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Looper's Delight
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Robert Eberwein wrote: > ...Like I said, I can beat a log with my ax handle to secure the head on >it. > That’s an intention. But when I notice the different tones [pitch > variations] in the soft and hard pulp, the hollow and solid parts, and I > begin to bang in a certain way to hear those variations, then I called >that > a *good* intention. But really, I only meant *good* as a catch-all word >to > catch all the possible *constructive* qualifiers of *intention*. And my > desire [ahem: intention/wish/aim/purpose/will] was to suggest that it is > silly to pretend that *good* and *bad* are only relative constructs. maybe silly to insist, but pretend? i don't know... > We all > know better, you give us too much credit :-) > but we’ve broken it all down too far. Simply to use the word > *good* is to get 10 responses informing me that *good* doesn’t exist. calling *good* a relative term does not imply that *good* doesn't exist. yet shades of grey exist, are not imaginary...one can still have black and white (or many blacks and whites) with grey. eventually a black or white (or good or bad) becomes a grey (or indifferent), but perhaps at a different point for you than for me. we don't need to have an absolute "black" for us to agree something is black (very likely it is not, has some contamination of its opposite within...). this does not seem silly. it seems like a pretty good description of the world. > Okay. Good. > > <*What would bad intentions sound like*? uh, barry manilow? (sorry!). > > By my [last post’s] definition, that would just mean that someone had *no > good intentions*. One couldn’t *plan* to have bad intentions, by that > definition—because the planning is what shifts it to a good intention; >or: > one can’t *plan* not to use his plan. > The word, *desire* could have easily replaced *good intention*- because >it’s > an intention with an positive aim [*positive*, as in, *acquiring or >creating > something that was not yet acquired/created]. i think one way to define *intention* that gets rid of the *good/bad* dichotomy is to differentiate if something has a *musical* intent. this gets rid of a value aside from that which is most germane. > > Obviously I’m in danger of again reducing it too far. One would never >talk > about making music with *bad intentions*. But it’s fun. What is >intentional > chaos??? [It’s not chaos anymore, right?]. > > [NWA, Atonal, Serial, Industrial Musik. There. I mentioned them first] > > <I also like Dennis reasoning that the intention of the listener is > <important…<snip> > <But I cannot agree that music only exists if there is a listener... > <Maybe we could agree that any intention (of the player or listener) > <is enough to turn noise into music? > > I wouldn’t say that Dennis’s wind-chimes aren’t music to him. My >children’s > laughter is music to me. But I do not forget that those are metaphors. >It's > poetic comparison. It's NOT composing music with our ears and brain. robert, i think i agree with what you seem to be saying, that music exists only if there is musical intent (and perhaps if only on the part of the creator), but it would then seem to follow that wind chimes and children's laughter are separate issues. children (usually) laugh because they react to something funny, not so much because they wish to bring "music to our ears". but if we agree the idea of intention is central to making music, why wouldn't wind chimes be considered music? one could set up a device which has certain sonic characteristics, activated by a natural force, and possibly randomized by the same force. the intention (of the person who makes the device) is to create a sonic event. the creators' *ears and brain* were more than likely involved; there is clearly intent. i have a rather beautiful album from the early seventies called _the wind harp_. it consists of various recordings of a rather large sound sculpture built on a windy hill (somewhere in scandinavia, i think...). i think many among us would consider it music. lance g. ps sorry for the provocation :-)