[LAU] The democratization on music might not always be a good thing...

David Santamauro david.santamauro at gmail.com
Thu Nov 4 16:33:10 UTC 2010


On Thu, 4 Nov 2010 16:16:26 +0100
fons at kokkinizita.net wrote:

> On Thu, Nov 04, 2010 at 10:43:12AM -0400, David Santamauro wrote:
> 
> > I see that analogy as very fitting but the conclusion as simply
> > wrong. A novelist or poet does, indeed, spend years (a lifetime
> > even) gaining a mastery of not only the "pencil", but also the
> > words and sentence structure. My 8-year old daughter will attest to
> > the difficulty involved and the years it takes to master moving her
> > writing instrument to produce the correct glyph--not to mention
> > putting all those glyphs together to form words, sentences and
> > ultimately a coherent story that expresses her intent.
> 
> I don't think the analogy is fitting at all.

Like I wrote to Drew earlier, I'm a firm believer that music is a
language and any parallels drawn between the two are justified.

> A novelist's or poet's
> art does not consist of being able to write or push keys on a
> keyboard. It consists of creating a good text. He/she could just
> dictate it to someone writing it down or typing it, and nothing would
> be lost.

But wouldn't there have to be some initial investment in learning in
order to even be able to dictate?

> 
> Now you could argue that a composer's art does not consist of being
> able to play all the instruments he/she writes for. So why not use
> a computer to find out how things sound. Simple fact is that anyone
> deserving to be called a composer does not depend on being able to
> hear the exact reproduction of what he/she writes. Entire songs,
> musicals, symphonies have been orchestrated or arranged rather well
> by composers (not only the classical ones) just sitting at their desk,
> or at most using a piano. They can do this because they know their
> trade. Which takes some time to learn.

Absolutely. They can do this because the vocabulary and syntax is
ingrained deep in the brain.

> 
> What we see today is a lot of people 1) unable to play any instrument
> or sing and 2) unable to create any music except by trial and error
> aided by technology. Yet they'd call themselves a musician. By that
> measure, they could call themselves painters,  sculptors, writers,
> dancers, and whatever they want. 

And I'm sure many do.

David


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