Re: [LAU] Bitwig: what we can learn from it

On 04/01/2014 11:23 PM, Hartmut Noack wrote:
> Am 02.04.2014 10:18, schrieb david:
>> On 04/01/2014 09:21 PM, Hartmut Noack wrote:
>>> Am 01.04.2014 23:47, schrieb Fons Adriaensen:
>>>> On Tue, Apr 01, 2014 at 10:57:44PM +0200, Hartmut Noack wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Am 31.03.2014 23:03, schrieb Len Ovens:
>>>>>>
>>>>>> On Mon, 31 Mar 2014, Ralf Mardorf wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Music isn't a competition about smartness.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I think that is what was being said. Music today seems to be no longer
>>>>>> about communicating anything at all... merely soundiing somewhat pleasant,
>>>>>> or showing off some vocal (or other) gymnastics seems to be most of it.
>>>>>
>>>>> I dont see that. I think, that today music is in the best shape I
>>>>> experienced since I taped the radio shows in memoriam John Lennon back
>>>>> in 1981.
>>>>
>>>> There's a daily program on RAI radio 3 (the cultural channel here
>>>> in Italy) called 'alza il volume' or in plain English 'pump up the
>>>> volume'. It keeps a look on the 'non mainstream' music scene. Much
>>>> of what it outputs is just entertaining and at times plainly boring,
>>>> but every now and then there will be some real gems. And most of
>>>> those gems are very probably produced using software such as Bitwig,
>>>
>>> I think, where the attitude of a musician reaches the point of "I know,
>>> what to do and I will do it just right." the choice to tools becomes
>>> liquid again: there are some great recodings today that are made on
>>> antique 4-Track tapes, Portishead use a hardware HD-recorder from the
>>> 90ies, most will use Pro Tools though...
>>>
>>>
>>>> and would not exists without it. So in that sense you are certainly
>>>> right, this *is* an interesting time for music production, at no
>>>> time before there was such a range of tools available as we have
>>>> today. But at the same time there's an incredible number of people
>>>> who are using these tools but absolutely fail to produce anything
>>>> that stands out, to put it mildly.
>>>>
>>>> If music is about 'communicating' anything, it should probably
>>>> (IMHO) first communicate itself.
>>>
>>> Absolutely! I want to hear music, that speaks for itself, before I
>>> accept thoughts and feelings transported by it. Anyway it is all about
>>> individuality plus love for music, both combined will almost
>>> automatically reject any boring standardisation and enable the artist to
>>> produce something worth listening to with *any* tool that offers the
>>> needed flexibility to fit the vision.
>>>
>>>> There's nothing more boring
>>>> than an artist trying to communicate his or her very personal
>>>> feelings, be they sorrow or anger. The very least you need is
>>>> a wider context that is relevant to others, and the music (or
>>>> any form of art) that will most strongly communicate anything
>>>> but itself will be the one that in which the creator himself
>>>> disappears completely.
>>>
>>> Rock/Pop music is performance art, the "Rockstar" is a role, that is
>>> played by someone, who happens to sing/play at the same time. The result
>>> is not music in the sense of Bach or Mahler but still relevant art if
>>> done right.
>>
>> But Bach and Mahler and many (if not most) of what we now consider
>> "classical and/or/great" musicians wrote for the same reason: to write
>> something that people would pay money for.
>
> No, they wrote the music to become famous enough to get a well-paid job.
> Some tunes they where paid for directly but that was: "Oh, I am lucky
> enough to have this famous Gustav Mahler being kind enough to write
> music for my humble orchestra." And there was no producer, who
> controlled and influenced the writing and if the work would not be
> asuccess, it may have had impact on the the fame of the composer but not
> the payment directly.
>
> Bach wrote some of his now most famous(and influential) works for the
> drawer as some kind of theoretical research on contrapunctus etc The art
> of the fuge was seldom performed in his day for a small circle,of
> specialists.

Another thing: in those days, the composer was usually the conductor, too.

-- 
David W. Jones
gnome@email-addr-hidden
authenticity, honesty, community
http://dancingtreefrog.com
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