The Ranting Room

 

yes!!

 

then again I hate all fads ... there's something about mass unoriginality that makes me crazy

 

I don't recall anyone considering those to be fads - and I was certainly around for the beginning of both.

 

ipads maybe ..I don't think they will last

 

Planking = fad

 

 

 

my gut says no ..

 

I think people who never smoked are using them because they're caught up in the technology and the need to look cool .. like why young kids smoke in the first place.

 

plus most places wont allow them .. so they aren't accomplishing anything.

 

I think - as your friend does - they'll just eventually lose interest and either smoke ciggies or quit.

 

we'll meet back here in a year and see if it happens or not

 

It is a little in between based on his actual application of the thought expressed there. There is a song where he used the sounds of buffalos bellowing, goats bleating and roosters crowing, all as a backdrop to vocals delivered by a singer. Many of these sounds are bent into melodic shape using, I think, synths but some are also used in their pure 'unmusical' form. The point being the momentary interlude of non music is accepted by an audience already prepared by the preceding music as well as visuals of a village simpleton playing with the livestock to accept the intrusion of such sounds. In other words the context decides what the audience perceives as music. This MAY have been what Cage also wanted to establish.

I would (and have) argue that is it sound but not music, however, some of it is musical, (for example it is hard to call the sound of rooks and crows as musical).

In another thread somewhere I postulated that all human music is based upon a pentatonic scale- that is, music from every culture throughout history shares a common harmonic relationship of tones even though they differ in absolute pitch and tuning. These five notes work well with each other because they are harmonious with each other (i.e., the interaction between them creates beat-notes that are harmonically related) - this relationship is mathematical and predictable (i.e., it is scientific). Our ears interpret this relationship as harmonious and thus musical. A composer and/or musician uses this musical scale to create music, however the scale itself is not music.

Some bird-song also exhibits this pentatonic relationship due to the same "science" - two tones played together create beat-tones that are mathematically related to the original two. (sin(X) + sin (Y) = 2(sin((X+Y)÷2) × cos((X-Y)÷2))). Therefore to our ears this bird-song sounds musical because it is a sequence of harmonic tones that resembles the music created by a musician, but it is not music.

'Harmonious' is by definition 'pleasant sounding' so it is what is aesthetically pleasing to our ears, the mathematical relationship is an after-the-event analysis of why that is so. This harmonic relationship was derived empirically by what sounded pleasant and the mathematics are merely the scientific explanation. I have speculated before that this is physiological due to how our ears convert acoustic waves into electrical signals to send to the brain for interpretation. Notes that are not of this simple sequence are not necessarily dissonant, they can be consonant (i.e. imperfect consonance).

With regard to 'demonstrable dissonance', I would not use lesser/greater (or even better/worse) but just different, or if pushed, more complicated. Harmonious is not just two notes played together it also relates to notes played in sequence, so there is a time/memory dimension involved. Dissonance works in this sequential time dimension too, as dissonant tones are a natural consequence of key changes (for example) and it is how this dissonance is resolved over time that affects our aesthetic appreciation of the note sequence or phrase. Dissonance can be used well or it can be used poorly, but used well it adds interest and tension, in this respect dissonance is seen as transitional (towards a resolution).