Re: Yoko broke up the band

On Jul 26, 12:34 am, Sean Carroll <seanc...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
donz5 wrote:

Excellent explanation, thanks for that. Reminds me of a bit done on
Letterman during his NBC days: A heartbeat was recorded, then looped;
the band then incorporated that loop as a steady rhythmic pulse to
which to play. Not an original idea by any measure, but I think it
illustrates your point -- a heartbeat, in one context, (perhaps
medical) may not be considered "music"; but in another, it most
certainly is.

And THAT reminds ME of the tape loops from 'Tomorrow Never Knows'. Who
knows where the original sounds came from? But by being put in a
specific context and manipulated a certain way, they became music. It
was even done in a way that was partly randomised -- I don't remember
the details, but George Martin said that the way they did it they could
not have exactly repeated any one performance. Real-world ambient
sounds, like, say, a toilet flush, or the background noises in 4'33",
also have that nonrepeatable quality -- something that is unimportant
when the sound occurs during every day life, but becomes inherently
interesting in the context of musical art.

Another example would be the chopped-up tape loop at the end of Sgt
Pepper. The actual sounds are nothing more than snippets of the Beatles
talking -- noise, not music. But by being cut apart and then put back
together randomly, and inserted into the contextual framework of the
run-out inner groove at the end of the album, they become part of the
musical art. The same goes for the 'dog whistle' sound that precedes the
loop.

Also -- Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite: structured recorded
melodies chopped up, then pieced together in random order, resulting
in a cacaphony of sound that perfectly lent itself to the desired and
intended effect -- a carnival atmosphere.


In the end, all ANY music comes down to is an arrangement and placement
into a contrived context of things that, separately, on their own,
unattached to one another and divorced of context, are nothing but
noises. Whether that noise comes from the vibrations of a guitar string,
air rushing around the sides of a human tongue, books slamming on the
floor, or flushing toilets is not important -- it is the CONTEXT INTO
WHICH THE NOISES ARE PLACED that is important, and that makes the art.

It might be more complicated than that-- what makes something music is
one's reaction to it. "Music to my ears" to one person is "pointless
noise" to another. A toilet flush, within the context of an art
performance, is, to one person, "idiotic," to another, "naive," and to
yet another, "a unique and valuable creation."

Or, at least, that's our current view; there's the ancient Greeks'
Harmony of the Spheres, which is worth a look-see:

http://www.emis.de/journals/NNJ/Pont-v6n1.html


.

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