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Ron Dough
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« Reply #1 on: 11:28:09, 14-12-2007 » |
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Yes, for many now music is primarily aural escapism, but for those kids on the bus there's a cultural issue as well: that's how their lives are. They'd probably no more sit down and appreciate a piece of music than they'd sit down to appreciate a proper meal: the priorities (and pressures) are different, and no doubt much of their feeding will be done on the hoof, grazing and snacking: feasting at fast food outlets is probably their highest repastal aspiration.
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perfect wagnerite
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« Reply #2 on: 12:02:25, 14-12-2007 » |
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Ivan Hewitt's piece raises some really interesting issues - about wanting the "gist" of things, and his description of the visitors to the V and A using their phones to capture an image of a work of art - "capture" being a relevant word here, since there seems to me to be an element of appropriation here; of, as it were, privatising (in however degraded a form) something that belongs more naturally in a public space. My iPod allows me to carry around recordings of a fairly substantial part of the Western classical musical canon in my pocket (ranging from medieval music to a few pieces by members of this board  ); the temptation to indulge in aural grazing is always there, of course, but so it the opportunity to listen in an engaged way. I spend a couple of hours out of each working day on trains (and spend quite a bit of my working life travelling around Europe) so I have a certain amount of the "dead time" that is also part of modern society. What this means is that I can choose to use the time to listen to recorded music "properly", in circumstances where I can listen without the risk of interruption. But the potential loss here is that, as with the mobile phone picture of the Islamic carpet, I am essentially privatising what has always been a public activity (of course I do this when I listen to the radio or my CDs at home). That must mean, in theory, that one part of the engagement with music - even music that is definitively written out and contains no element of improvisation - is lost; and I think we all know that the experience of live performance is fundamentally different (which is one reason why a live broadcast is different from a recording with the pieces separated by Petrocian bons-mots.). On the "gist" issue, I am sure that this is part of what we all do when listening to familiar music; what allows us to reflect on a performance of, say, the Eroica is partly the fact that we know how it is likely to go, because the outline of the music is already in our minds. And Hewitt is surely right that muzak in shops is the Gebrauchsmusik of market capitalism, a rather ironic tribute to music's insidious suggestive power, even in its cheapest and most etiolated forms. |
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At every one of these [classical] concerts in England you will find rows of weary people who are there, not because they really like classical music, but because they think they ought to like it. (Shaw, Don Juan in Hell)
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oliver sudden
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« Reply #3 on: 17:53:02, 14-12-2007 » |
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What might have made Hewett's piece interesting would have been a look at what the youngsters on a bus have in common with, well, me potentially on the same bus, likewise listening to a sound of relatively ordinary quality simply so it can remind me of music I know already. But I have the music plugged into my ears to keep the world out whereas they're at least sharing the music with each other (and, yes, inflicting it on everyone else).
Then his piece might have seemed a little less like another variation on the perhaps overdone theme of Let's Point at the Chavs and Mock...
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time_is_now
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« Reply #4 on: 19:10:00, 14-12-2007 » |
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Indeed, Ollie. Similarly when I read Ron's post above I can't help feeling as if I have more in common with the 'youngsters' he describes than he seems to allow for.
Most of my life is done 'on the hoof, grazing and snacking'; true, there are long periods where I go underground (as it were) - writing, thinking, listening - and it's probably true that most of those kids on the bus don't do anything comparable. But I'm troubled by the implication that concentration is a skill one loses by not regularly exercising it, or that just because someone leads a significant proportion of their life in a certain way, that automatically proves them unfit for - oh, I don't know what you want to call them - moments of transcendence?
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The city is a process which always veers away from the form envisaged and desired, ... whose revenge upon its architects and planners undoes every dream of mastery. It is [also] one of the sites where Dasein is assigned the impossible task of putting right what can never be put right. - Rob Lapsley
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increpatio
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« Reply #5 on: 19:48:20, 14-12-2007 » |
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Oh my, that article struck me as being rather dreadful in tone; he made no effort to understand what other people were doing, simply projecting his own interaction-methods for music onto others. Yes, for many now music is primarily aural escapism, Any chance of evidence for this? but for those kids on the bus there's a cultural issue as well: that's how their lives are. They'd probably no more sit down and appreciate a piece of music than they'd sit down to appreciate a proper meal: What one does on a bus I don't think can be thought of as representative of one's entire existence, even probably! the priorities (and pressures) are different, and no doubt much of their feeding will be done on the hoof, grazing and snacking: feasting at fast food outlets is probably their highest repastal aspiration.
Say what? You seem not to be giving them much credit, I'd say (unless you were to give more evidence to substantiate your claim). |
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« Last Edit: 19:55:06, 14-12-2007 by increpatio »
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Ron Dough
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« Reply #6 on: 21:47:01, 14-12-2007 » |
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Inko:
Any chance of evidence for this?
Well, how about muzack, for a start? CFM? The comparatively huge sales of crossover albums? The need for noise of any sort as a distraction from thinking? It's not exactly the first time such thoughts have been raised on this board or at TOP. Oh, and, from this thread, Ollie's
But I have the music plugged into my ears to keep the world out....
OK, I may be in a position where I seem impossibly ancient to you all, but I'm no hermit. What I'm saying there doesn't just apply to those on buses, does it? It's very much part of the social fabric nowadays that 'the family meal' is a thing of the past for a substantial part of the population. As tinners points out, the pace of life for most people has changed: I'm not saying that one loses the skill of concentration, what I am saying though is that if so many people hardly sit down to have something as essential as a meal, is it really likely that they'd take to sitting down and listening to music for protracted periods, particularly when much of it wouldn't interest them anyway? Even if we leave 'classical' music aside for a moment, and look at what has happened to mainstream popular music over the last forty years, I'd argue that the same holds good; what sells in volume now is rarely the finely crafted attempt to engage the mind, but rather more likely the mass-produced commercial music with a short shelf life. What Hewett doesn't address, of course, is that sitting down and listening to music is the mutation, and that music was there to move bodies long before it was there to move minds; the longest exposure that many get to music today is a return to music for moving.
This leads me back to something else we've discussed on the boards before. What unites tinners's and inko's points is the fact that neither of them mentions the fact that, to all intents and purposes, they're both freaks - as, of course, we virtually all are here. In the same way that those with more of a taste for the mainstream in classical music view New Music with perhaps suspicion, perhaps derision, so exactly the same points of view are taken by a far wider public concerning classical music (and those who enjoy it) in general. It's a closed book, it has elitist overtones, you name it, someone here will have been on the receiving end of it. I'm not taking a let's point at the chavs and mock view whatsoever: what I am suggesting is that the kids on the bus (and probably their parents, too) are the norm. It's not just the 'listening' that Hewett espouses which is culturally alien to much of the population, it's also, by inference, what he might suggest they should be listening too.
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increpatio
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« Reply #7 on: 23:52:22, 14-12-2007 » |
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It's not just the 'listening' that Hewett espouses which is culturally alien to much of the population, I don't think this. I mean, there are many different ways of listening, but anyone who carries around an mp3 player is as guilty of this as the guys on the bus really I think, for his purposes. it's also, by inference, what he might suggest they should be listening too.
I'm one of a few people amongst my group of friends who's into new music or classical music, but every one of them has very definite musical tastes and has strong feelings (not just opinions) about the music that they love and listen to; I don't know any people who just listen to light 'pop' or 'rock' (whatever that is); they all have their tastes and I don't think any of them are restricted to the top 20. And I am willing, from my experience, to say that I'd be able to defend the listening habits of most of my acquaintances, and that I think this does increase the pool of 'non-normal' listeners. And I suspect that it would stretch to a lot more people. I'll see if I can fit in some field-work, but I can't promise anything. It's possible that their habits of listening might be different; the bus anecdote, I think, shows absolutely nothing. Well, how about muzack, for a start? CFM? The comparatively huge sales of crossover albums? Musack, understood as elevator music or the like, is not something that people choose to listen to. You can't complain about people that they allow themselves to be exposed to it too much I think. What's wrong with crossover in and of itself? And: what's CFM? Oh: classic fm? Hmm; you've got me there I'll have to think about it. The need for noise of any sort as a distraction from thinking? This is nothing new; people always have been able to let their hair down to some sorts of music. It's more portable now, but so are the other sorts. |
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Ron Dough
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« Reply #8 on: 00:11:29, 15-12-2007 » |
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But the music as a distraction from thinking isn't necessarily a letting down of hair (although it might be if you have a Debussy opera on in the background) . Many people have music (or the radio) on to shut out the silence, without really being aware it's there: that's not listening. I can find you plenty of people who put music on when they have guests for a meal; its purpose is not to be listened to. Ask a group of film-goers to guess what percentage of the movie they've just seen had music in the background, and the chances are that the majority will be way under in their estimations: they're as used to shutting music out, or using it as a barrier against something else, as actually listening to it. |
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increpatio
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« Reply #9 on: 00:33:52, 15-12-2007 » |
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But the music as a distraction from thinking isn't necessarily a letting down of hair (although it might be if you have a Debussy opera on in the background) . Many people have music (or the radio) on to shut out the silence, without really being aware it's there: that's not listening. I can find you plenty of people who put music on when they have guests for a meal; its purpose is not to be listened to. Ask a group of film-goers to guess what percentage of the movie they've just seen had music in the background, and the chances are that the majority will be way under in their estimations: they're as used to shutting music out, or using it as a barrier against something else, as actually listening to it. That's not to say that they're not able to, just (at least to me) that music functions in that capacity in certain situations. Would you expect them to be actively listening to music while eating dinner with people? Salon music has long served a similar function, neh? So, do you think that people who go to music concerts (classical, pop, or rock) are not listening to what's going on around in terms of the sound then because they've spent too long in hotel elevators, shopping malls, and dinner parties? Or when they sit down to listen to a new CD they've bought (yes, it does happen, though I'm not sure exactly how often the 'average person' would) |
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Andy D
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« Reply #10 on: 01:02:46, 15-12-2007 » |
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Going back to the original Ivan Hewett article for a moment, I find it immensely annoying when I'm on the bus trying to listen to something on my minidisc only to have someone imposing their choice of music upon everyone else via something that sounds like very loud headphones ie a horribly tinny sound coming from a mobile.
I must own up to v occasionally using music as "background" but I don't like doing so. I was driving a lot today but I had great difficulty finding something to listen to. This morning I had Radio 3 on but it sounded pretty dreary so I put a tape of the Fall on - and that just sounded far too noisy to me. Whereas I usually love the Fall. I've been sitting in total silence for the last 3 hours (after CotW) so that's also a choice I've made re the music I listen to, ie nothing can be "real listening" as well.
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« Last Edit: 01:06:06, 15-12-2007 by Andy D »
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Ron Dough
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« Reply #11 on: 09:31:06, 15-12-2007 » |
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(listening to) nothing can be "real listening" as well.
And that's another really important point. I've mentioned before how important natural sounds (the sea, woodland, burns etc.) are to me. I rarely listen to music before mid-morning unless it's work-related, but I'm quite happy to walk along the beach first thing and concentrate on the sounds the sea makes as it meets the reef which protects virtually all our shore. Returning to the question of aged-based variations in listening, and what people can 'listen' to, what about autoharp's recent comments about public spaces where classical music is actually used as a deterrent to drive the young away, while older people enjoy it? He has obviously listened enough not only to identify the piece, but even to be able to comment favourably on its performance, but to many others its mere presence is enough to make them want to stay away: the last thing they want to do is to have to listen to it. Is that not exactly the sort of cultural alienation I was mentioning earlier, and am I alone in finding the use of music in this negative fashion depressing? Isn't it guaranteed to alienate the whole concept of serious music and the art of listening to it still further? |
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Reiner Torheit
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« Reply #12 on: 10:52:05, 15-12-2007 » |
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public spaces where classical music is actually used as a deterrent to drive the young away, while older people enjoy it?
Have there been any cases yet of older folk in tweedy clothes bringing thermos flasks of tea or hipflasks of Sanatogen along to level crossings, pedestrian subways or electrical substations to listen to the Haydn being broadcast from the loudspeakers placed there? The next think you know, they'll be graffitiing the R3 logo on walls, or drawing portraits of Rob Cowan with aerosol spray-paint... I was unaware of this phenomenon of playing rap music on buses until this week, when it happened on a bus I was on in London. It's clearly a UK-based thing - I've not seen it elsewhere. IMHO this has nothing to do with social malaise or the hopelessness of life for the young disenfranchised urban yoof of 2day... it's 'cos you ain't got no conductors on yer buses, innit! And talking of buses, cue Bryn.... |
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"I was, for several months, mutely in love with a coloratura soprano, who seemed to me to have wafted straight from Paradise to the stage of the Odessa Opera-House"
- Leon Trotsky, "My Life"
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oliver sudden
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« Reply #13 on: 20:34:42, 16-12-2007 » |
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I've seen music being played out loud on phones in both France and Germany... indeed I've done it myself, on a late-night train bound for Dessau when I thought my colleagues (no one else was in the compartment) might like to hear a bit of Ciocarlia. Beer was also had. Quite pleasant it was.
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martle
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« Reply #14 on: 21:06:35, 16-12-2007 » |
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I've seen music being played out loud on phones in both France and Germany... indeed I've done it myself, on a late-night train bound for Dessau when I thought my colleagues (no one else was in the compartment) might like to hear a bit of Ciocarlia. Beer was also had. Quite pleasant it was.
Ollie, you're obviously every inch the behoodied anti-social yob that we always suspected you to be.  |
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Green. Always green.
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