Classical - (Jazz) - Pop

[Lat-Literal]

(Actually - now I come to think of it, every meaning of the word "Music" that I use can be divided into the "tasty" and the "Not tasty"!)

That's quite interesting to me. I wouldn't "do" music as tasty but I would "do" music as alternative pictures. If we cut around matters like maintaining standards and being appalled at an absence of standards, it probably comes down to the extent to which you are instinctively spoon-fed and the extent to which you put together your own meals. The latter will be barely different from the former unless there is not only the motivation to think but there is access to a wide range of ingredients. CFM doesn't offer a wide range of ingredients.

[doversoul1]

I had always thought that R3 was interested in Jazz because, like classical music, it is a minority taste and hence not something for R2, except perhaps with the BBC Big Band. Maybe record shops put jazz records far from the pop section as it sold so badly and couldn't be allowed to take up valuable sales space.
Surely Jazz can be akin to either Pop or Classical music depending on the nature of the Jazz performance. Plenty of Jazz players produce melodic tuneful jazz that doesn't stray too far from a popular base and the catalogue of great Jazz performances of popular songs is vast. So if Jazz needs to be classified I think I'd agree with the alignment with popular music. I can't think of any classically influenced Jazz that I care for, especially not of the Loussier kind.

What makes Jazz a distinct type of music is improvisation. It does not matter what tune or song is being played*. What matters is how it is improvised, and impastation takes a lot more musical knowledge and techniques than performing Pop. Improvisation is the creation of musicians and not something that marketing can make it work. This is why it is seen as serious music along with classical music. Most other types of non-traditional popular (other than Pop) music like progressive rock etc. have ‘progressed’ from Pop whereas Jazz does not share this roots.

Jazz, like classical music has borderline / crossover works and performers but when the discussion is about classification / different types of music, we need to focus on the ‘core’ (typical works or performance) of the music or the discussion will go nowhere.

*This is why you don’t find John Coltrane’s CD in the same shelf as The Sound of Music despite the fact that they both have My Favourite Things.

[MrGongGong]

What makes Jazz a distinct type of music is improvisation.

I'm not sure that is always the case at all.
There are plenty of improvised musics in the world that aren't Jazz and plenty of music that is called "jazz" that is less improvised than a Haydn string quartet.

"Serious" is always a problematic word IMV. People who make "pop" music can be very serious indeed.

[doversoul1]

I'm not sure that is always the case at all.
There are plenty of improvised musics in the world that aren't Jazz and plenty of music that is called "jazz" that is less improvised than a Haydn string quartet.

"Serious" is always a problematic word IMV

Good dog, Pavlov.

[MrGongGong]

Good dog, Pavlov.

It might be something that has been said many times BUT it's nevertheless true IMV

I'm not 100% sure that Natty is real anyway?

[Bryn]

Hmm. Into which category does one classify AMM? Since its early days it has comprised a mix of musicians from a jazz and classical background who have continued significant careers in their original fields. It gets even stranger, their pianist, John Tilbury (soloist in works for piano and orchestra at the Proms in recent years) has also been featured on Jazz on 3 performing Samuel Beckett. Come to think of it, while one's first impression of an AMM improvisation might be of 'sound based' music, there are also often a great many notes involved too.

[MrGongGong]

Hmm. Into which category does one classify AMM? Since its early days it has comprised a mix of musicians from a jazz and classical background who have continued significant careers in their original fields. It gets even stranger, their pianist, John Tilbury (soloist in works for piano and orchestra at the Proms in recent years) has also been featured on Jazz on 3 performing Samuel Beckett. Come to think of it, while one's first impression of an AMM improvisation might be of 'sound based' music, there are also often a great many notes involved too.

AMM fall into the Tasty category IMV
How about someone takes Natty down to OTO one evening?

[teamsaint]

I'm not sure that is always the case at all.
There are plenty of improvised musics in the world that aren't Jazz and plenty of music that is called "jazz" that is less improvised than a Haydn string quartet.

"Serious" is always a problematic word IMV. People who make "pop" music can be very serious indeed.

The problem with words in general is trying to attribute a fixed meaning to them.

Hence the need for so many academics in English departments.

[MrGongGong]

The problem with words in general is trying to attribute a fixed meaning to them.

Like what Mr Plant said

[Lat-Literal]

The problem with words in general is trying to attribute a fixed meaning to them.

Hence the need for so many academics in English departments.

Overtly physical or "health" types can knock the power out of words as soon as they employ the latest word favoured by awful government or multinational corporations.

That is one thing I have learnt this year and it's been a blimmin' hard lesson. There is, at root, a powerlessness in individual rationality or even in "teaming up" with it.

But we keep to what we do as it is the only thing we know and good luck to us all, however much we might differ on the nuances. They really are slighter than you'd think.

Muscularity beats substance in time terms but it is a wimp. There is no quality to it whatsoever. What is its point other than barging about grey in executive boardrooms?

(The Evening Bugle said "There's something slightly challenging about this guy - it is difficult to put your finger on it but then he's a nobody")

[french frank]

"Serious" is always a problematic word IMV. People who make "pop" music can be very serious indeed.

I don't think the word is supposed to describe the seriousness/earnestness of the people who "make" the music, but the music itself. How complex it is, how susceptible of critical analysis, what depth of discussion does it give rise to.

That's not to say that every listener is expected to subject every/any music to such analysis - just listen and enjoy if you want - but is the music susceptible of such depth of study. I imagine that some 'pop' is musically serious (though do they call themselves 'pop' musicians? I don't see the word attached to Radiohead in their Wiki article, for instance), but most of it isn't. Justin Bieber (Genres: pop) has a very long article in Wikipedia, the shortest section being the one called 'Artistry' - two lines long, neither actually considering his music - merely the other artists who have inspired him. Isn't most 'pop' personality based, failing much musical interest?

[Lat-Literal]

I don't think the word is supposed to describe the seriousness/earnestness of the people who "make" the music, but the music itself. How complex it is, how susceptible of critical analysis, what depth of discussion does it give rise to.

That's not to say that every listener is expected to subject every/any music to such analysis - just listen and enjoy if you want - but is the music susceptible of such depth of study. I imagine that some 'pop' is musically serious (though do they call themselves 'pop' musicians? I don't see the word attached to Radiohead in their Wiki article, for instance), but most of it isn't. Justin Bieber (Genres: pop) has a very long article in Wikipedia, the shortest section being the one called 'Artistry' - two lines long, neither actually considering his music - merely the other artists who have inspired him. Isn't most 'pop' personality based, failing much musical interest?

Yes, now, without a doubt. It has been so for 20-30 years. To some extent it was always so. I am grateful for the reference to Radiohead. It was in Mark's video. They are not to my taste, other than bits from a couple of albums, but they are significant and it isn't easy to describe why. "Serious" would be one word. Another aspect is the use of various formats for releasing new material, often innovative. If this were the 1970s, they would be on the R3 "rock show" rather than "the Floyd". Your post is right. Strong arguments.

(What we (have to) do is explore around the edges - there is a big difference between what is in the Top 40 and quite a bit of talent out there, even if it is rarely innovative - I'd say that the further from the mainstream one goes the more it is genre based and the more there is musicality because industry heads aren't musical although they set agendas)

[MrGongGong]

I don't think the word is supposed to describe the seriousness/earnestness of the people who "make" the music, but the music itself. How complex it is, how susceptible of critical analysis, what depth of discussion does it give rise to.

Indeed, but that's not really the way people use it.
"Serious" is inevitably used as a pejorative term by those who appear to be trying to claim some kind of superiority for the music that they listen to.

Also this doesn't really hold up to scrutiny once you get past the comparison of (for example) Justin Bieber and Wagner or JLS and Messiaen.
What about

The Blue Danube = "Serious"
Trout Mask Replica= "not serious"

?
Susceptible to "depth of study"?

I also think that references to "the charts" these days are equally ridiculous when discussing Mahler as they are with Pop music. The days when they were significant are gone IMV.
None of which is to say that all things are equal in complexity, significance or efficacy.

'"As serious as your life"? (again)

http://www.serious.org.uk

[NatBalance]

I suppose it depends on what people think "listening" is - a passive absorption of sound, or an active contribution to the Music. Those who just want Music to "wash" over them will never "get" 4.33" and will be irritated and even enraged by what they perceive to be a "con" ....

I think the reason people see 4'33" as a con (or in my case as an interesting idea badly put across) is because all Cage has done is ask you to listen to ambient sounds and hear the music in it. Excellent idea, great, but asking you do something, or creating a situation where you will have to listen to the ambient 'music', is not actually a piece of music in itself. Asking you to listen to the surrounding soundscape and hear the music in it is more like meditation or observation. It's the same as if Rautavaara, instead of composing his Cantus Arcticus …

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XXIfk8TSpxI

… had not actually composed anything but just said "Oh, go and listen to some birds".

If John Cage had done something like what I suggested in post #18 it could then be called a piece of music and I reckon it would be a great piece.

If John Cage had actually composed some sounds to go with the silence (or the ambient music of life), then he would have put his point over much better. He may only have needed to play one note every so often. Perhaps the same note, on the piano, or a violin (what ever instrument and note or chord suits the ambient sounds of the particular location) perhaps played so quietly that you can only just distinguish it from the surrounding soundscape. THEN I would have understood his point.

Of course the occasional almost imperceptible notes would have to be very sparsely dotted about. It would have to be about 90% ambient 'music' to put over the point.

Rich

[MrGongGong]

Rich , Natty ?

You miss the point about 4:33"
(which is not unusual)

Here are some wonderful things for you to wrestle with

http://www.gruenrekorder.de

http://www.gruenrekorder.de

A short thing: So if, as you insist, 4:33" isn't really music it raises the question of what would make it music?

a possible scenario
Q:Are the birds in Cantus Artcicus music?
A:Yes because the composer chose to have them there
Q: Were they music when they were in the wild and being recorded?
A: NO because they hadn't been inserted into a composition
Q: Is the wind machine in Vaughan Williams's [I]Sinfonia Antartica [I] music?
A: Because the composer put it there.
Q: If I played the wind machine before the concert or in the interval (check out Favourite Intermissions) would it be music?
A: No

Therefore it's the context that makes it music or notmusic?

4:33" has a duration
has movements
has sounds
has a performance context
has a score
has sounds that the composer intended (as much as recording the birds unless you posses the superpower of commanding them to sing)

What's the problem?

(for me the answers to all those NO questions are YES, but whether it's any good or not or worth listening to is another matter all together)

There's a TEDex youtube clip somewhere of a philosopher (I think in Manchester?) talking about 4:33" and also missing the point, but what he does is define music in a narrow way then show that because 4:33" doesn't fit his definition it's therefore notmusic ... hum

I think the reason people see 4'33" as a con

is because they subscribe to the conspiracy theory of contemporary art? (Foil hats at the ready)

http://www.see-this-sound.at/print/work/941

http://www.sfu.ca/~truax/wsp.html