[mplpost] It's a wrap? Was:... toiletries (long and not PC)

[Nick Naffin]

	What do you know - there I just wanted to disturb some... on-list, and then
I got some kiss and make-up out of it.

	Bob MacKenzie and I, though, seem to have to disagree on the chicken and
the egg, the maker and the comb, and maybe a few entirely different things.


Sez Bob:

> You make one comb now and three hundred years later it's still the same
comb. <

	Same with a Bach fugue.  I should have made myself clearer, though; my
whole original post in its possible reference to anything discussed 'round
here referred to the skills and training of the artistan, not the comb.
Just couldn't resist it as a closer.

Sez me, for which I got properly chastised by She Who Must Be Obeyed:

>> Other cultures notwithstanding, in order to be a merely competent Western
classical or jazz player, one has to acquire skills that are usually
considered 'virtuoso' level in some pop or so-called folk scenes; and any
late nineteenth century European hack composer knew a lot more about
harmony, counterpoint, and arrangement than most working tunesmiths today.
<<

Replied Bob:

> This is very subjective.  Once you get past the basic technical skills, it
has much more to do with aesthetics.  For example, a friend and I were
recently discussing that a classically trained musician may not appreciate
some of the "noise" that shows up in indie productions ( or garageband or
punk or whatever) and yet this is a sound many of these artists actually go
for as part of their aesthetic. <

	I don't quite follow your conclusions here. A) I do not believe skills or
theoretical knowledge are subjective, nor aesthetic in nature.  You know the
theory or 'rules' behind what you do, or you don't; you can play certain
stuff, or you can't.  The notion you know theory but choose to ignore or
change it, or could play but choose not to is another matter.  B) I don't
know how you get from players' and composers' alleged skills to noise on
indie productions; but I agree that on some, or even many of these that may
be a deliberately applied part of an aesthetic.  Then again, it might just
be due to limited resources, experience and/or bad engineering, something
I'm sure many of us have their own experiences with.

 Then I was bad; and Bob wrote:

> Sounds like snobbery to me.<

	To me too.  Just trying to stir up some trouble; out of sheer bitchiness
(my birthday, remember?).

> Academic snobs are the bane of the arts.  They stultify and eventually
calcify everything they touch.  (My opinion and no reflection on you Nick.)
<

	Thanks.  I didn't think I'd qualify, anyway.


> It was a different world then.  Perhaps we should get rid of the
automobile and recorded music and a hundred other modern developments too?
And they said the Luddite movement was dead... <

	Whoa.  Where did that come from?  Technical developments are an altogether
different thing than popular music. What do the means of recording, if any,
have to do with musicians' capabilities, or compositional structures?  The
levels of education, if not the span, have declined; attention spans appear
notably shorter than they were just fourty years ago;  some older music
requires more skill to write and play than contemporary.  I may be a snob,
but puh-leeze.  ;-)

(inserted grinny thingie just for Richard.  The day I'll write 'wink, wink'
is when they'll catch me in a mosh pit.)


Also,	James Gordon wrote:

> Hey- I like Alyssa's differentiation between "art music" and "popular
music"- this helps with our definition debate about folk music I think..
Take "art" back to its root in the word "artifice"; "true" folk music
sometimes lacks this artificial process, which usually gives it an integrity
and a sincerity that draws us folkies towards it.
James <

	I like it too.  One thing, though; I don't think 'artifice' is the root of
"art."  I think it's from Latin, ars; a word I keep hearing a lot at home
lately.

	Nick

________________________________

nick naffin
digital luddite

www.interlog.com/~takenote/naffinwright.com

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