Should turntables be considered valid Instruments?

Great Debates
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This is exactly my point. Everytime I try to narrow the definition someone shoots me down until now the only thing left to be shot down is the control issue. If someone will just chime in and convince everyone that the ocean waves make music, then we’ll have succeeded in making the word music practically meaningless.

This is why I asked the question, “what is not music?” I was hoping someone would start narrowing the definition. Can we all agree that the sounds must be controlled? If so, what about intent? If someone controls the sounds, but does not intend them as music, is it still music? (e.g. giving a speach or tuning an engine)

If someone designing an engine spends some time adjusting the engine specs so that the sounds created will be just the right tones when tuned properly, and that person really enjoyed the sound of a well tuned combution engine, would it be music?

Or is it the listener who decides? If someone is giving a speech intending only to convey meaning and not at all intended to be enjoyable for the sounds alone, and someone in the audience gets lost in the gentle rhythms of the language and the resonation of the speaker’s voice, is it music?

And what of someone who likes sounds that no one else does. If someone were to create some horrible sounds that were universally disliked, would it still be music because that one person liked them and meant it to sound that way? In other words, is the definition somewhat subjective?

I think that by narrowing the definition of music we will inevitably leave out some art that is sound. If you go back and read my posts, you will see that I allowed for that from the beginning.

Personally, I don’t think any of my examples are music. I would rather we narrowed the definition further. I want to know what the rest of you think. I think we COULD come up with a definition that is clear, objective, and precise. Do we WANT to? I do. I’d do it myself and just put it forth but I would rather we all agreed on the final definition as much as possible. If I were to just put one forth undiscussed, I’d just get shot down again.

Once we get the term music defined, we can define musical instrument. Then we can decide definitively whther turntables are instruments or not.

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my opinion, NO!

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In my opinion the guitar players, piano players, etc… that join this type of thread usually are not musicians in my opinion. They are instrumentalists. They are performing a physical skill, therefore it is little different from a martial artist or a gymnast. So they are not really musicians. The person who programs a whole new song on a midi sequencer is more of a musician because he is creating music. The instrumentalist is just a laborer. Now a guitarist that makes new music, he is also a musician and not merely a laborer. I would say that most DJs are NOT musicians but that it is possible for them to be such. Though I have found guitarists to be of the most musically closed minded nature of any other instrumentalist. It’s that strength in numbers mentality. Though, I don’t know why their heads are so big. Just because Jimi Hendrix played guitar doesn’t mean that he has anything in common with you just because you can play Stairway to Heaven.

Anyone can play guitar. Radiohead even wrote a song about it.

Erek

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Wow, now we have another whole debate. Are cover band members musicians? Or instrumentalists? And what’s the difference? They, at least, reproduce music. Do they have to create to qualify as musician? Does that mean you have to do originals? New arrangements?
I’m still waiting for someone to help me define music. I’m willing to, for the sake of discussion, use whatever definition we can come up with except one that is synonymous with ‘sound’.

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VileOrb - My apologies - I think I mistook the flavor with which you asked “What isn’t music?”. I think that my instinct is that so much is NOT music, it would still be easier to try and define music rather than it’s opposite.

So while I let another post settle, I’ll take another stab at that:

A theory’s usefulness is based on how accurately it describes what’s going on, no? So it would seem to me that in order to define music, we need a definition that can describe some things that we both agree ARE music, no? Then we can use this definition to evaluate something ‘unknown’. If we agree on a definition, but dislike that something is included in the definition, then perhaps that’s a matter of [light word-usage]prejudice[/light word usage] rather than objective assessment.

So based on that, I will submit that there is no debate that Classical, Blues, Rock, Jazz, and Folk are ALL ‘music’. What are common themes? They are Art of the Moment. They use a sonic medium. Music has harmonic content, meaning, ‘unilliterated’ sound which changes pitch. Something that could define music is how harmonic content is used, but that’s different between the 5 test subjects. Loud/Soft - pandemic. Textural changes - ummm, pandemic. Timbre - used in all. Variable density - used to effect in all. Rhythm - used in all. There is Consonance and dissonance in all of them, but again they are used in different ways - we could keep that in the definition, though. All are expressive: they try to express an idea, thought, whether intentionally or no. All are deliberately produced by humans.

So if we can agree on what are universal similarities between these five, we have a Draft Definition - then we try it against things that we agree shouldn’t be music (a picture, the sound of a waterfall), and perhaps some
things which are borderline (the Muslim prayer calls from minarets, tribal drumming).

Interjection: if you feel that the sound of a waterfall is indeed music, then how do you have to change your draft definition to accommodate it? You pretty much have to eliminate everything except the first two elements, (it’s of-the-moment and sonic), at which point just about EVERYTHING is music, and the term music becomes meaningless.

Then at the end, we evaluate Hip-Hop and Rap and see where it falls.

Does this make sense?

mswas - I disagree that a musician must compose in order to be called such. There is a term “composer” or even “songwriter” for such people. A musician is one who ‘creates’ music - that is, produces the sound that is picked up by the audience’s ear.

Furthermore, one who ‘plays’ an instrument is not merely exercising a physical skill, at least, not if they’re any good. I suppose I could concede that there are a large number of people who have ONLY physical skill, but really playing an instrument requires heart and spirit as well as raw technique.

That said, I agree that there’s a bad depreciation in effect on the word ‘musician’. The word ‘play’ has lost some weight due to its casual usage. There are worlds of difference between someone who took piano lessons when they were in kindergarten, and someone who’s been playing piano their whole life, performs on stage regularly, teaches, tours, etc. Yet both people could be said to ‘play’ the piano, and that creates a false equality between the two. In Spanish, there is a verb “defenderse”, which when used to describe language fluency literally means “to defend oneself” - the connotation being that one is “ok”, can get by, but is by no means fluent. Most people who ‘play’ instruments can only defend themselves.

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MLC - It sounds like were on the same page here. I tried to say earlier that music had to have rhythm and melody. The consensus seemed to say that melody was not required. Or else saying that my definition of melody is too narrow.

I shouldn’t have brought up that I don’t think drum solos have melodies (except for occasional tidbits played on the more tonal drumset pieces). I immediately was pounced on someone who does like drum solos. What? Is it my duty as a music fan to support drummers taking the lead?

So, I reiterate: I think music must have both rhythm and melody. Melody is not as easy to define as I orginally thought, but harmony is not required and neither is timbre. Many aspects of sound are optional even if prevalent. IMHO, rhythm and melody are not optional.

I have heard someone playing a couple of bongos (I agree that these are fairly tonal drums) play rhythms that were very engrossing but not, IMO, music. They had tones and rhythms but not melody. Just because they had a series of notes did not make it a melody. IMO, the tones were used to set up multiple interlaced rhythms in such a way that the listener could distinguish each rhythm seperately (listening to only one tone) or as a part of the whole (listening to all tones). A wonderful thing, but not melodic. OTOH, if there is a melody being played on another instrument in sync with this, then the total is definitely music, and the bongos then are being used to create music, but only a part of the total sound of that music.

Let me bring dance into this. I think that dance is an art unto itself. There are dances that are not accompanied by sound. Some produce their own sounds. But I have not heard of a dance that produced melody without musical instruments involved, in which case you’ve got more than just dance. Dance frequently has a lot to do with visuals, but does it have to? Could you have dance that was enjoyable to witness with no visual or tactual information? A tape recording of dance? I submit that this is what many drum solos and rap performances are. Many of these performance include a lot of visuals as well, but people still listen to them on the radio.

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VileOrb -

Let me go in reverse order: Interesting position - that rap/rhythm is dance, not music. Yet Dance does not necessarily produce sound at all, and rhythm IS a sonic phenomenon. Ballerinas, Highland Dancers, Jazz Dancers, tribal dancers, bellydancers do not do what they do TO produce sound. They do what they do to express with their bodies. In that, the ONLY way to experience dance is visually or experientially. If you don’t think that rhythm alone is music, then that’s one thing. But you can’t define it as dance without skewing the whole meaning of “dance” to encorporate your definition.

It may take me a while to get back to this, due to work constraints -
But to sum up, for clarity:

You’re saying:

Melody (undefined) and Rhythm (undefined) are required in conjunction to create “music”.

Rhythm by itself is not music

Melody by itself is not music

Am I correct?

So: What is Rhythm? What is Melody?

These must be defined in order for your argument to hold any weight.

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errrr. incorporate - whoops -

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MLC - Let’s drop the dance thing unless you want to start another thread.

I’ll start with melody as much as I have time for. Why don’t you take a shot at rhythm if you get a chance?

Melody:

This one I’ve had a hard time defining. I’m not sure I have the necessary vocabulary anymore.

I remember in music theory class (14 years ago now so the memory is dim) having to take pieces of classical music and eliminate the embellishments to come up with the skeleton of the melody. I kept thinking that some piece would reduce down to the same note over and over. I asked the professor abou tthis and he said that in that case the music I was analysing would be considered either a chant or, laughing, a rap song. But I don’t think he was entirely joking.

I don’t even remember the rules we applied to do this task, but I think they might be empoyled in coming up with a definition for melody.

Certainly there should be an ordered sequence of tones. If you start with a different tone, but maintain the relationship between each of the following tones, the melody should still be recognizable (this might not mean much, but it might help someone figure out what I’m trying to say).

I’m trying to figure out in my own mind how many notes it takes at a minimum. A single note repeated is not melody. Two notes - I don’t think that’s enough either. Maybe you could do it with three. Definitely three is enough if you don’t count ocataves separately. Four is unquestionably enough.

If we talk about music based on the standard 12 tone scale it’s a bit easier to talk about, but I don’t want to eliminate other scales. There should be some structure to the scale the melody is written on. It doesn’t matter what structure as long as there is a structure. Of course, this doesn’t matter much if you’re only working with 3 or 4 notes. It matters alot if you’re going to add harmony to your music.

OK, I gotta get back to work. I’ll try to get back when I see someone has either made significant comments on my melody definition, or made an attempt to define rhythm.