Could we ever some day reach the very limit of song tunes?
Think about it. There are a limited number of tones on the music scale. And a limited number of notes (quarter notes, eighth notes, etc.). And a limited number of way they could be arranged.
I don’t know much about statistics (strangely, they never covered it in any school I went to). But I’m sure what I just described would lead to billions of combinations.
But wait a minute. Not every combination is a legitimate song. You could have a computer spit out random notes, on a piece of paper. But how many of these would be nice, coherent songs? I trust you see what I mean.
So clearly there is a limit. But could we reach it some day, presumably in the late future?
“Perpetual copyright” sounds like what the U.S. is headed toward. I’m betting there’s gonna be another push to extend copyrights even further, when 2024 approaches and the copyright on Steamboat Willie once again comes close to expiring.
Just listen to the song “Four Chords” (though they take some liberties) from Axis of Awesome. Seems most pop/rock songs are the same song anyway.
As for reality, you mention that ‘not all the combinations would be nice coherent songs.’ But that’s only the case for your current musical sensibility. Sure, there may be some things that are universally unpleasant, but that still wouldn’t invalidate their usage as music. There are many cultures that use atonal scales and such that sound very bad to western ears, but once you start hearing the intricacies in it, and the relationships, that can become very interesting and pleasant. Given the nearly infinite level of music complexity that can be made, I don’t think we’ll reach a ‘limit’ in any practical sense.
Even if we take just the 88 keys on a piano, now layer it with how many different rhythms and chords, plus multiple coincident musical lines and instruments, and you can very quickly get into astronomical numbers of combinations that are beyond imagination.
