Wiardgroup

You know I have been thinking for a long time now, that calling it "electronic music" has 
really been a one ton anchor around the neck of electronic sound.

That isn't to say you can't make "music" by electronic methods, but those methods open a 
whole new range of possibilities, that we have no category for. So they have been forced 
into the category of "music". And fit is often uncomfortable.

In one sense, I feel this is unfair to music. Perhaps we think of music as a container that 
can stretch infinitely. But the question arises, "Should we expect music to absorb ever 
sonic possibility of the human mind forever". Could this possibly be destructive to music 
itself?

Secondly, when you call it music, you force upon it centuries of tradition. You create an 
expectation in the listener that is an automatic limit on what the artist can present. And 
you exclude those who love sound, but are untrained in the traditions of music.

Third, supposing we have a very capable electronic sound source. Perhaps only 10% of the 
possible tonalities it can generate fit within our traditional description of "musical". What 
about the other 90%, just throw them away? I have heard some very evocative sounds form 
electronic sources, rich and interesting, but in no way could I call them musical.

As Gary Chang pointed out to me, virtually all "music" is associated with some ritual. 
Weddings, funerals, graduations, coronations, arrival of dignitaries, mating rituals are 
VERY big. But so called electronic "music" has no associated ritual. So in the past, they 
tried to fit it into some existing ritual, without much success.

We need terms like "sound sculpture", "electronic tonality", "tone poem", "noise poem", 
"sonic attack", "tonal protest", "anti-music", "music for other species", "dadaist sound 
montage", "surrealist vibration collage", "invisible object", "atmospheric disturbance", 
"aural archeology" or whatever. These need to be accepted as legitimate artistic 
expressions. Until then, the potential of electronic sound will remain largely unheard.

This assumes we are still on the ascending side of civilization, where the refinement of 
distinction in thought is relevant. If not, then the first one to grab the biggest rock wins!

Using terms to categorize music is only good in a superficial sense.

Back in 1978 pretty much anything that was independently released
simple in structure and was not what was on the charts was called Punk
by those of us buying the huge outcry of weirdness that was pouring
fourth.

Was it all technically Punk? No but it was a simple was of saying that
you didn't like ABBA. People in retrospect throw around terms like No
Wave which was really called "Art Rock" (not to be confused with what
Roxy Music had done)

Electronic music has had to endure so much shit because it for a very
long time it could be academic experiments, Krautrock, New Age, Dance,
or Moogsploitation, all depending on who one thought of. 

As technology exploded and got into everyone's hands multiple genres
burst out, birthed others and kept mutating. It's no longer about
whether you like German sequencer Disco, tape collage or Devo. The
details have become much more intricate.

Terms are only really efficient if you are trying to explain something
you heard to someone else and you need to touch upon "facts" and
assumptions of style.

Remember that electronic music could be many things.

--- In wiardgroup@yahoogroups.com, "Grant Richter" <grichter@...> wrote:
>
> You know I have been thinking for a long time now, that calling it
"electronic music" has 
> really been a one ton anchor around the neck of electronic sound.
> 



agreed
I used to use 'electronic music' around here, until i found that most
people associate 'electronic music' with DJs. grrrr.....
  
now i tell them, the plebs, that I just make a bunch of noise with a
synthesizer.   tonight someone asked "oh, so you just hold down one
key?", to which i replied that I don't even play a keyboard.  "oh,
like Pink Floyd then?"
what?

so i think i'll just go with "musical terrorist"

or something

yeah i dunno.  

people who know what a modular synthesizer is I can actually talk to


all in all, yes, sometimes the noises we make stretch the definition
(or whatever) of music sometimes, but i think it's still music.

I think 'sonic attack' is a good one.  i think i'll use that


thanks
BRAD

Grant, 

I love your point about needing new names for music,
but have to add it is very hard to pin down
particularly with what most of us synth geeks make
anyways. 

In general: Anything that is electronic, that isn't
sandwiched between commercials on either radio or
video, and doesn't have a typical arrangement
(pop/top-40 intro,verse,chorus,bridge, chorus, chorus
blah blah blah) is "techno."

It says so in the dictionary... really

Okay, so it doesn't but most people don't understand
the eclectic nature, composition, and arrangement of
various electronic music (sadly)

Although, a comforting though it many look at a Van
Gogh or Picasso and think "Boy, that is *crap*", and
then run off to buy the newest issue of FHM, Maxim,
etc and look for true art. 

We are the few, and as with any other artists we are
almost universally misunderstood now. Only later
will/may things come full circle (once we are dead of
course). While it would be nice to have more fans of
my own music, I have more than some and there is a
certain satisfaction to sounding unlike anything
someone has heard before... even if it means the great
and powerful "*THEY*, Them, Those other popheads"
think it sounds like crap,

Fight on EM soldiers, fight on!

Back to my personal crap-music-fest,,,

Thomas

PS. Before possible flame war begins, yes I do also
understand there is a traditional side to melody and
structure, and song writing which is amazing, takes a
lifetime or longer to perfect and can never be
replaced. But this is also the point that most/some
(at least) electronic music is meant to be flipping a
major bird in that direction. I have great respect for
traditional music... it would just be nice sometimes
is respect would automatically be a two-way street.
But, it isn't so we call it "art" and hope to be
misunderstood, if even by a few... evcen if it is,
after all, just noise




--- Grant Richter <grichter@asapnet.net> wrote:

> You know I have been thinking for a long time now,
> that calling it "electronic music" has 
> really been a one ton anchor around the neck of
> electronic sound.
> 
> That isn't to say you can't make "music" by
> electronic methods, but those methods open a 
> whole new range of possibilities, that we have no
> category for. So they have been forced 
> into the category of "music". And fit is often
> uncomfortable.
> 
> In one sense, I feel this is unfair to music.
> Perhaps we think of music as a container that 
> can stretch infinitely. But the question arises,
> "Should we expect music to absorb ever 
> sonic possibility of the human mind forever". Could
> this possibly be destructive to music 
> itself?
> 
> Secondly, when you call it music, you force upon it
> centuries of tradition. You create an 
> expectation in the listener that is an automatic
> limit on what the artist can present. And 
> you exclude those who love sound, but are untrained
> in the traditions of music.
> 
> Third, supposing we have a very capable electronic
> sound source. Perhaps only 10% of the 
> possible tonalities it can generate fit within our
> traditional description of "musical". What 
> about the other 90%, just throw them away? I have
> heard some very evocative sounds form 
> electronic sources, rich and interesting, but in no
> way could I call them musical.
> 
> As Gary Chang pointed out to me, virtually all
> "music" is associated with some ritual. 
> Weddings, funerals, graduations, coronations,
> arrival of dignitaries, mating rituals are 
> VERY big. But so called electronic "music" has no
> associated ritual. So in the past, they 
> tried to fit it into some existing ritual, without
> much success.
> 
> We need terms like "sound sculpture", "electronic
> tonality", "tone poem", "noise poem", 
> "sonic attack", "tonal protest", "anti-music",
> "music for other species", "dadaist sound 
> montage", "surrealist vibration collage", "invisible
> object", "atmospheric disturbance", 
> "aural archeology" or whatever. These need to be
> accepted as legitimate artistic 
> expressions. Until then, the potential of electronic
> sound will remain largely unheard.
> 
> This assumes we are still on the ascending side of
> civilization, where the refinement of 
> distinction in thought is relevant. If not, then the
> first one to grab the biggest rock wins!
> 
> 


Thomas White
  Natural Rhythm
www.naturalrhythmmusic.com

Beautifully said.
People ask me what I do and I am very uncomfortable when 
saying "musician"
I prefer the term noise maker but that doesnt seem to be an acceptable 
response.
20 Years ago when I was in various bands I was more of a musician than 
I am now
however the more skilled I become (opinion alert) the less I become a 
musician.
Luckily I am not bound to any kind of record deal etc, so I am free to 
explore my art.
I am also poor, misunderstood and unrecognised.
My life is achieving perfection LOL.
Peace 
out

> Was it all technically Punk? No but it was a simple was of saying that
> you didn't like ABBA. 

We're not supposed to like ABBA?

At 08:20 PM 12/15/2008, Grant Richter wrote:
>You know I have been thinking for a long time now, that calling it 
>"electronic music" has
>really been a one ton anchor around the neck of electronic sound.
>[snip -- no need to re-quote it all]

Gustavo Matamoros is a Miami-based "composer" (more on that term in a 
second) who has run iSAW and the Subtropics festival for about 20 
years. Subtropics is an almost annual series of music/sound events 
(http://subtropics.org/, see also http://isaw.info/) that has 
featured people like John Cage, Gino Robair, and David Dunn, among 
many others. What I really want to mention here, though, is that 
Gustavo has wrestled with questions like "What do you do? Is that 
music? What the...?" for a long time. ;-)

Well, Gustavo's business card now bills him as an "An Artist Working 
with Sound". That's not a bad label, IMHO. How do you describe 
something like the installation he did on the grounds of Vizcaya 
(http://www.musiconabudget.com/)? It was certainly not "music" (in 
the conventional sense, at least). Yet, it was "composed" in that a 
lot of planning and building and testing went into it.

Are the terms "sound art" and "sound artist" are too pretentious? The 
word "art" carries a lot of baggage, after all.

Synthesizers are used in conventional music, to make self-running 
aleatoric patches ("bug music"?), and for a whole spectrum of things 
in-between those endpoints (assuming that those are the endpoints). 
So, I don't think there is one term that applies to all our efforts, anyway.

John

--- In wiardgroup@yahoogroups.com, Les Mizzell <lesmizz@...> wrote:
>
> 
> > Was it all technically Punk? No but it was a simple was of saying that
> > you didn't like ABBA. 
> 
> We're not supposed to like ABBA?
>

just the stage plays, and the movie...
not the music, of course, Les!

don't panic
-doc

Hi Grant (et al)

'electronic music' hmmmmm

Every musician knows that categories are bullshit and ...
...every entity that sells music as 'product' knows that they are
essential for business. So i guess the sides and terms of that
dichotomy are pretty clearly drawn.

As for the semantics:
i like 'synthesist', but in the strict sense, all art is a synthesis*,
and the artists know it, unless the artist is almost pathologically
egomaniacal (and that number is small.... certainly well under 48%!)

i attended a post-concert discussion after a major american symphony
performance and one of the members of the orchestra rebutted another
member's disparagement of 'electronic music' as artificial and
compromised, with the assertion that if there's a speaker on anywhere
within earshot then what the audience hears is at least partially
'electronic music' and that the chances of a purely acoustic listening
experience are dwindling to nill given the economics of scale inherent
in performance venues...and that he saw this as a good thing! 
   He cited that fact almost all of the rabid bluegrass purists who
loudly eschew the 'impurity' of electric instruments had never heard
the music on a porch ...instead, it was on a CD (speaker), or at a
festival (speaker) or on the radio (speaker)...
and the same went for most classical purists! "It's ALL electronic,
Now!" he asserted!

Man! the audience and the orchestra were ready to tar & feather him
right there and then!

-doc

* that is: all art is a reworking of previously established elements
and thus it has a context. (Cage & DuChamp's 'frame')

--- In wiardgroup@yahoogroups.com, Les Mizzell <lesmizz@...> wrote:
>
> 
> > Was it all technically Punk? No but it was a simple was of saying that
> > you didn't like ABBA. 
> 
> We're not supposed to like ABBA?
>

Well perhaps it would be wiser to say that there where at least two
main schools of thought.

1. Reject all mainstream anything.
2. Like whatever you like and fuck anyone else's opinion.

Personally I fall into the latter category and always did. I didn't
like ABBA but I did like plenty of other "uncool" stuff. I think that
because my 1st choice in music was at least in America rejected by the
masses I was very open minded to checking out other musics, especially
if I felt it was a cultural underdog.

TD

Doc: what your friend in the orchestra was echoing was something that
Miles Davis actually said at one time, and others as well. Particularly that
most music nowadays is electronic in some form (involving a mic, speakers,
recording equipment, reproducing equipment, whatever).

Anyway, I've always used the working definition of music to be:

          Organized Sound

Now this could be very chaotic indeed in some cases. It can be organized
in a very "deep" manner, like the setting of knobs and the attachment of
wires, or in a more "thin" or "traditional" manner using elements of harmony,
melody, etc. Perhaps even organizational elements in both categories.
Birds produce organized sound (hence music) and so to crickets and the
wind in the trees. I would say even road construction can be construed as
producing organized sound. In this sense, what distinguishes the categories
is the type of organization. Whether we perceive the organized sound to be
pleasant is a matter of culture and training for the most part. I know that
when I started listening to and playing traditional Japanese music I really
hated any of the singing that went with it. After listening to and playing this
stuff for years I've really grown to love the singing parts. The same was true
for various "categories" of music (organized sound). Music is organized
sound, whether we like it or not (as individuals) is mostly learned (cultural).
Calling what Morton Subotnick creates, electronic music is not at all unfair
to Music, it is Music (organized sound).


--- In wiardgroup@yahoogroups.com, "drmabuce" <drmabuce@...> wrote:

>
> Hi Grant (et al)
> 
> 'electronic music' hmmmmm
> 
> Every musician knows that categories are bullshit and ...
> ...every entity that sells music as 'product' knows that they are
> essential for business. So i guess the sides and terms of that
> dichotomy are pretty clearly drawn.
> 
> As for the semantics:
> i like 'synthesist', but in the strict sense, all art is a synthesis*,
> and the artists know it, unless the artist is almost pathologically
> egomaniacal (and that number is small.... certainly well under 48%!)
> 
> i attended a post-concert discussion after a major american symphony
> performance and one of the members of the orchestra rebutted another
> member's disparagement of 'electronic music' as artificial and
> compromised, with the assertion that if there's a speaker on anywhere
> within earshot then what the audience hears is at least partially
> 'electronic music' and that the chances of a purely acoustic listening
> experience are dwindling to nill given the economics of scale inherent
> in performance venues...and that he saw this as a good thing! 
>    He cited that fact almost all of the rabid bluegrass purists who
> loudly eschew the 'impurity' of electric instruments had never heard
> the music on a porch ...instead, it was on a CD (speaker), or at a
> festival (speaker) or on the radio (speaker)...
> and the same went for most classical purists! "It's ALL electronic,
> Now!" he asserted!
> 
> Man! the audience and the orchestra were ready to tar & feather him
> right there and then!
> 
> -doc
> 
> * that is: all art is a reworking of previously established elements
> and thus it has a context. (Cage & DuChamp's 'frame')
>

With all due respect, every "musician" and "composer" - electronic or
otherwise deals with the existing and prevailing opinions about what
music is.  Personally, as a music pro, I can tell you that music that
you make simply grows feet and walks away and has its own life.  All
that music is is folklore and mythology.

I have a metaphorical tale that I often use to illustrate this....

Composers like to stand in the middle of the stream - feeling the
currents and energy around us.  This, of course, is much to the
puzzlement of those onlookers on the shore, who think that this is
quite peculiar.

Then, one day, a fish swims into our pocket.  Now the onlookers think
- "oh, that's it - he's a fisherman!"  And whenever they see us, they
talk about the big fish that we have caught.

But all we really want to do is to stand out in the middle of the
stream....

What music is about is excuses - excuses to spend all of our time and
money on music.  Everything else is really the rhetoric of onlookers -
talking about big fish.


gary

I was once introduced to a group of painters as a "post-industrial 
noise artist". Still makes me chuckle.