Dude says - I play what I hear

[MarkRhodes]

If you watch that video, Hal's talking about minimizing emotion as a way of keeping you from getting too "excited" and trying to hard to swing...but the concept of minimizing emotion in general is important to me. I want people to feel something from my music, but I don't really want to "tell" them what to feel. So as an example I think I used here before, it's NOT "I'm going to play 'sad' now," it's more "I'm sad, and I'm going to play now, and if you're sad too, you might catch that." (or you might get something totally different out of it and that's cool too)

The latter, IMHO, is so much more powerful.

I think one way to think about this is journalism. Say, a reporter is on a helicopter with soldiers (or rescue workers) hovering over a troubled spot. The reporter speaks clearly, carefully, focusing on specific facts and terms. The audience may feel tremendous emotion. If the reporter became overtly emotional himself, it would---I think---make it harder for the audience to experience their own emotions.


Another way, of course, would be theater. The actor may have a headache and hate the actress opposite him, but this is the love scene and he hits his marks, delivers his lines, and the audience experiences the emotion.

To come down a notch, to something we experience daily: advertising. Ads generate emotions. They are meticulous, expensive, and relentlessly thought out.

Finally, there are cat videos... People get very emotional about cat videos. And baby videos. The kittens and babies aren't feeling the emotions we feel when we see them. But we feel those emotions.

[MarkRhodes]

Which makes me think of "Body and Soul."

It has been said of this standard that it is unique because the "squares" loved it yet the hippest of the hip loved it too.

[dingusmingus]

www.youtube.com/watch?v=oZTlfPHfwso


sure this has been posted before but WTF?!


ps make sure you listen to the full clip it just gets more and more insane.

Whoa. Just...whoa.

[55bar]

I know right! The guy is blind so I guess he HAS to only use his ears.

[MarkRhodes]

[QUOTE=destinytot;510733]Interesting stuff.

Leaving interaction aside, the utterances of speech and the guitarist's playing produce signals. There is a sender and a receiver.


Words and notes are merely symbols. Their meaning can be literal or inferential.

QUOTE]

There is no dictionary of meanings for musical notes, such as C natural or Bb.

Also, a musical performer is "speaking" to several people at once. Perhaps a dozen in restaurant, a hundred or so in a small club, perhaps thousands from a stage.

And all the while, he may be thinking of someone who is not there. I have just read Pete Hammil's "Why Sinatra Matters" and Pete quotes Nelson Riddle as saying "Ava Gardner taught Frank how to sing a torch song." That is, the tumultuous emotions of their affair were what Frank drew on to sing torch songs, even if she wasn't in the room where he was singing them. I have read that Charlie Christian mentally dedicated "Stardust" to his mother when performing. She might hear him via radio, though sometimes he wasn't being broadcast on radio...)

[DaveWoods]

Not only that, his sensory feel of the fret board is such that he lands right on the changes. He has to have an inner imagined picture, or inner sensory vision of the fret board. One thing for sure. It would also ward off a lot of exterior distractions.

[dingusmingus]

[From destinytot] Words and notes are merely symbols. Their meaning can be literal or inferential.

-------------

There is no dictionary of meanings for musical notes, such as C natural or Bb.

I agree. I'm not sure what it would mean for the "meaning" of a note to me "literal." Or perhaps, notes can only be literal.

I've always been ambivalent about descriptions of music as "expressing ideas." I feel that the ideas that music expresses are only about music. Unlike a painting, or poem, or movie, which may be a representation of an event, music is always about music. No?

[Vladan]

I agree 100% if we take music as abstract, notes in relative relationship over time. Well, maybe it could be about an abstract idea of clashing?

If we add the sound of actual musical presentation it can be about some act say about bumblebee flying around,
with some more effort actors can have some emotions attached to them, like anger, sadness, joy, melancholy ... with combinations.
I very much doubt there is a way to represent Baptizing of ..., or The Birth of ..., or anything too visual.
With music understood as a sound, it is more kinetic (?) in nature, it moves, sound is oscillatory movement, it moves you ...
Let me see, let alone hear, a painting make you tap your foot.

[destinytot]

[QUOTE=MarkRhodes;512080]

Interesting stuff.

Leaving interaction aside, the utterances of speech and the guitarist's playing produce signals. There is a sender and a receiver.


Words and notes are merely symbols. Their meaning can be literal or inferential.

QUOTE]

There is no dictionary of meanings for musical notes, such as C natural or Bb.

Also, a musical performer is "speaking" to several people at once. Perhaps a dozen in restaurant, a hundred or so in a small club, perhaps thousands from a stage.

And all the while, he may be thinking of someone who is not there. I have just read Pete Hammil's "Why Sinatra Matters" and Pete quotes Nelson Riddle as saying "Ava Gardner taught Frank how to sing a torch song." That is, the tumultuous emotions of their affair were what Frank drew on to sing torch songs, even if she wasn't in the room where he was singing them. I have read that Charlie Christian mentally dedicated "Stardust" to his mother when performing. She might hear him via radio, though sometimes he wasn't being broadcast on radio...)

Actually, I think we agree - but I haven't been clear.

I'm thinking of a note's pitch value - measured in hertz - and its function in the chord of the moment as 'literal' meaning.

What I'm calling 'inferential' meaning is constructed - if at all - out of subjective (human) values in the listener.

For me, the latter are the important ones (and the only place for Utilitarianism in music).

PS The literal sounds 'right'; the inferential sounds 'good'... but I think I'm over-simplifying a sublime act of translation.

[jordanklemons]

www.youtube.com/watch?v=oZTlfPHfwso


sure this has been posted before but WTF?!


ps make sure you listen to the full clip it just gets more and more insane.

Dang. That's all. Just dang.

[destinytot]

www.youtube.com/watch?v=oZTlfPHfwso


sure this has been posted before but WTF?!


ps make sure you listen to the full clip it just gets more and more insane.

Love it - especially the vocal harmony with the line. Thanks!

[55bar]

Love it - especially the vocal harmony with the line. Thanks!

I watch this ever time I need a reminder how much I rely on my eyes!

[Vladan]

After not playing guitar since mid December, except for couple of minutes here and there 3 notes per string Major scale (I'll pass some thoughts on that part, if still actuall in due time), I can say:

As far as for harmonizing the melody, I play what I hear, but I hear only what I already know to play. Line improvising over harmony may be different.

How I realised that? I decided to play some guitar as I'm in need for some fresh audio for my clips (in recent months I've only used my PUNK band rehearsals and live gig recordings from 1990), so went to reharmonize one of my own pop rock songs. I had some idea about the final sound I wanted to achieve, say imagined.

When I started doing it, as I played each melody note, I pretty much heard in my head harmonies beneath the melody and was able to play them, with some sstruggle. The most struggle I have when I clearly know the top melody note, I hear that dimminished flavor under it, but can not decide what's better, dim or half dim (like V7b9 vs. vii7b5). I naturally play one, but after a while it starts bothering me, so I change for another, only to find that one equally bad. Whatever ...

The point is, although chords were those I've heard in my head, they were not what I've imagined. I've imagined some chords I'm not familliar with, so they could not be triggered by melody. Two different mind sets. In both I've "heard" harmonies, but two different ones, one I could play, the other I could not.

So in the end, instead of some Jazz thing I ended with mixture of "Russian Romance" and "Country & Western Pop". Good enough for me, but not what I've imagined it would be.

[christianm77]

I think one way to think about this is journalism. Say, a reporter is on a helicopter with soldiers (or rescue workers) hovering over a troubled spot. The reporter speaks clearly, carefully, focusing on specific facts and terms. The audience may feel tremendous emotion. If the reporter became overtly emotional himself, it would---I think---make it harder for the audience to experience their own emotions.


Another way, of course, would be theater. The actor may have a headache and hate the actress opposite him, but this is the love scene and he hits his marks, delivers his lines, and the audience experiences the emotion.

To come down a notch, to something we experience daily: advertising. Ads generate emotions. They are meticulous, expensive, and relentlessly thought out.

Finally, there are cat videos... People get very emotional about cat videos. And baby videos. The kittens and babies aren't feeling the emotions we feel when we see them. But we feel those emotions.

Brilliantly put. I may have to steal this.

[MarkRhodes]

I agree. I'm not sure what it would mean for the "meaning" of a note to me "literal." Or perhaps, notes can only be literal.

I've always been ambivalent about descriptions of music as "expressing ideas." I feel that the ideas that music expresses are only about music. Unlike a painting, or poem, or movie, which may be a representation of an event, music is always about music. No?

I've mentioned this before, but here we go again... My first philosophy prof in college used to say (because he had heard it said of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony), when coming upon people listening to music, " I think I sense in this the mystical solution to the problem of evil..."

If we all agreed---just for the sake of discussion---that Beethoven's Ninth did contain, or express, the mystical solution to the problem of evil, what good would it do us? We would immediately disagree about that that solution means....

Also, back on being expressive. When I perform, I am always at least a little nervous. (Sometimes very nervous.) Now, if I make the audience nervous, I am doomed! I don't want them to feel what I am feeling in that sense at all....

[destinytot]

I've mentioned this before, but here we go again... My first philosophy prof in college used to say (because he had heard it said of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony), when coming upon people listening to music, " I think I sense in this the mystical solution to the problem of evil..."

If we all agreed---just for the sake of discussion---that Beethoven's Ninth did contain, or express, the mystical solution to the problem of evil, what good would it do us? We would immediately disagree about that that solution means....

Also, back on being expressive. When I perform, I am always at least a little nervous. (Sometimes very nervous.) Now, if I make the audience nervous, I am doomed! I don't want them to feel what I am feeling in that sense at all....

I take comfort from the thought that interpretation is part of perception but not of expression.

[fumblefingers]

Now here are a couple of dudes who can play what they hear. Excellent transcriptons.

[3625]

[princeplanet]

Yep folks, having heard these creatures up close, I can tell you this is no trick! These Lyre birds (or Liar birds if you like!) can do astonishing mimickry, it truly beggars belief! But never heard one imitate a sax, although if such a sound were placed in their habitat, then I think they could imitate Eric Dolphy!

[3625]

I just found this...

[55bar]

Is this for real?!

[3625]

Is this for real?!

I know it seems far out, but like PrincePlanet said - totally true. We have these birds in the wild near where I live in Australia.

[fumblefingers]

playing what you hear, call & response example.

see 0:55 seconds in.

[fumblefingers]

He can do quarter tonal and microtonal stuff on keyboards that allow such flexibility.

am curious about this comment. how does one do that on a keyboard that is arranged by half steps?

or are you saying that there are keyboards that accommodate smaller intervals? i've never heard of that, but then i'm not a keyboard player...

[princeplanet]

I have only ever met one person with the musical equivalent of eidetic imagery. There is something like a tape recorder in his head which has random access features as opposed to the limitation of serial playback. He can as far as I can tell play exactly what he hears, although not having the same ability I cannot really hold him to any kind of valid account here. I don't think there is completely accurate long term retention, but the short term is impressive. The basic ability is probably a "gift." But it has been enhanced by a lifetime of really hard work.

He is a pianist and singer. He has played since the age of four. He practices six to twelve hours a day when he can. He has an MA in music. He seems to have perfect pitch, both absolute and relative. He can do quarter tonal and microtonal stuff on keyboards that allow such flexibility. He claims to think in pure music as opposed to the mechanics of his instrument. He does not play other instruments but he can. Give him a few hours to work out basic mechanics and he will coax something very musical, if unpolished, out of pretty much anything. And although he lacks the physical stamina to play drums for real, he is a superb drummer for short periods of time.

Did I mention that I hate him. Just kidding.

I know that guy! This is the exact profile of the person I know that comes the closest to what we're discussing here (why are they always pianists?). Actually, in University we were introduced to an intellectually handicapped savant that played back a minute's worth of atonal music he'd never heard before, perfectly (perhaps to instil a little humility in those of us that thought we had pretty good ears!!). But obviously this gift is present in non autistic individuals as well.

So no-one is saying that these people do not exist, I'm just saying that there is a HUGE difference between these people and those of us that can bluff singing what we play. I'm pretty sure some (not all) people would like people to think they are specially gifted, hence the party tricks. I've known people that like to give the impression they have perfect pitch, and have seen them enjoy the admiration of peers that hold them in awe. I enjoy testing such people, most have been frauds! But the one guy who made me look like an ass for doubting him tore me a new one when his friend asked to test him in an unusual way. He got me to play a 10 note cluster on a piano within an octave, and the magic eared one with his back turned could tell you immediately which 2 notes you left out! Did it several times with his friend out of the room (just in case), he picked it every time. He explains that it's as easy as seeing what colors are missing on a color wheel... bastard!