent, if it's to mean anything, would require this quality to be OBJECTIVE. It means not only the composer has to recognize this, but EVERYONE ELSE. It becomes a scientific issue of quantification, then, of what this "quality" is.

I think a distinction can be made between objectivity and universality.

A composer can evaluate his own music objectively because he has complete knowledge of the creative process, unlike the audience who only perceives it. I very much agree with what jawood said in another thread:

A composer writes out his/her composition in an objective, definable realm whereas the listener takes in the composition in a subjective realm.

It's not unlike how a chef can objectively evaluate his own dish because he knows exactly what ingredients and recipes were involved, whereas the patron can only perceive the colors, tastes and textures of the dish.

If 'inherent quality' is to be used when appealing to universality, perhaps another term can be used when appealing to objectivity, maybe something along the line of 'definable quality'.

... K. You realize I just wanted to make the point that social sciences exist, right? I could've not linked wikipedia, in fact I can remove the link if that makes you happy, it's irrelevant. :>

Why, you've used Wiki as your reference for almost all your arguments on the page so far (and have posted a link to something in wiki many times) ... might as well go on to argue with it.

I think a distinction can be made between objectivity and universality.

A composer can evaluate his own music objectively because he has complete knowledge of the creative process, unlike the audience who only perceives it.

Uh. What the hell, homes?

You seriously just said that a composer is fit to make unbiased & objective value judgments on their own music because they wrote it. I... I really have no idea what to say.

Just wow.

I won't waste my time explaining why this is absolutely insane, it should be obvious to anyone with half a brain.

Why, you've used Wiki as your reference for almost all your arguments on the page so far (and have posted a link to something in wiki many times) ... might as well go on to argue with it.

Uh. So? Discrediting the wiki without actually checking the damn wiki and being an expert on the subject it discusses (enough to know WHY it would be wrong) isn't a cool thing to do, y'know? Are you a sociologist? If so, why are you here wasting time? Go correct the wiki, after all, everyone can edit it!

Uh. So? Discrediting the wiki without actually checking the damn wiki and being an expert on the subject it discusses (enough to know WHY it would be wrong) isn't a cool thing to do, y'know? Are you a sociologist? If so, why are you here wasting time? Go correct the wiki, after all, everyone can edit it!

Well, I think in a debate as this, it's best to get your facts from more reputable sources - not everyone will fact check what you say and it is best to be as 'factual' as possible. And no, I am not a sociologist - hence, why I won't correct the wiki.

The concept of diversity proving my argument only needs a single piece to work, say, Cage's 4'33.

How does cage's piece 4'33 prove anything? How popular is this piece really? do you ever listen to recordings of it or know anyone that listens to recordings of it? How often is it performed live? Do people who aren't familiar with classical music know of this piece? Was it composed long enough ago to be considered to have survived? Is it appreciated in the same sense as other music or is it appreciated solely for the reason that it prompts us to ponder the meaning of music, and if not, can it fully be considered music?

Such anomalies are, indeed, almost the entire body of 20th century music if we look at them in terms of statistics (how many of those exist, vs how many "traditional" pieces exist) and that's just the western world. It would imply that people who wrote these pieces have genetic mutations of some sort that make them prone to liking/enjoying this music, which is really nonsense since they also wrote and enjoyed the old stuff just as well and it'd be a scallop to prove this objectively (in genetics, no less!) by very definition of what you're trying to prove.

Such anomalies? What other pieces can be considered anomalous at the same level of Cage's 4'33, and are any of them popular? What exactly do you mean when you say anomalous, what makes a piece of music anomalous and not others?

You seem to place allot of the weight of your argument on the fact that music from different regions and time periods sounds very different, but what you fail to realize is that just because it sounds very different doesn't mean there aren't underlying similarities that you are not consciously aware of.

Also, did you ever consider that because some peoples of the world are less technologically advanced or lack a sufficient system of musical notation, that their music would fail to develop as far as other music, thus accounting for some differences in the sound of music from place to place?

Well, I think in a debate as this, it's best to get your facts from more reputable sources - not everyone will fact check what you say and it is best to be as 'factual' as possible. And no, I am not a sociologist - hence, why I won't correct the wiki.

OK, but if you're not a sociologist, how do you know the wiki on this specific topic isn't reliable?

:/

Also, did you ever consider that because some peoples of the world are less technologically advanced or lack a sufficient system of musical notation, that their music would fail to develop as far as other music, thus accounting for some differences in the sound of music from place to place?

WTF, LOL.

I laff'd, thx.

How does cage's piece 4'33 prove anything? How popular is this piece really? do you ever listen to recordings of it or know anyone that listens to recordings of it? How often is it performed live? Do people who aren't familiar with classical music know of this piece? Was it composed long enough ago to be considered to have survived? Is it appreciated in the same sense as other music or is it appreciated solely for the reason that it prompts us to ponder the meaning of music, and if not, can it fully be considered music?

No offense, but your kidding right? Listen to a recording of it??? Are you familiar with this piece, Matt?

Uh. What the hell, homes?

You seriously just said that a composer is fit to make unbiased & objective value judgments on their own music because they wrote it. I... I really have no idea what to say.

Just wow.

I won't waste my time explaining why this is absolutely insane, it should be obvious to anyone with half a brain.

I'm interested in exploring your position. To clarify, we're no longer appealing to universality, but rather to objectivity. Is this your understanding as well?

OK, but if you're not a sociologist, how do you know the wiki on this specific topic isn't reliable?

:/

I don't - and I won't pretend I do - BUT, my point is.. it can be edited by Anybody! How much more simpler does the logic in that have to be??? If anybody can edit it, that means logically, the factual integrity of the article is in question. Wiki does not check the references one posts while making edits - also, some of the material doesn't even have a reference or footnote to it. And furthermore, Wiki has a Neutral View policy - which means that for the most part the divergent views in the topic are not gone into any vast level of explanation in the least (this is done to provide a more balanced informational source - according to Wiki.) Again, this is why I said that if you are looking for a factual reference for your posts - Wiki is not and SHOULD not be your source.

I'll stop replying to this thread from this post onwards, have fun kids.

No offense, but your kidding right? Listen to a recording of it???

That's my whole point, no one would every listen to a recording of it because it's not pleasing to the ear. Silence or the ambient sounds of an audience are not something that anyone would appreciate listening to. Thus 4'33 becomes an example of music that doesn't appeal to our inborn preferences going unappreciated by the masses.

That's my whole point, no one would every listen to a recording of it because it's not pleasing to the ear. Silence or the ambient sounds of an audience are not something that anyone would appreciate listening to. Thus 4'33 becomes an example of music that doesn't appeal to our inborn preferences going unappreciated by the masses.

Sorry to so quickly break my non-posting promise, but HOLY scraggy LOL.

Thanks sir, that made my day.

I'll stop replying to this thread from this post onwards, have fun kids.

No, please don't. I'm interested in understanding why you think it's absolutely insane that a composer can objectively evaluate his own music.

No, please don't. I'm interested in understanding why you think it's absolutely insane that a composer can objectively evaluate his own music.

I'm with Cygnus on this one. I'd really love to hear this explained (and what a great point you bring up, Cyg!). I hate to say it, but I really didn't think about approaching the discussion from this basis. Now that I see it, there's definitely something that needs to be clarified here.

No, please don't. I'm interested in understanding why you think it's absolutely insane that a composer can objectively evaluate his own music.

Alright, since you're so polite I'll concede to explaining.

Objective evaluation, the opposite of subjective evaluation, only exists based on evidence which, by the weight of this evidence itself, is agreed upon (and tested for.) Objective evaluation is what you're trying to get at with the scientific method. You want to eliminate bias, eliminate subjective factors, you want to get at the actual evidence and what it really means.

It's insane that a composer can objectively evaluate ANY piece of music in terms of "merit" or anything like that unless we can agree on what all this means. Say, if we say "pieces which have C major chords are superior," we have a condition to look for for which to measure pieces objectively. After all, it's easy to identify c major chords, right?

But the problem is apparent when we try to find which parameters to consider "superior" because we need to define an objective to all this for there to be a "superior" music composition than something else. Superior, inferior, better and worse, are all functions of trying to assess how a theory/idea/etc achieves a particular objective. We have to decide on what the "objective" of music is, to assess what makes X or Y music superior or inferior to anything according to this objective.

Music must have an objective, purpose or something to allow for objective judgment of merit (how well does music achieve this purpose or objective we set for it.)

But look a little further, what is really going on? Is this objective we are attaching to music, whatever it is, really the case? Can we agree on an indisputable objective or purpose for music? Clearly, Cage, etc etc, show that music's meaning is already very complicated to define, imagine how hard it would be to define purpose on top of it.

So, instead of taking this rather complicated road, my take on it is that music has no inherent purpose or objective, it simply IS (through the various evolutionary factors that allowed it to come into existence.) That is, if music is just a social and cultural construct, and its purpose changes as well as its meaning depending on the culture we're looking at.

It changes even depending on the individual we're asking.

Therefore, we may very well say that a composer has more knowledge about their own composition, but that he is capable of making objective value judgments of it is absurd since we have to first start climbing the proverbial mount impossible trying to find a definition that we can ALL agree to make this even possible. So, therefore, why bother? It's much easier, cleaner, more efficient, to say that the composer is acting based on conditioning imposed by the society, culture, education, etc etc he was exposed to. He's making judgments based on what he's been conditioned appreciate, to like and dislike, etc. This is easily observable, testable, and I'm sure that if you look you can find thousands of studies on precisely this.

I'm just saying, look beyond the composer for the real reasons why he thought his music was worth burning. The burning, his taste, all of that are just the surface of a lot of stuff which is attributed to things which indeed influenced his life and from which NOBODY can escape.

No man is an island, and like it or not, we are ALL incapable of making objective value judgments on art because of the above reasons, just like we are completely incapable of having no bias (as this would imply we never like or dislike anything.)

So yeah, I hope this answers it. Now I'll stop posting. :<

I think my music is absolutely amazing and better than any music created before; therefore, it is.

See the flaw?

I think my music is absolutely amazing and better than any music created before; therefore, it is.

See the flaw?

Yep, shortcut to my wall of text indeed. :>

That's my whole point, no one would every listen to a recording of it because it's not pleasing to the ear. Silence or the ambient sounds of an audience are not something that anyone would appreciate listening to. Thus 4'33 becomes an example of music that doesn't appeal to our inborn preferences going unappreciated by the masses.

There are recordings of it. People buy them and listen to them. People enjoy it.

Alright, since you're so polite I'll concede to explaining.

Objective evaluation, the opposite of subjective evaluation....etc.

Despite all of this, there is something illogical to both your statement and to that of QM's after. If a composer truly has nothing to measure there work upon - in terms of merit or anything else - than why do we keep composing music? I mean, seriously? Do we just compose to fulfill some innate, cold, scientific portions of our brains? OR do we compose to communicate?

This whole discussion is relatively pointless.

In art, there are subjective "standards" that are applied. Some remain "true" for many periods of time, others are more ephemerous.

Some standards might include subjective evaluative points such as "balance of proportion", or a series of archetypal "forms" to which the art form attempts to adhere.

For example, in music, one such form would be the sonata-allegro. There are various standards for a sonata-allegro, that have changed, been modified over time, but have superficially remained "valid".

When you evaluate a work that fits into the category of "sonata-allegro", you evaluate as objectively as is possible (which, admittedly, is not very possible) just how closely does any work fit into the "standards" regarding that particular form.

If the proportions of the work, when compared to a "standard" sonata-allegro, fall too far outside the "normal range" then we have a simili-objective point of reference.

To be perfectly clear, I'm using a single formal example, not using it as a standard against which to measure all music.

However, most art DOES more-or-less fit against a template of form or structure, and to a degree can be evaluated by that single standard.

Now, all that says is "how well does it fit against the template". It doesn't objectively evaluate it for "good" or "bad". It just says how close it comes to fitting any given template.

That then becomes ONE means of evaluating ONE aspect of that work of art.

Then the objective evaluation comes into play. "Does the departure from the standard bring a quality to this work that enhances my appreciation of it?"

And obviously, the inverse is just as true:

"Does slavish adherence to the template create a work of art that enhances my experience of it as a work of art?"