Theory vs. playing by ear

[Chris236]

This is obviously qualitatively different. A car is a technology. Which is a word you’ve used to describe the way people hear. So that is maybe something you really think—that composition and the way we hear are technologies in service of some clearly defined and end goal?

never said that. And I don’t think they’re more qualitatively different than comparing a pizza and music. Lol

no end goal. Just exploring, cultivating and inhabiting a natural landscape .

[pamosmusic]

never said that. And I don’t think they’re more qualitatively different than comparing a pizza and music. Lol

no end goal. Just exploring, cultivating and inhabiting a natural landscape .

Comparing tasting and hearing, but your point is taking.

[Chris236]

Comparing tasting and hearing, but your point is taking.

that’s a relief. I’m feeling a little exhausted for some reason. In real life, I hardly ever feel the need to defend my point of view. lol

[pamosmusic]

that’s a relief. I’m feeling a little exhausted for some reason. In real life, I hardly ever feel the need to defend my point of view. lol

That must get very boring.

[Chris236]

That must get very boring.

I wish I had time to be bored. Back to it!

[Christian Miller]

So Bach used parallel 5ths, and supposedly that was a dissonant sound at the time, but you believe he found it acceptable because the harmony was arpeggiated?

Actually that’s the opposite of what I said. Bach did not hear this as an arpeggiated chord. The parallel fifth only pops up if you hear it that way. If you understand the way the phrase works and finger it accordingly there’s no parallel fifth.

there’s loads of examples of this sort of thing in baroque music. They heard music differently back then. Even their basic conception of the diatonic scale was different (based in the hexachord).

[Chris236]

Actually that’s the opposite of what I said. Bach did not hear this as an arpeggiated chord. The parallel fifth only pops up if you hear it that way. If you understand the way the phrase works and finger it accordingly there’s no parallel fifth.

there’s loads of examples of this sort of thing in baroque music. They heard music differently back then. Even their basic conception of the diatonic scale was different (based in the hexachord).

I can hear the phrase clearly…But I doubt Bach had so short a memory as to not ‘hear’ the triad and P5 created by offsetting the interval buy a 16th of a beat.…..
But I am curious why you find that excerpt particularly relevant?

[Christian Miller]

I can hear the phrase clearly…But I doubt Bach had so short a memory as to not ‘hear’ the triad and P5 created by offsetting the interval buy a 16th of a beat.…..
But I am curious why you find that excerpt particularly relevant?

So you are saying that it’s easier for you to believe that Bach wrote bad two part counterpoint than he may have heard that extract differently to you?

OK, I guess I wish I had your confidence haha. (But this sort of situation is well known in the literature, it’s absolutely fine.)

I mean it WAS intended as an example of how musicians in different eras heard apparently simple musical objects differently… haha

in any case changing the fingering makes a big difference - you hear the top line as much more melodic. Focus on the stepwise descent in forward motion, not the rising third.

[RLetson]

Maybe relevant, but definitely interesting.

[Chris236]

So you are saying that it’s easier for you to believe that Bach wrote bad two part counterpoint than he may have heard that extract differently to you?

OK

Anyway if you read John Mortenson’s books for example, he talks about similar examples, and why they do not in fact represent consecutives. Which is to say from the point of view of point on point counterpoint it’s absolutely valid, the top line is purely melodic, not harmonic.

I mean it was intended as an example of how musicians in different eras heard apparently simple musical objects differently… haha

in any case changing the fingering makes a big difference.

I’m just saying I don’t identify anything ‘bad’ here. The parallel fifths in the example don’t offend me and it’s not because there’s a millisecond displacement. I’m guessing they didn’t offend Bach either or he probably wouldn’t have written this.

[Christian Miller]

I’m just saying I don’t identify anything ‘bad’ here. The parallel fifths in the example don’t offend me and it’s not because there’s a millisecond displacement.

I mean, that’s nice dear, but the point is Bach would not have written a parallel succession of 5 3 chords (root position triads to you moderns) like this. Never. HE would have regarded as poor counterpoint regardless of what you might feel.

And yet you will find patterns like this throughout his music.

So he didn’t regard them as the same thing. this is not an arpeggio of parallel 5 3 chords. It’s a contrapuntal pattern.

In fact you (and I) were listening to it with the wrong phrasing.

the secret is, I just realised, is you need to perceive it in forward motion as Hal Galper would call it (what’s the subtitle of his book again?). It’s contrary step wise motion resolving into the beat each time, not a rising third against a static bass. Listen for the stepwise descent in the top voice and you don’t hear a parallel fifth at all. Slur the upbeats into the downbeats like a jazzer, in fact.

Fingering and phrasing it correctly helps with this. Anyway, I personally learned something from this extract.

[Chris236]

I mean, that’s nice dear, but the point is Bach would not have written a parallel succession of 5 3 chords (root position triads to you moderns) like this. Never.

And yet you will find patterns like this throughout his music.

So he didn’t regard them as the same thing. this is not an arpeggio of parallel 5 3 chords. It’s a contrapuntal pattern.

This is two part counterpoint, right? The top line is conceived in purely melodic terms and in counterpoint with the bass alone.

In fact you are listening to it with the wrong phrasing.

the secret is, I just realised, is you need to perceive it in forward motion as Hal Galper would call it (what’s the subtitle of his book again?). It’s contrary step wise motion resolving into the beat each time, not a rising third against a static bass. Listen for the stepwise descent in the top voice and you don’t hear a parallel fifth at all.

Fingering it correctly helps with this. Anyway, I learned something from this extract.

I realize that there was a point in time when people didn’t like the sound of parallel fifths and understand that Bach skirted that with the displacement from the melodic pattern. What I don’t understand is how this is relevant to what I said, and what you originally replied to.

i’m guessing we’re having two different conversations here. I’m also guessing you didn’t intend to offend me by calling me ‘dear’ right?

[Christian Miller]

It’s funny how ‘the most natural/perfect/complete music’ ends up being whatever the person in question likes the best. And if progress provides music that is less attractive to that person it is clearly a symptom of societal aberration!

Seems very much like justifying a conclusion to me… it’s hard to take that type of argument seriously tbh. The idea of teleological progress in the arts is a bit of faith based position that’s hard to argue with, but I’m not sure many of is would say Bach has been bettered, even if his music lacks features present in more modern music, such as distant chromatic modulations, sonata form, the modern jazz rhythm section, or the keytar.

I would find it more interesting if some absolute head case reasoned that music they didn’t personally like was the objectively best music. Maybe some of the modernists were like that haha

[pamosmusic]

I realize that there was a point in time when people didn’t like the sound of parallel fifths and understand that Bach skirted that with the displacement from the melodic pattern. What I don’t understand is how this is relevant to what I said, and what you originally replied to.

i’m guessing we’re having two different conversations here. I’m also guessing you didn’t intend to offend me by calling me ‘dear’ right?

It’s relevant because Bach probably heard and processed music differently. Rather than the same way you did. To your point about theory reflecting the way you hear something … it seems a bit odd that you’re resistant to the idea that other people use other theoretical terms, not because they hear the same thing you hear—only imperfectly—, but because they hear things differently than you.

EDIT: I think it’s instructive to flip the script a bit. Going back to something simple like that harmonic analysis from post 1,290,987,987. It’s possible someone isn’t hearing what you’re hearing; but is it possible you’re not hearing what they’re hearing? That they’re not missing something fundamental — maybe they’re hearing something different, that you’re missing in the music.

[Christian Miller]

I realize that there was a point in time when people didn’t like the sound of parallel fifths and understand that Bach skirted that with the displacement from the melodic pattern. What I don’t understand is how this is relevant to what I said, and what you originally replied to.

Well no, not really.

This pattern is commonplace throughout baroque music, not unique to Bach.

Not writing parallel fifths is an important stylistic feature of polyphony c1500-c1900. Read any treatise, Fux etc.

Bach was extremely strict on this in his own teaching according to scholar Derek Remes. It wasn't like he was trying to get away with writing fifths as if he wanted to write them and wasn't allowed, or lacked the technique not to avoid them (!) - he simply didn't hear that passage that way.

i’m guessing we’re having two different conversations here.

Not really, you’ve made a very grand claim - essentially that the way people hear music is somehow based in the objective nature of reality. This is a view that covers basically everything, so counterexamples can come from all over the place, literally anywhere or any time in the whole of music.

I’m also guessing you didn’t intend to offend me by calling me ‘dear’ right?

The spirit was jokey and light hearted, are you offended?

[Christian Miller]

From Durante

"A passage from a Durante toccata appears in Example 7.3. The second measure of the passage almost seems to be made of parallel root-position chords, if each pair of sixteenths were to be “compressed” into a single chord, as if thrown into the garbage masher in Star Wars. Such a perception is a result of modern theory, in which we were trained to look for roots. But it is more correct historically to hear no chords and no roots in this passage at all; it is simply a series of intervals between two voices."


Mortensen, John J.. Improvising Fugue (p. 174). Oxford University Press. Kindle Edition.

( I knew this intellectually, but only really heard it the other day with the Bach.)

Again the forward motion thing helps again - look at and listen for the stepwise connections in the bass in the second bar, not the thirds. As jazzers, this should come naturally?

So there's a right and wrong way to hear this passage with respect to the era, and hearing arpeggiated chords is the wrong way. As modern musicians interpreting (or improvising) this idiom of music we have to unlearn it.

Which I think is quite interesting as a point in general and has a wider implication. I'll see if I can think of an equivalent thing for jazz.

[pauln]

[Chris236]

Well no, not really.

This pattern is commonplace throughout baroque music, not unique to Bach.

Not writing parallel fifths is an important stylistic feature of polyphony c1500-c1900. Read any treatise, Fux etc.

Bach was extremely strict on this in his own teaching according to scholar Derek Remes. It wasn't like he was trying to get away with writing fifths as if he wanted to write them and wasn't allowed, or lacked the technique not to avoid them (!) - he simply didn't hear that passage that way.



Not really, you’ve made a very grand claim - essentially that the way people hear music is somehow based in the objective nature of reality. This is a view that covers basically everything, so counterexamples can come from all over the place, literally anywhere or any time in the whole of music.



The spirit was jokey and light hearted, are you offended?

Ummmm….I’ll take the high road here with regards to your ‘joke’.

I’m not going to re-articulate the statements I’ve already made in hopes of it hitting home this time nor will I defend myself against claims of elitism or the spinning of nuances into blanket statements again ,but, none of what you’ve posted disqualifies what I’ve actually said…

chicken? Egg?

Whatever floats your Bach.

[Christian Miller]

I’m not going to re-articulate the statements I’ve already made in hopes of it hitting home this time nor will I defend myself against claims of elitism or the spinning of nuances into blanket statements again ,but, none of what you’ve posted disqualifies what I’ve actually said

Ok. So, you are defending an argument not yourself, no?

Otoh if you make a number of emphatic statements it seems reasonable to accept that those statements may be challenged. I understand that’s the score when I sound off myself… In any case i feel I’m challenging your arguments in good faith. If you have more nuance to add, I’m interested to hear.

So a straightforward yes/no question - do you accept that people in the past or in other cultures heard/hear music differently? I think that is a fairly binary distinction.

(This has been may main line of argument over the last few posts.)

IF you accept this, the only possible area of contention would seem to be seem to be - WE hear music better NOW. Which aside from anything else strikes me as hard to substantiate either way, so one would have to chalk this up as a faith position - a priori - unless anyone can think of a compelling argument.

Moving away from music history etc and citing my personal experience for a moment, I feel my hearing of music has evolved massively in the years of my playing and studying music. The Bach is an example of how it has changed recently. I don’t feel the way I hear music now is the final stage of that evolution either. Hearing more is what it’s all about for me and I doubt I’ll reach an endpoint - you can always go deeper or wider with it.

[pamosmusic]

I think at the end of the day the stakes of this conversation are that when a student asks me (or when I ask myself) … “why do I have to do it this way” … my answer just isn’t “that’s the way music works.”

The answer is that we’re trying to play this certain style of music and what we’re working on is idiomatic to that style. Or we want a certain and it’s a way of accessing that sound. We can try it the other way some other time.

So I feel like the only stakes of this discussion are that I can’t really appeal to the objective fundamental nature of music to justify what I’m telling myself or someone else. The rules are just rules … they’re useful because they’re useful and when they’re not they’re not.

Which is why I feel it’s an odd hill to die on. Putting aside the implications for how the objective reality vibe implies treating other styles of music, it seems like nothing of consequence really follows from the position. Other than being able to appeal to something deeper to justify the structure I impose on what I’m working on.

Thats been an appealing thing about investigating the Barry Harris stuff more. The whole vibe is very comfortable in its shoes. The rules are just rules. You’re probably there because you want to play bebop and the rules are just a way of accessing the idiom.

EDIT: though there is a certain religious zeal among some of the Barry Harris acolytes.

[RLetson]

This thread has all kinds of echoes with other nature-of-art conversations and debates I've encountered in a lifetime of talking about art (particularly literature), but I'll spare everyone those reflections. Nevertheless--

At least two senses of "hear" might apply, um, here. One is "ability to detect and discriminate-among sounds" and another is "understand or appreciate or respond to a particular set of sounds as interesting or pleasing or useful for building music."

One of my musical mentors had very acute hearing--he had worked in the university radio station and could tell when a particular turntable was in use because, he said, it was always a little off. I don't know whether he had official "perfect pitch," but his sense of in-tune was very acute--I saw him advise another player that a particular string was flat or sharp in mid-performance. I have a decent ear, but I often couldn't make out what was clear to Dan.

So Dan could "hear better" in that detecting/discriminating sense. I suspect he also heard better in the sense of digging what he heard, since he had the widest appreciative range of anyone I've known. You name it, he dug it.

Seems to me that the acceptance of tempered tuning suggests that we "decide" what sounds good or interesting or useful. And it's not like those of us who have always lived in a tempered-tuning musical environment can't hear just-tuning consonance when it's deployed--isn't that one of the appeals of barbershop singing? There's nothing inevitable about any musical way of arranging sounds--no aesthetic teleology as we approach a more perfect arrangement of the resources, based on whatever physics might tell us about where the wave-forms line up.

FWIW, whether it's the result of wide and persistent consumption of the music or the last twenty-some years of playing a lot of it, I think I "hear" some music better--I don't feel lost in the middle of, say, a Haydn quartet or a bop solo--though most free jazz still doesn't make much sense to me. And the samples of gamelan that I listened to the other day don't seem to have any structure, though I'm sure that the performers knew exactly what they were doing and why. I'm pretty sure that, given enough listening time and probably some instruction, I could learn to make sense of gamelan--though whether I would dig it would be a separate question.

[Christian Miller]

I think at the end of the day the stakes of this conversation are that when a student asks me (or when I ask myself) … “why do I have to do it this way” … my answer just isn’t “that’s the way music works.”

The answer is that we’re trying to play this certain style of music and what we’re working on is idiomatic to that style. Or we want a certain and it’s a way of accessing that sound. We can try it the other way some other time.

So I feel like the only stakes of this discussion are that I can’t really appeal to the objective fundamental nature of music to justify what I’m telling myself or someone else. The rules are just rules … they’re useful because they’re useful and when they’re not they’re not.

Which is why I feel it’s an odd hill to die on.

I used to be much more absolutist about musical aesthetics etc myself in the past, I think it’s comforting.

odd to imagine I was even more insufferable back then….

Putting aside the implications for how the objective reality vibe implies treating other styles of music, it seems like nothing of consequence really follows from the position. Other than being able to appeal to something deeper to justify the structure I impose on what I’m working on.

Thats been an appealing thing about investigating the Barry Harris stuff more. The whole vibe is very comfortable in its shoes. The rules are just rules. You’re probably there because you want to play bebop and the rules are just a way of accessing the idiom.

EDIT: though there is a certain religious zeal among some of the Barry Harris acolytes.

you know what, most of the people I ran into at the workshops, the ones who followed him around the world were actually pretty chill. It’s the online Barry harris police who seem to be the dogmatic ones to me.