Klarinet Archive - Posting 000252.txt from 2000/05

From: Daniel Leeson <leeson0@-----.net>
Subj: Re: [kl] Tone descriptions
Date: Thu, 4 May 2000 19:27:54 -0400

William Wright wrote:

I don't see how you can discuss the real guts of music without
metaphors which, by definition, are not unambiguous.

Bill, I will happily use any metaphors you like providing you are able
to state unamiguously what the metaphor means and that everyone else
agrees with your meaning.

Music is a very emotional arena. We wouldn't do it so much if we did
not like doing it, and the emotion of performing is a joyous
experience. But when we talk about the things we do (presumably because
we want to transmit useful information to another person), I am of the
opinion that using emotional terms that have little or no agreed-to
meaning is counterproductive. It tells me nothing precise and only
informs me about how you feel about something.

Take "dark" for example as a metaphor for the sound character of a
clarinet. That may be an extraordinarily meaningful term to you, as it
may also be a meaningful term to me. But a problem arises in assuring
that the "meaningfulness" of the experience is the same between us. For
example, if a "dark sound" pleases you it can do so for a hundred
reason, none of which are even vaguely close to the hundred reason
whereby that same sound character pleases me.

All of this would be irrelevant in any case, were it not for the fact
that impressionable students begin to become insecure by virtue of the
fact that (1) they don't know what a dark sound is, (2) they don't know
what they have to do to get it, and (3) they don't know what it is when
their teacher tells them they have it.

Instead of enjoying a sound because they like it, they are searching for
a holy grail that has different meanings to different people. The
bottom line is that it is simply too emotional an approach to a very
emotional subject; i.e., sound character. And what is worse, it is far
too simplistic to characterize something as complex as sound character
as being "dark" or "bright." Why not "purple" and "puce"?

Bottom line: I don't care what you wish to call your sound, just don't
presume that it characterizes a standard that applies to a lot of
people. If you are going to be emotional about sound character, call it
beautiful. It is just as imprecise but it speaks of an emotional
reaction to an emotional event unashamedly (which is OK, too, but it
doesn't transmit useful information).

"Dark" doesn't do diddley to me.

--
***************************
** Dan Leeson **
** leeson0@-----.net **
***************************

---------------------------------------------------------------------
Unsubscribe from Klarinet, e-mail: klarinet-unsubscribe@-----.org
Subscribe to the Digest: klarinet-digest-subscribe@-----.org
Additional commands: klarinet-help@-----.org
Other problems: klarinet-owner@-----.org