Music The Future of Music: Wonderings on 2 Centuries Ahead

[zoobyshoe]

I was just thinking of all of the faux conductors, guitarists, pianists, etc, in the world. Is it possible that we are all pretending that we are making the music?

I've conducted some of the finest air orchestras in the world. All self taught, no training. Despite that, I get magnificent sound out of them.

 

[hypnagogue]

Maybe we only listen due to a desire to make music.

I was just thinking of all of the faux conductors, guitarists, pianists, etc, in the world. Is it possible that we are all pretending that we are making the music?

Funny; when one attends a piano recital in a room full of pianists, guess what everyone's fingers are doing when the best pianists play?

I don't think that's particular to music though. I remember jumping off the walls and practicing kicks after watching The Karate Kid as a child for instance.

I don't think it necessarily has much to do with a desire to make the music or to pretend that we are per se. It could be a more low-level, reflexive kind of thing-- I imagine mirror neurons figure in heavily. Music does seem to elicit general rhythmic movements anyway, of which imitations of instrument performance and such are a subset.

I'd say most people listen to music because the sounds and the way they're strung together and the emotions they evoke and so on are just intrinsically enjoyable in some way or another.

Though it is true that playing music oneself can be quite engaging. This may be because it meets the conditions condusive to producing a 'flow' state, or 'being in the zone'-- attentional and other cognitive resources are consumed with the given task, the task presents a challenge that can be met by employing some level of skill, there is clear and immediate feedback on what's working and what isn't, there is a framework of rules to work within, etc.

 

[zoobyshoe]

I don't know if this is the same thing as a 'reflexive" reaction, not sure what comprises one, but I do always feel a participative component. It's irrational, but just appreciating it makes me feel I am somehow also creating it.

 

[moose]

How many spectacular songs have you heard, period? I can only think of a few songs that I would consider "spectacular"

Maybe 5 or 6? Which is essentially my point.

 

[hypnagogue]

Maybe 5 or 6? Which is essentially my point.

What are the 5 or 6 you consider to be spectacular?

 

[Astronuc]

For Spectacular songs, how about for starters -

Karn Evil 9 from Brain Salad Surgery by Emerson, Lake and Palmer

All Along the Watchtower and Voodoo Chile from Electric Ladyland by Jimi Hendrix

Bridge of Sighs from Bridge of Sighs by Robin Trower

The Low Spark of High Heeled Boys from The Low Spark of High Heeled Boys by Traffic

In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida from In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida by Iron Butterfly!

Raspberry Jam Delta-V from Crystal Planet, and Searching from Is There Love in Space? by Joe Satriani

 

[jimmy p]

Computer made music will never capture the emotion of songs. For example, a computer could play the notes of, I don't know, say Guns N Roses - Estranged, but it could not capture the essence and emotion that Slash uses to play the soaring guitar solos.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Computer made music will never capture the emotion of songs. For example, a computer could play the notes of, I don't know, say Guns N Roses - Estranged, but it could not capture the essence and emotion that Slash uses to play the soaring guitar solos.

What makes this quality so intangible? The fact that so many of us respond to particular songs tells me that there are common factors which might be identified and used to predict what works. In fact, much of what tops the pop charts now is formula music written for formula bands consisting of formula characters. You can even go to boy band school now.

Consider also:
http://www.epinions.com/inst-review-7EEC-1F523E39-397B1F52-prod5

 

[hypnagogue]

Computer made music will never capture the emotion of songs. For example, a computer could play the notes of, I don't know, say Guns N Roses - Estranged, but it could not capture the essence and emotion that Slash uses to play the soaring guitar solos.

Why not? Slash communicates those emotions by playing the notes a certain way-- maybe holding this note that long, bending that note a bit, etc. In principle, there is no reason why such a style could not be captured by an algorithm; the computer just needs to reproduce certain patterns of timing in how it plays the notes.

If you read Hofstadter's article, he seems to be a classical music aficionado and yet he thinks the songs created by one existing program sound like they portray emotion and even meaning.

 

[CosminaPrisma]

I'm no music theorist, but I think it would be possible to study what pitch, tones, timbres, etc that people think convey certain emotions (like what Ivan Seeking says) and be able to create a computer program that generates music according to that. I think after working on it for a few years and tweaking it researchers would be able to write a program that composes/plays music that is relatively indiscernable from what humans make that also conveys certain emotions that most people would agree upon. As recording techniques get better so will synthesizing sounds on a computer imho--thus making the computer music less distinguishable from the total man made thing.

 

[CosminaPrisma]

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/11/24/60minutes/main657713.shtml"

That kid in the above link could also be the future of music.


the future of music might just depend on popular opinion (you all probably read this already)

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=000D8E2F-C0DD-13EB-80DD83414B7F0000"

Depending on what new improvisations in music making become popular with the masses is what will predict the future of music. Maybe that's what happens with http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/humpback/song.html" ...when their whale song dialect changes...I saw a special about the cognitive anthropology of music awhile ago and they speculated on that.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Computer made music will never capture the emotion of songs. For example, a computer could play the notes of, I don't know, say Guns N Roses - Estranged, but it could not capture the essence and emotion that Slash uses to play the soaring guitar solos.

Why not? Slash communicates those emotions by playing the notes a certain way-- maybe holding this note that long, bending that note a bit, etc. In principle, there is no reason why such a style could not be captured by an algorithm; the computer just needs to reproduce certain patterns of timing in how it plays the notes.

I think jimmy p has a point here, if I understand what he's saying correctly. Given the notes, could a program be written that would explore them for an extremely moving, stylistically specific, original interpretive performance? Slash is not imitating another style, by formula, but generating a new one from himself. Could a computer program be written that could generate a new, unique, sucessful (people would like it) human sounding performer that is not an imitation of an existing one?
That seems vastly less possible to me.

 

[jimmy p]

Exactly my point! But expressed much better. What a team we make zooby.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Exactly my point! But expressed much better. What a team we make zooby.

Yes. We have special translational advantages gained through our prior work in stupid quetions.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Would you two like to be alone? :!)

 

[jimmy p]

You are just jealous because you aren't part of a team dedicated to answering all of lifes stupid quetions.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Would you two like to be alone? :!)

Roffel!

...

 

[zoobyshoe]

What makes this quality so intangible? The fact that so many of us respond to particular songs tells me that there are common factors which might be identified and used to predict what works.

You can, but I think there are scads of human composers who can already do this faster and easier than anyone could write a program to do it. You may remember the scene from Amadeus where he improvises in the style of composers whose names people call out to him. The film makes it out that only a musical genius could do that. In fact, most classically trained musicians can do it to some degree. People who write film scores in particular are style sponges because they have to have the ability to score a huge, practically infinite, variety of scenes if they want work. It wouldn't be difficult at all to locate a film composer to write a film score in the style of Chopin or Beethoven. If you ever saw The Ruttles you must have noticed how all the Ruttles songs sounded exactly like Beatles songs you had just never happened to hear before. They did a great job with that.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Well, a program only need be written once. The idea is not that you would have to write a new program for each new song. The idea is that given the proper algorithms, a computer could spit out new songs and styles ad infinitum.

The real question to me is: Where does the music in the heads of these genuises come from? Some, like the boy in the link, say that they hear the music as if it were composed by someone else. It makes one wonder if some of the greatest songs are written by anyone...

 

[zoobyshoe]

Well, a program only need be written once. The idea is not that you would have to write a new program for each new song. The idea is that given the proper algorithms, a computer could spit out new songs and styles ad infinitum.

New songs in a pre-existing style already exists (see Hypnagogue's link). New styles would take some very creative leap to figure out. The way the program analyzes old Chopin to write new Chopin turns out to be: take a lot of his old music apart into pieces and reassemble the pieces in a new configuration. This is fine for a limited number of "new" compositions, but I bet after a while it would become horribly repetitive. In real life a composer evolves, abandons old habits and discovers new things to explore.

The real question to me is: Where does the music in the heads of these genuises come from? Some, like the boy in the link, say that they hear the music as if it were composed by someone else. It makes one wonder if some of the greatest songs are written by anyone...

If you immerse yourself in something all the time it becomes habitual. After listening to Bach for a few hours I start to hear Bach-like music in my head and sometimes can't stop this for a couple days. I think it is just a matter of inertia: get a whole bunch of neurons working on a certain kind of thing and they'll continue at it even when you're not pushing them to do so anymore.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

New songs in a pre-existing style already exists (see Hypnagogue's link). New styles would take some very creative leap to figure out. The way the program analyzes old Chopin to write new Chopin turns out to be: take a lot of his old music apart into pieces and reassemble the pieces in a new configuration. This is fine for a limited number of "new" compositions, but I bet after a while it would become horribly repetitive. In real life a composer evolves, abandons old habits and discovers new things to explore.

I can imagine something like this happening: The basic outline for a song can be varied randomly - infinitely for all practical purposes - and the results checked against the parameters that are used to define music. So it could be that we would only rule out that which is known to violate the basic rules - that known to assault the senses. The rest passes as new styles, melodies, etc.

If you immerse yourself in something all the time it becomes habitual. After listening to Bach for a few hours I start to hear Bach-like music in my head and sometimes can't stop this for a couple days. I think it is just a matter of inertia: get a whole bunch of neurons working on a certain kind of thing and they'll continue at it even when you're not pushing them to do so anymore.

However, we are talking about creations and not reproductions, which strikes at the heart of the topic. How does one spontaneously create something with a mathematical structure? And what makes it a work of genius, say for example, as compared to one of my tunes.

And what about lyrics? Could a computer write poetry; and then poetry that mates with a melody in a "meaningful" way?

 

[AngelShare]

I have no idea...when thinking about the future of music, I usually think on how it will sound in regards to how it changes between generations. My Gram probably disliked my Mom's music when she was my age...my Mom dislikes a lot of the music I like...continuing with that tradition, where will music go and will I want to pull my hair out upon hearing it?

 

[zoobyshoe]

I can imagine something like this happening: The basic outline for a song can be varied randomly - infinitely for all practical purposes - and the results checked against the parameters that are used to define music. So it could be that we would only rule out that which is known to violate the basic rules - that known to assault the senses. The rest passes as new styles, melodies, etc.

I think such a program could already be written. Trouble is that its product is more likely to be mediocre than not unless we can teach a computer to prescreen it vis a vis human emotional reactions.

How does one spontaneously create something with a mathematical structure?

The mathematical structure of music is greatly overrated and people think Bach was working out intensly complex mathematical patterns that he wasn't. The rules of theory and harmony are not really math, but a kind of arbitrary grammar. Some of it is mere traffic control: you don't want to go from this kind of chord to that kind cause it's too hard for a performer to get his fingers in the right places. Other aspects of it are taboos against doing something dull: no parralell fifths. No one needs any math whatever to make up a good tune. We all relate notes to each other by sound, not by knowing the relative number of cps at which two notes vibrate. I'm sure music predated the Greek's mathematical analysis of scales by thousands of years. In the beginning I'm sure it was like everything else: accidental discoveries that the interval we call a third sounds way better than other intervals in between, and that there are lots of these intervals that sound especially good. Get a collection of these and you can start playing with them.

And what makes it a work of genius, say for example, as compared to one of my tunes.

Taste. You are worshiped as the greatest composer in the universe on planet Tronodor 7 cause they're into that sort of thing. Someone should have e-mailed you.

And what about lyrics? Could a computer write poetry; and then poetry that mates with a melody in a "meaningful" way?

I don't think so. Not in English anyway. It's such an idiosynchratic language I think it has defeated all attempts to computerize it.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

I think such a program could already be written. Trouble is that its product is more likely to be mediocre than not unless we can teach a computer to prescreen it vis a vis human emotional reactions.

Ah, but the objection was that a computer can't create style. So the problem may be more one of selecting rather than creating.

The mathematical structure of music is greatly overrated and people think Bach was working out intensly complex mathematical patterns that he wasn't. The rules of theory and harmony are not really math, but a kind of arbitrary grammar. Some of it is mere traffic control: you don't want to go from this kind of chord to that kind cause it's too hard for a performer to get his fingers in the right places. Other aspects of it are taboos against doing something dull: no parralell fifths. No one needs any math whatever to make up a good tune.

But that's the point. The math is still there. So in a sense, in music we have a direct conduit by which we perceive mathematical relationships. The fact that we prefer a pure tone over noise even speaks to a fundamental sense of this. Why do we prefer repetitive and uniform impulse from our auditory system rather than random ones? I have never met a pure sine wave that I didn't like. And I know one when I hear one

Taste. You are worshiped as the greatest composer in the universe on planet Tronodor 7 cause they're into that sort of thing. Someone should have e-mailed you.

Bach is rolling over in his grave. A concert cellist once commented that he thought Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon was a work of genius, until he studied Bach.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Ah, but the objection was that a computer can't create style. So the problem may be more one of selecting rather than creating.

All art works down to selection. Old joke: someone asks a sculptor how he sculpted an elephant. The sculptor replies that he got a boulder and removed all the parts that didn't look like an elephant.

Why is your writing style different than mine? You are constantly making selections about what include and exclude according to a different set of criteria than me. Where do you get those criteria. It would be impossible to track it all down: it's a set of values built up over the course of your whole life. It would be a huge task to catalog 10% of those criteria. Your brain juggles it all instantly. In order to write in an original style to please or provoke human emotion the computer is going to have to know a great deal more than the simple math of chords.

But that's the point. The math is still there. So in a sense, in music we have a direct conduit by which we perceive mathematical relationships. The fact that we prefer a pure tone over noise even speaks to a fundamental sense of this. Why do we prefer repetitive and uniform impulse from our auditory system rather than random ones? I have never met a pure sine wave that I didn't like. And I know one when I hear one

Why we like it isn't necessary to explain in order to write music, or get a computer to do it. And, music doesn't get interesting till you start playing against the fundamental math, breaking the basic rule of sounding good, which starts with the tension you get when you start using minor chords. They don't sound good, as in happy. They express sadness, anxiety, anger, etc. Then there are sevenths and ninths and augmented and diminished chords: more ambiguous and sophisticated. It's all about tension and resolution of tension. I'm kind of babling and rambling.

Bach is rolling over in his grave. A concert cellist once commented that he thought Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon was a work of genius, until he studied Bach.

"Genius" really is a value judgement, though. I'm not sure by what criteria the cellist changed his mind but every classical performer I know has a pop artist they worship as a genius, people they consider as doing something amazing, having some amazing quality that thoroughly trained musicians lack. Stevie Wonder is often named. I've heard Brian Wilson, Barbara Streisand, can't remember the others (from college days).

Anyway, on Trogdor 7 the inhabitants are particularly responsive to the Seeking style, and see nuances in it that just aren't noticed or appreciated on other planets.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

You reminded of the Star Trek Voyager episode where the doctor [a computer hologram, funny enough] is a singing star loved by the entire planet.

Of course he was eventually replaced with a better computer.

 

[zoobyshoe]

You reminded of the Star Trek Voyager episode where the doctor [a computer hologram, funny enough] is a singing star loved by the entire planet.

Of course he was eventually replaced with a better computer.

Oh Yeah! I saw that episode!

But don't worry. The Trodor Seven's are an immensly loyal race.

 

[dduardo]

I got a bunch of postmodern rock bands on my ipod. The genre basically takes classic bass-guitar-drums and fuses it with classical instruments and computer generated music.

Some bands that fall into this category are:

Sigur Rós
Mogwai
Explosions in the Sky
Godspeed you Black Emperor!I think the trend in music will definitely be computer generated sounds, but used in a way to compliment the human factor.

Something that I would like to see more of is story within music. Some bands that do this already are the decemberists and Bright Eyes.

 

[Mk]

lol "post-modern" Music from the future!

Something that I would like to see more of is story within music. Some bands that do this already are the decemberists and Bright Eyes.

Me too. I like those. Songs that have meaning, or story. Yay.

 

[Bladibla]

Classical music will not change with any amount of time. There is a limit to how much instruments can be 'developed' to enhance the sound and make it easier; it is with your OWN skill that a instrument must be played.

I get really peed off when we talk about Maths and Music being related. It was NOT bach's intention or any other composers intention to be related to any amount of mathematics. Bach didn't learn any mathematics that we FAMOUSLY know of. Sure, his music is very abstract and strictly rule bound, but that's according to rules of musical form: Fugues, Canons, etc. I don't see a mathematician being good at making music, or visa versa.

And just what the hell is the deal with who and who being a genius? Bach wasn't a prodigy. Tchi wasn't a prodigy. Heck, a LOT of composers were not prodigies. More than natural intelligence, I would say HARD work is done to achieve these great pieces of music. Bach started music by copying other composers pieces to master all forms of known music then (except opera, argueably) yet I still will call Bach a great man, if not liking him, out of spite of mozart for being a overrated hack. Why do you think he went blind in his fifties?