tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-91314768691730218662024-03-29T04:26:52.083-07:00Conscious Music and LifeOn music teaching, music science, creativity, and related social, political, and economic issues…Aaron Wolfhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.comBlogger42125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9131476869173021866.post-44287835163875675202020-12-31T17:41:00.008-08:002023-11-14T11:11:34.903-08:00Auld Lang Syne 2020 — on the Kite Guitar<p>All this year, I've had a note on my task list to write about how I've been continuing lessons with video chat (so far sticking to the free/libre/open tool <a href="https://meet.jit.si/" target="_blank">Jitsi Meet</a> instead of Zoom or other proprietary options). I have a lot I could (and <i>will</i> later) say about this whole situation. It's been working out surprisingly well, continuing with most of my students and adding new students who are local, out of state, and even overseas.</p><p>Of the many reasons I haven't gotten around to writing articles about video lessons, one issue is the time and energy I've been putting into the <a href="http://kiteguitar.com" target="_blank"><b>Kite Guitar</b></a>! This new system of guitar fretting and tuning fulfills a dream I've had for 20 years to be able to play more harmonious chords and expressive melodies in a flexible-enough, practical way. I will be publishing much more about that soon.</p><p>In honor of the New Year (and played extra slowly so that astute listeners might notice the special qualities of the tuning):<br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="310" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/sZGZmgGkYzI" width="478" youtube-src-id="sZGZmgGkYzI"></iframe></div><br /><p>I'm resisting the urge to go on about the guitar, the tuning, the <a href="https://en.xen.wiki/w/Kite_Guitar_Translations_by_Aaron_Wolf#Auld_Lang_Syne" target="_blank">arrangement</a>, my process of updated video production (using all free/libre/open software), and more. It will all come in due time. Looking forward to a productive and prosperous 2021, and sending my love and well-wishes to everyone in the world! Happy New Year!<br /></p>Aaron Wolfhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9131476869173021866.post-84383160312282093792020-02-14T18:51:00.002-08:002020-07-16T21:51:46.857-07:00I Finally Wrote Another SongSummer 2018. A couple years into fatherhood. Still holding onto all sorts of creative dreams but making little progress. I was juggling compulsions, goals, responsibilities, thoughts, worries…<br />
<br />
I was getting into mindfulness meditation. I dabbled in meditation since childhood, but I had not previously made it a routine practice. Meditation now is among a slew of efforts toward getting my routines and life in better order.<br />
<br />
One day in August (2018), I took a break from some chores. I put on some random music. I heard some singer-songwriter stuff I liked well enough. I felt inspired (and perhaps also looking for an outlet to procrastinate and push away some stress).<br />
<br />
I picked up my guitar, and a new song came out. It was just a bunch of thoughts that had been on my mind. Thoughts about my relationships, my compulsions, my procrastination. I recorded a better take a couple days later. Now, in early 2020, I'm finally posting it:<br />
<br />
<iframe allow="autoplay" frameborder="no" height="300" scrolling="no" src="https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/tracks/484287255&color=%23ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false&show_teaser=true&visual=true" width="100%"></iframe>
<br />
<div><br /></div><span><a name='more'></a></span><div><br /></div>
Through 2019, I succeeded in better sorting my priorities, improving my health and routines. Creating and posting new recordings turns out not to fit my top priorities right now. Hence taking 18 months to post this.<br />
<br />
I have hopes and plans for more creative output sometime soon. My song here is a hint of some things to come. But I can't do everything, and that's okay. I even had a bunch of notes about more details to add to this very post — explaining the one fretlet I had on my guitar in the recording, more context about the musical style, the meaning… But now, I have to let this all go, get to my other responsibilities, and get to bed on time. Goodnight.<br />
<br />
P.S. Happy Valentine's Day 2020 (I had my wife in mind as the "you" in the song, and I'll write her more songs some day. At least I can dedicate this post to her. Thank you, Samantha, for supporting me in all the other priorities that do matter more. I love you.)<br />
<br />
P.P.S. I also want to find better ways to share my music that have no paywalls, ads, etc. I have some lists to look into. I've put some things on Archive.org in the past. With Soundcloud, anyone can download with the button included in the embedded player, but strangely you have to log in to download if you visit the song at Soundcloud. Like everything else I do, this is licensed CC BY-SA — everyone can and should share and otherwise do anything you want with this as long as you include credit and pass on the freedoms using the same license for any derivative works.Aaron Wolfhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9131476869173021866.post-35984887413542085182020-01-31T13:48:00.004-08:002020-07-16T21:52:19.094-07:00Featured on the Now&Xen podcast playing the Kite Guitar<div data-select-link-text="1">
I was featured on the Now&Xen podcast! Full link: <a href="https://nowandxen.libsyn.com/29268-cents-kite-giedraitis-aaron-wolf-spencer-hargraves-jacob-collier">https://nowandxen.libsyn.com/29268-cents-kite-giedraitis-aaron-wolf-spencer-hargraves-jacob-collier</a><br />
<br />
Here's an embedded player:</div>
<iframe allowfullscreen="" height="90" mozallowfullscreen="" msallowfullscreen="" oallowfullscreen="" scrolling="no" src="//html5-player.libsyn.com/embed/episode/id/12928589/height/90/theme/custom/thumbnail/yes/direction/forward/render-playlist/no/custom-color/12507b/" style="border: medium none;" width="100%"></iframe><br />
<br />
The "xen" in the podcast name refers to the prefix that means "strange" or "foreign" (so xenophobia is fear of foreign people or things, xenophilia is love of them). In this case, it refers to xenharmonic, a term for musical tunings that feel foreign.<br />
<br />
In the podcast, I'm <b>playing on and discussing the amazing <a href="https://en.xen.wiki/w/The_Kite_Guitar" target="_blank">Kite Guitar</a>,</b> named for my friend Kite Giedraitis who discovered the tuning and invented a practical language around it.<br />
<div><br /></div><span><a name='more'></a></span><div><br /></div>
Also while it can produce "xenharmonic" (strange) new sounds, the Kite Guitar can play familiar, comfortable harmonies that just blend better than any normal instrument! I'm not interested in merely being weird (there's lots of other xen, weird sounds out there). As you'll hear in the podcast, my goal is to play inspiring, beautiful blended harmonies I hear in barbershop quartets, blues, world music, and so on.<br />
<br />
Note that this is mostly <b>edited from a live conversation</b> that wasn't
planned as a podcast. It captures enthusiasm and a lot of ideas, but the
three of us already understood tuning theory. <b>Most musicians — even
professionals — may not understand the language here. But anyone can
still get some gist and hear the sounds.</b><br />
<br />
For 20 years (note the past articles here on <a href="https://blog.wolftune.com/search/label/tuning" target="_blank">tuning</a>), I've been seeking a practical system for playing more harmonic and expressive tunings on guitar and Stick. I finally have it! I'm thrilled to be a partner in developing and bringing the Kite Guitar to the world. We're planning videos, audio recordings, songs and compositions, instrument production, educational methods, theory explanations and more… For now, enjoy this sneak peak.<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="993" data-original-width="1468" height="216" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUUPn3HsHZ-5eV5tZksMx8ZU3w854pPV10ITTvFFAD7o4EHwRNQsmXsq4vfYiTIhPc40Wg-I2vRqNfw0Dn1vh_vbg6zCHejtbUK0jfL33Jx56O61jQY_3k_Yik1w1WW5XhEh36ZCMY8W0/s320/Jacob-Collier-Kite-Tuning.jpg" width="320" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Kite, Jacob Collier, me,<br />
and Caleb Ramsey (who recorded that session)</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
BONUS: The end of the podcast has a couple short clips from when Kite and I showed one of the earliest prototypes to Jacob Collier… We hope to get him an instrument and see what amazing things he does with it. And I plan to write sometime more about the way Jacob has inspired me both in my music and teaching.<br />
<br />Aaron Wolfhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9131476869173021866.post-29550503911740988752019-02-08T18:50:00.001-08:002020-06-25T17:44:12.430-07:00My Tribute to Mister Rogers' Neighborhood<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhselsnklJ09TodTZZhmuZzMucz19m9Yn2F4zr5yJDrBjBcnDOFG040X3JEM3YfXJnIz8Ed6LKjPXFV1-YXxxbfqY6Li7bJoqu1q5kWMTqzlRwSz32XZl0wQF-_QEH89bOo967uncxOD2M/s1600/Fred_Rogers_and_X_the_Owl_Look_Magazine_photo_1969.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="407" data-original-width="293" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhselsnklJ09TodTZZhmuZzMucz19m9Yn2F4zr5yJDrBjBcnDOFG040X3JEM3YfXJnIz8Ed6LKjPXFV1-YXxxbfqY6Li7bJoqu1q5kWMTqzlRwSz32XZl0wQF-_QEH89bOo967uncxOD2M/s320/Fred_Rogers_and_X_the_Owl_Look_Magazine_photo_1969.png" width="230" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Fred Rogers <a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=75538339" target="_blank">photo</a> by Robert Lerner </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
In this article, I describe my recently renewed appreciation of <i>Mister Rogers' Neighborhood</i>. In particular, the artistic intentions and the marvelous music.<br />
<h2 id="raising-kids-in-todays-media-reality">
Raising kids in today's media reality</h2>
I wish for everyone in the world to know and embrace love, compassion, curiosity, creativity, mindfulness, emotional intelligence, and so on. Of course, it takes regular investment to maintain and strengthen such things in my own life. And as one person, I only have so much influence and only so much capacity to support others. I do what I can with my students. And as a father, I bring these concerns to raising my now two-year-old son.<br />
An enormous threat to these values happens to dominate today's media: manipulative advertising. For perspectives, see my older post: <a href="https://blog.wolftune.com/2014/10/i-hate-advertising.html"><i>I hate advertising</i></a>, and check out the <a href="http://www.commercialfreechildhood.org/">Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood</a>. Putting ads themselves aside (ideally <i>blocked</i> by a good adblocker), our ad-driven economy creates a race-to-the-bottom toward whatever spectacles or addictive designs get the most attention. It brings us enormous quantities of unhealthy, annoying, hyper, and dumbed down works. In the worst cases, we get the deeply traumatizing <a href="https://www.ted.com/talks/james_bridle_the_nightmare_videos_of_childrens_youtube_and_what_s_wrong_with_the_internet_today">perils of YouTube's "kids" videos</a>…<br />
<a name='more'></a><h2 id="our-first-family-video-watching">
Our first family video watching</h2>
With so many reasons to limit screen-time for <i>all of us</i> (not to mention the particular harms it has for the youngest kids), we aim to minimize videos and similar things in our home. But audio seems fine — music particularly. We play <i>lots</i> of music recordings of all sorts along with making our own music.<br />
It started with a book: a children's atlas of U.S. states. My then one-year-old son took interest in the state birds in particular. So, I decided to look up bird songs online. We moved on to our North American bird guide, letting him pick out birds for me to then look up sounds from <a href="https://www.allaboutbirds.org/">AllAboutBirds.org</a>, the <a href="https://www.macaulaylibrary.org/">MacAulay Library</a>, or <a href="https://www.audubon.org/bird-guide">Audobon online Bird Guide</a> (I'm not anti-technology, this access is simply astounding, I had no resources anything like this when I was growing up). I looked up audio-only options and that went great. He even started letting us brush his teeth with no fighting as long as we played bird sounds at the same time.<br />
Then we got a children's <i>world</i> atlas from the library. So, he picked out animals from that and asked for sounds. When he asked about tapir sounds, all I could find were a handful of YouTube videos. I failed to hide the videos from him, and I gave in to letting him watch them.<br />
For weeks, he constantly asked for tapir sounds (by which he meant the full videos). I didn't want to watch the same handful of short tapir videos over and over, so we expanded into watching various wildlife documentaries.<br />
<h2 id="mister-rogers-neighborhood">
Mister Rogers' Neighborhood</h2>
When I saw the new Fred Rogers documentary, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Won't_You_Be_My_Neighbor%3F_(film)"><i>Won't You Be My Neighbor?</i></a>, I was reminded of how wonderful his show was. So, I decided that was okay to add to our modest video watching time.<br />
<i>Mister Roger's</i> was an anti-TV television show — the opposite of cartoon "bombardment" (Fred's own wording from his congressional testimony for PBS funding). Fred treated the show with deep thoughtfulness and with love and respect for his young audience. For insight on his process, see his <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2018/06/mr-rogers-neighborhood-talking-to-kids/562352/">Rules for Talking to Children</a>. The pacing of the show was natural, not gimmicky. It was authentic, human communication; not a spectacle to entertain and distract the viewers. <br />
<br />
One way to understand how great <i>Mister Rogers'</i> was: read this review describing how the newer animated show <a href="https://articles.earthlingshandbook.org/2012/10/10/daniel-tigers-neighborhood-review/"><i>Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood</i> falls far short</a> in so many respects.<br />
<h2 id="the-master-musician-behind-the-neighborhood-johnny-costa">
The master musician behind the Neighborhood: Johnny Costa</h2>
<i>Mister Rogers' Neighborhood</i> would have been great enough given the values I mention above, but the musical quality made it that much more superlative.<br />
I had vague recollections from seeing the show as a kid myself. I knew that Fred had a music degree and wrote nice, sophisticated, jazzy songs. But watching now, <b>I was shocked to hear absolutely <i>astounding</i>, virtuosic piano playing</b>. Looking into this, I discovered that the show was blessed with live music for every episode — a small band led by <a href="https://www.johnnycosta.com/">Johnny Costa</a>. Johnny even improvised totally different jazz arrangements of the opening theme each time!<br />
Here's a 3-minute intro about Johnny's piano playing for the show:<br />
<iframe frameborder="0" height="480px" src="https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/xxZWCY-RXaQ?rel=0" width="100%">
</iframe>
Now, check out the classic episode on <a href="https://pbskids.org/video/mister-rogers/1421146807">Mistakes</a>. Johnny's playing in the intro is simply superb. He plays marvelous background accompaniment throughout the different scenes as well, including the support for the moving duet with Betty and Fred (as Daniel Tiger). Johnny played dynamically, fitting the music to Fred's natural pacing. If you then play the next episode in the playlist, you'll hear the opening song with a quite distinct piano accompaniment. Johnny mixed it up constantly with amazing variations, somehow all still fitting with Fred's singing. I suggest listening to the openings of several different episodes to notice the contrasting piano in each.<br />
<h2 id="freds-songs-and-approach-to-music">
Fred's songs and approach to music</h2>
Beyond creative and expressive songwriting, I appreciate the artistic intentions. His songs do good in the world. He didn't write them to show off but to share sincere love and wisdom. As I like to put it, his music is <b><i>expressive</i></b> — the energy goes outward, sharing a gift with us; <b>rather than <i>impressive</i></b> (where the energy goes toward the performer, focusing on how talented they are). The same goes for Johnny Costa's piano playing which somehow has no sense of pretension (even though I can't help but be amazed and impressed since I started paying more attention to it).<br />
I also love the amount of <i>silence</i> in the show (ironically, the new documentary still plays music over the discussion of Fred's use of silence!). Even though I'm a musician, I often like to just have quiet ambient sounds and silence when I'm done teaching or practicing. I don't need or want constant active stimulation.<br />
Fred also presents music as a tool we can all use for communication, enjoyment, mood and time regulation, memory, <a href="https://blog.wolftune.com/2008/06/benefits-of-music-study.html">and more</a>… Music is not just for performing in concert for others. Everyone can and should make their own music for their own purposes. Fred Rogers and <i>Mister Rogers' Neighborhood</i> provide a model toward which we can all aspire. I want to keep that in mind every day as a parent, teacher, and citizen in whatever vibrations I put out in the world.<br />
<br />
<h3>
Watch the show</h3>
<div data-select-link-text="1">
To access the show, see <a href="https://www.misterrogers.org/" target="_blank">misterrogers.org</a> where they publish some rotating select episodes.<br/><br/> Side-note: there used to be whole seasons on archive.org but they have been taken down, such a tragedy how 40+ year old culture gets limited and controlled by select commercial interests, see my old essay <a href="https://blog.wolftune.com/2008/06/rational-view-of-copyright.html"><em>A Rational View of Copyright</em></a>, sigh.</div>
<br />
<hr />
P.S. I've not <i>yet</i> found anything else comparable to <i>Mister Rogers' Neighborhood</i> to share with my son. We might try <i>Sesame Street</i> — it has some fast-paced animations and isn't as transparent about what's real and what's pretend, but I've heard that the 1970's episodes are still quite good (less so for newer ones). Even many newer documentaries have overly-fast cuts, though there's lots of good stuff in that space, notably anything from David Attenborough (especially when <i>written</i> by him, not just narrated — David is as thoughtful as Fred; he's totally the Fred Rogers of nature documentarians, only with a much much much higher budget). I'd be happy to hear from anyone who understands all these issues and has other recommendations for healthy media options.Aaron Wolfhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9131476869173021866.post-37580863619834155222018-01-14T21:42:00.001-08:002018-01-15T10:01:51.993-08:00My new Strum & Sing group classOver my career, I've taught a variety of group classes covering a range of topics from general blues-rock/jam to classical ensembles to music-theory-and-cognition. Most of my students were school-age kids.<br />
<br />
Now, I'm starting a new adult-focused (but younger students welcome too) beginning Strum & Sing class. Here's the flyer:<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEievaQRxbI48g8_gpgaxCxuhA7n-Lh-h-t2PFT9EimYuVJ8-IZWpJUO8Cl-d95YjP6VLMh4UeLXmsupPe3Kd-R4T7SOwQTalgm0eg-XGx6Dm8DwLdgvnFkpHoJFE2piX91B4B8FkaYb4zg/s1600/group-class-flyer.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1242" data-original-width="960" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEievaQRxbI48g8_gpgaxCxuhA7n-Lh-h-t2PFT9EimYuVJ8-IZWpJUO8Cl-d95YjP6VLMh4UeLXmsupPe3Kd-R4T7SOwQTalgm0eg-XGx6Dm8DwLdgvnFkpHoJFE2piX91B4B8FkaYb4zg/s320/group-class-flyer.png" width="247" /></a></div>
<br />
<h3>
A new, more flexible approach to beginning guitar</h3>
The focus of the class will be students keeping a good rhythm while playing simple chord progressions and singing songs. Depending on each student's preference, any option that works will be fine including power chords, single-note bass-lines, small bits of chords, open-tuned bar or slide chords, various strummable instruments, or even muted percussion strumming. This addresses one of the biggest challenges of a group class: how to work with both absolute beginners and more experienced students playing together.<br />
<br />
Unlike the way most teachers do this, I'm going to focus on the flexibility of some basic music theory contexts. We'll learn songs using common letter counting such as 1, 4, 5 which could be A, D, E or C, F, G, and so on.<br />
<br />
The main emphasis: that there's no one right way to play any song. We can adapt and adjust to fit what works for our level and context. So, we'll explore multiple approaches so that each student can find a comfortable way to fit with the group and learn to be flexible musicians going forward.<br />
<br />
For those in Portland, contact me if interested in joining the class. For consideration of the pros and cons of classes versus private lessons (versus other learning approaches like watching online videos etc.), see my old article on <a href="http://blog.wolftune.com/2011/05/comparison-of-different-media-for-music.html">comparing learning options</a>.<br />
<br />
The rest of this article gets into some initial thoughts about the folk-song / pop-song focus of this new class…<br />
<a name='more'></a><br />
<h3>
My love/hate relationship with folk and pop songs</h3>
<br />
For years, I resented the way most people (audiences, students, and other teachers alike) were so into what I saw as superficial pop songs. In the enormous world of music, there's so much depth, interest, innovation, virtuosity, expression, and meaning. Why spend our limited time on mediocre, corny, or superficial stuff?<br />
<br />
But I wanted to know what others out there were teaching and I taught students songs they requested to learn. Over time, I gained deep appreciation for <i>some</i> pop music. I also switched my focus (both personally and in my teaching) from performance (emphasizing learning music to perform in concert for an audience) toward a participatory focus (playing music with others, not for a passive audience). Even when old time folks songs aren't the most artistically inspiring (though there are many exceptions that are wonderful), I've found meaning in enabling everyone to join in. For such open participation, familiarity with songs helps a lot and can outweigh questions of choosing the best songs.<br />
<br />
Still, I've found myself begrudgingly teaching music I didn't love because it happened to be the easiest route I knew to get someone going as a beginner. Besides, I also emphasize the value of learning from any song, liked or disliked. A curious student can always ask themselves, "why do I find this song annoying?" and learn as much as by studying why they love another song…<br />
<br />
But now, in preparation for this group class, I finally decided to get over those excuses and do a better job at finding the best song choices in folk and pop song stuff.<br />
<br />
<h3>
Song database in progress</h3>
<br />
Over the past year, I've been putting together a big database of songs organized by the simplicity of their chord progressions. The eventual dream will be to cross reference "works" entries in <a href="https://musicbrainz.org/" target="_blank">MusicBrainz</a> and add tags for all sorts of things relevant to learning. Ideally, I could quickly search for songs with certain features that I rate highly and thus choose the best options for students at each level. If I structure this well enough, I can publish the database under a free/libre/open license and make it a collaborative project for people around the world to contribute to. That's a ways off, but I already have many notes that help me in my teaching.<br />
<br />
<h3>
Class plans</h3>
<br />
So, my plan for the class is to structure it by my <span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://blog.wolftune.com/2018/01/practice-plan.html">6 Parts of a Balanced Music Practice</a></span></span><span style="font-weight: normal;"></span> including writing our own new songs. But for the main items of what songs to learn, I will use the new database. We will start with 1-chord songs, then move to 2-chord, then 3-chord songs with repeated progressions, then more complex 3- or 4-chord songs etc. At each step, we'll choose one song to learn fully but the list will make it easy for students to dabble with others and reinforce their ear training.<br />
<br />
Students ready for more advanced playing will be asked to try singing harmony or playing more complex variations of accompaniment patterns or rhythms.<br />
<br />
Most of all, I look forward to singing a few songs I sincerely love so I don't have to make excuses about mediocre choices.<br />
<br />
I plan to write up more details as the class develops.<br />
<span id="goog_1696588223"></span><span id="goog_1696588224"></span>Aaron Wolfhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9131476869173021866.post-63319164790552679322018-01-01T14:04:00.001-08:002022-07-01T14:47:33.611-07:00The 6 Parts of a Balanced Music PracticeOver my couple decades of teaching, I evolved a framework for balanced music practice. Recently, I've moved toward also modeling this balance within my lessons. It has six parts: <br />
<ol>
<li>Set up</li>
<li>Warm up</li>
<li>Repertoire</li>
<li>New pieces</li>
<li>Creativity</li>
<li>Listening & Studying</li>
</ol>
<br />
<a name='more'></a>Before I describe them, keep in mind that frameworks like this should be treated as guidelines, not as rigid instructions. No such framework can capture everything perfectly.<br />
<br />
Here are descriptions of each stage:<br />
<br />
<h3>
1. Set up</h3>
<br />
This covers all the preparations and arrangements for effective practice. The list can include:<br />
<ul>
<li>room set up</li>
<ul>
<li>chair(s)</li>
<li>music stand</li>
<li>sound reduction</li>
<li>removing distractions</li>
<li>lighting</li>
</ul>
<li>instrument set up</li>
<ul>
<li>tuning</li>
<li>posture</li>
</ul>
<li>computer stuff</li>
<ul>
<li>speakers</li>
<li>microphones</li>
<li>software</li>
</ul>
</ul>
Basically, prepare your tools and environment for effective practice time.<br />
<br />
<h3>
2. Warm up</h3>
<br />
Get going by warming up both physically and mentally. This can include:<br />
<ul>
<li>music exercises</li>
<ul>
<li>scales</li>
<li>chord changes</li>
<li>rhythm patterns</li>
<li>dynamics</li>
<li>etc</li>
</ul>
<li>physical exercises</li>
<ul>
<li>speed drills</li>
<li>stretching</li>
<li>etc</li>
</ul>
</ul>
The best warmup is tailored to each student's particular situation. A good warmup provides a chance to really engage with particular <i>skills</i>.<br />
<br />
If a student uses warmup time to focus on consistent tempo or playing quietly versus loudly etc., then they can later trust that those elements will be working well enough while performing more complex music that doesn't let them focus on those details.<br />
<br />
Ideally, a warmup pushes toward a student's limits just enough to be engaging without overdoing it. It shouldn't feel boring. It should feel musical and challenging but appropriate for getting going. <br />
<br />
Designing optimal warmups tailored to each specific case is itself a valuable skill to build. It requires understanding a student's strengths and figuring out the most musical way to practice the best next step from there.<br />
<br />
<h3>
3. Repertoire</h3>
<br />
I like to use the word "rehearse" instead of "practice" here. The repertoire stage involves really <i>performing</i> some music that could be done in a concert. Avoid stopping and restarting. This isn't the time for problem-solving or technical focus. This is the chance to indulge in real musical expression with something you feel confident playing.<br />
<br />
Repertoire may be memorized or read — whichever way you'd want to actually do in concert. It can involve improvisation — if that's what you'd do in concert. It is also worth doing even if you never intend to actually perform for anyone else.<br />
<br />
Repertoire rehearsal is about fully realizing music that you've already learned. Also, by playing your repertoire regularly, you won't forget all your pieces after learning them.<br />
<br />
<h3>
4. New pieces</h3>
<br />
This is the prototypical "practicing" most people imagine when thinking of music practice. In learning a composition or song or jam, you take it in sections, go slowly to avoid errors, fix problems, make sense of the music, etc.<br />
<br />
<h3>
5. Creativity</h3>
<br />
As one of my favorite music authors, W.A. Mathieu, tells his students: "only spend a quarter of your time on <i>other people's music</i>."<br />
<br />
Creativity in music can involve reinterpreting a song, composing new music, improvising, experimenting, recording, and so on. It can involve open-ended play or carefully structured work.<br />
<br />
<h3>
6. Listening & Studying</h3>
<br />
Broadly, this stage is less about directly performing or learning to perform music. We don't necessarily need to make this part of each practice session per se, but we do want more than just having music playing in the background while we do unrelated activities.<br />
<br />
Students should practice <i>active listening</i> with real attention to the music. Within the music, attention can go toward a wide range of aspects. What sounds are there? Where do chords change? What makes this section so exciting? What is it about that song that makes it so annoying?<br />
<br />
Other studying includes reading about music, talking about music with others, and all forms of ear training. Ideally, we attend live concerts or at least watch concert videos. Take inspiration from others, and put music practice into broader life context.<br />
<br />
<h2>
Using the framework</h2>
<br />
Each student should adapt these ideas to their particular context. At the end of the day (and the end of the week), we can reflect on whether we've achieved a good balance.<br />
<br />
In my lessons, I make sure students understand how to do each of these stages. I try to at least touch on them all in each lesson.<br />
<br />
Set up is obvious enough but always necessary. Learning new warmup approaches can take most of a lesson, but I usually only touch on them briefly to remind students about that stage and check that they are doing well.<br />
<br />
When a student rehearses a repertoire piece in a lesson, I make a point of never interrupting them — it's a real concert performance. We may reflect afterwards and discuss both what went well and what to work on improving.<br />
<br />
Working on new pieces or doing some creative composing or improvising typically take the bulk of lesson time.<br />
<br />
I used to feel uncomfortable taking limited lesson time watching a concert video or listening to a recording, but I've found it valuable. I can (and do) send students listening assignments to go through later. However, the focus and attention is different when we share a listening experience together and can discuss it in the moment and describe how it relates to the rest of the stages.<br />
<br />
<hr />
<br />
Someday I plan to write individual articles with further details on each stage.<br />
<br />
Please feel free to comment or contact me with thoughts or feedback. I'd love to hear how readers feel about this type of structure. Is it useful to you? Do you have other approaches to keep balanced?Aaron Wolfhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9131476869173021866.post-7239706799721176832016-06-17T01:05:00.003-07:002020-07-16T21:58:57.274-07:00Cooperation in EverythingIn all areas of my life — as a self-employed music teacher and musician, social entrepreneur, scholar, activist, parent, and more — the most defining element is the issue of how my individual actions fit into larger social context. This relates to everything from my embrace of participative music to my embrace of free/libre/open culture and technology. The dilemmas around effective cooperation or lack thereof frame nearly every topic.<br />
<br /><div>
William "Salt" Hale, the Community Director of my non-profit startup <a href="https://snowdrift.coop/" target="_blank">Snowdrift.coop</a>, heard me give a pithy and personal explanation of these things in a lightning talk at <a href="http://seagl.org/" target="_blank">SeaGL</a> last year, and he requested a video of it. So, with help from my student, friend, and fellow Snowdrift.coop volunteer Athan Spathas, I recorded that spiel and several others about the ways that cooperation and coordination matter in so many areas of life. Athan prompted me with a range of topics, and I explained how they all connect to these social issues.</div><span><a name='more'></a></span>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="580" mozallowfullscreen="true" src="https://archive.org/embed/AaronWolf-SocialDilemmas&playlist=1" webkitallowfullscreen="true" width="640"></iframe><br /></div><div><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><font size="1">Link for hosted videos: https://archive.org/details/AaronWolf-SocialDilemmas</font><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>
I don't have answers to everything, I just know some things about the nature of the problems. But that's a good place to start. Too many people
today believe a strange individualism that denies the fundamentally social nature of these issues. So, I hope these perspectives provide some value and insights or at least a moment of entertainment.</div>
<br />
I may record more such videos given enough requests, and I'll do what I can to answer questions or provide more references and related links if I can find time. Aaron Wolfhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9131476869173021866.post-82104309116804632332015-10-07T00:44:00.000-07:002015-10-07T00:55:17.450-07:00I was a guest on Music Manumit podcastI was honored to be the recent guest for a podcast called Music Manumit, a show focused on Creative Commons music. Check it out: <a href="http://www.musicmanumit.com/2015/10/aaron-wolf-151005-music-manumit-podcast.html">http://www.musicmanumit.com/2015/10/aaron-wolf-151005-music-manumit-podcast.html</a><br />
<br />
I regret that I didn't specifically name the folks I mentioned in passing. My teacher I referenced was <a href="http://ozmusic.com/steve_oz.html" target="_blank">Steve "Oz" Osburn</a>. The barbershop songwriter friend I mentioned who used a Creative Commons license is the wonderfully talented Paul Olguin (who I need to help get his own website up sometime!).<br />
<br />
I mentioned also my <a href="http://blog.wolftune.com/2012/08/copyingisfun2.html" target="_blank">barbershop arrangement of Copying Is Not Theft</a>. More significantly, this podcast prompted me to finally get more of my old recordings posted. I had some up before, but now I'm finally sharing more thoroughly and specifically updating my old music under CC BY-SA license. For a start, I posted my 15-year-old album, <a href="https://archive.org/details/Conspiracies-Racketeering-Aaron-Wolf" target="_blank"><i>Conspiracies & Racketeering</i></a> on Archive.org along with some of the source files (MIDI tracks). I hope to post more albums and other backlog of music soon…Aaron Wolfhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9131476869173021866.post-29757756218190065942014-12-02T14:09:00.001-08:002015-01-08T22:53:15.615-08:00Launching Snowdrift.coop<a href="https://snowdrift.coop/" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;" target="_blank"><img border="0" src="https://snowdrift.coop/static/img/logo-compact.png" /></a>This past week, we launched a fund-drive for <a href="https://snowdrift.coop/" target="_blank">Snowdrift.coop</a>. We need to cover legal expenses and further development so the site can begin operating. The fund-drive itself is at <a href="https://snowdrift.tilt.com/" target="_blank">snowdrift.tilt.com</a>. <i>Update January 2015: The campaign succeeded!</i><br />
<br />
At Snowdrift.coop, you can read dozens of pages of writings explaining the whole concept in depth. Here at wolftune.com, I focus on my music teaching and related topics.<br />
<a name='more'></a><br />
These different parts of my life do connect. For one thing, I recorded some music for the background of the fund-drive video. More importantly, Snowdrift.coop promises a good mechanism for me to fund work I've always wanted to do to make better music education materials that will be freely shareable and adaptable.<br />
<br />
I license this entire site for free sharing and adaptation under CC-BY-SA (see the bottom of the page for more). My various posts here included recordings, videos, and more — all under the same free license. And, of course, <a href="http://blog.wolftune.com/2014/10/i-hate-advertising.html" target="_blank">I don't show third-party ads</a>. <br />
<br />
All the time and energy helps create a holistic compilation of work that may help promote my teaching, but mostly it remains volunteer time. I could keep up a modest pace into the future, but I really want to put all these things together and build a new, better guitar method and overall music instruction materials.<br />
<br />
I have no pretense that I have all the best answers. My dream is
to collaboratively develop my ideas, welcoming everyone's input under free licensing, while drawing on all the bestsources . If Snowdrift.coop succeeds, it could help fund this work so that I could dedicate my time comfortably to building these free public goods. Of course, for now, there's so much work to keep doing just to get Snowdrift.coop going.<br />
<br />
Thanks everyone for your support!Aaron Wolfhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9131476869173021866.post-58215433415428381962014-10-24T16:20:00.000-07:002019-01-11T14:15:02.959-08:00I Hate Advertising!<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mad_%28magazine%29" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;" target="_blank"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgltRdjWWX3CrSoMPekmviC8jL9diUHwCPVQDyF7Q1THCxuePdKvHmqcMFEASCcVMfdA3wbyL55K3ZhurW71jeF6pErfC91MtpQFyuSrBvofdDiK6zFL1w2OswbC3euNMoMuuS33ALIjcc/s1600/MADvertising.jpeg" width="200" /></a>My formative years were especially influenced by <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mad_%28magazine%29" target="_blank">MAD Magazine</a>. I started reading in the late 1980's, but I quickly amassed a large collection of back issues and book collections going back to the magazine's start in the 1950's. In fact, my introduction to many cultural icons was through MAD's satire of them before I'd even experienced the original. MAD was full of ingenious political and pop-culture satire but perhaps the primary target was <i>advertising</i>.<br />
<br />
MAD even attacked the subtle details of things like the proportions of cereal boxes. Every manipulative detail of the ad-biz was ridiculed and laid bare. <br />
<br />
Most substantially, <b>MAD magazine itself had <i>no</i> third-party ads from 1957 through 2001</b>. This practice went against all business assumptions about the publishing industry. They did everything backwards. Cheaper paper, black-and-white, no ads, and they purchased the rights to submitted artwork outright so they could use and reuse it freely. They savagely satirized all of America's consumer culture, ad-biz, and celebrity obsessions. Their interests were aligned solely with the readership.<br />
<br />
<a name='more'></a><br />
In early 2001, new corporate owners switched MAD to full-color and included third-party ads. I immediately canceled my subscription and never really read the magazine again. I'm not that impressed with the bits of it I've read here and there since, but some is still good. I also appreciate the satire of stuff like The Onion. But nothing today is like the MAD magazine pre-advertising. <a href="https://www.adbusters.org/" target="_blank">Adbusters</a> does a good job attacking advertising and consumerism, but it's more bluntly political and serious.<br />
<br />
It took me a long time to realize what life is like for most people who have had much less blatant awareness of the manipulative machinations of advertising. Ads have now infiltrated our lives deeper than ever with all our online
activities being tracked in order to specifically target each of us
most effectively. Today's virtual news-stands are themselves deeply intertwined with the ad-biz and have no interest in promoting ad-free satire if there's any great stuff out there still (it's hard to know what's truly ad-free myself since I block ads online anyway, but feel free to tell me about your favorites I may have missed).<br />
<br />
<hr />
<br />
<i><b>We break this blog post to bring you this special Public Service Announcement:</b></i><b> If you are not already running an Ad-blocking plugin, go install one <i>immediately</i>.</b> DO IT. They even block video ads! My recommendation: uBlock Origin <a href="https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/#installation" target="_blank">uBlock</a> (and I also check the optional "annoyances" blocking in the settings).<br />
<br />
<hr />
<br />
I <i>could</i> include third-party ads on this site, but I don't. The handful of <a href="https://www.youtube.com/user/nphony/videos?flow=grid&view=0&sort=p" target="_blank">my videos on YouTube</a> have received over 250,000 views so far, and I <i>could</i> enable the "monetize" feature. Doing that would make viewers watch <i>extra</i> video ads (unless they run an ad-blocker!), and I'd get some income from it. Of course, I wouldn't have any control over the ads, so they would surely promote products I would <i>never</i> endorse. My only third-party advertising involves occasional and contextually-relevant links to specific products I recommend.<br />
<br />
I have no idea how much money I'm missing by not accepting ads, but putting ads on my site or my videos would <i>not</i> mean getting paid <i>for</i> my creativity. People like to spin this situation as, "these ads pay for this free service," but it's really just a more intertwined version of having a day-job as a sleazy salesman so you can fund your valuable but unprofitable service or art. Instead of selling out and compromising my values, I'm working to provide a better economic model for creative work via <a href="https://snowdrift.coop/" target="_blank">Snowdrift.coop</a>.<br />
<br />
<h3>
Advertising my lessons</h3>
Against this background, I feel uncomfortable wading into advertising myself.<br />
<br />
I grew up in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and started working at <a href="http://www.ozmusic.com/" target="_blank">Oz's Music</a>, a local musical instrument store, in 1998. Over time, some people I met at the store took lessons with me, and those folks referred new students. I ended up teaching full-time without ever doing any real advertising.<br />
<br />
When I moved to Portland, OR this past August, I found myself needing to start over and recruit new students. Uncomfortably, I looked into how to advertise my teaching. Portland has hundreds of guitar teachers. Why would anyone choose to take lessons with me?<br />
<br />
Obviously, ads don't have to be obnoxious and manipulative. There's nothing inherently unethical about a simple informative ad. But I'm still wary of wading into the whole world of marketing, and I don't like the pure <i>quantity</i> of advertising already out there. I decided to work on staying as human and transparent as possible and to avoid whatever felt anything like the slick-marketing I see others doing.<br />
<br />
My first issue: work out how to distinguish my teaching.<br />
<br />
Most teachers advertise their years of professional performance experience and their educational credentials. Pop/rock teachers generally talk about how awesome guitar is or how they can teach your favorite songs. Classical teachers emphasize their concert reviews and licensed status with formalized trademarked systems like the Suzuki method. Now, I've played full-time in a touring band, have a classical guitar degree, years of experience, and can teach all the generic stuff, but so what…?<br />
<br />
What makes my teaching unique? Well, I really question things and have developed ways to explain music universally with cross-cultural perspectives and insights from science and psychology. Do other teachers do this? Sure, there are some others, but I've never seen anyone advertise this way or really emphasize these values. Ideally, I'm not just trying to get anyone and everyone to hire me but also to find those students who most appreciate the things I am most excited about teaching.<br />
<br />
So, I wrote a really long Craigslist post. Many paragraphs. It referenced how self-conscious I feel about advertising. I talked about how guitar is <i>not</i> the most awesome thing in the world, how guitar lessons might <i>not</i> be the readers' top priority, and that's fine. I described how I work to balance my perspectives and question things, and yet I still appreciate all sorts of things about music and guitar, and if you want the sorts of guidance and insights I offer, I'm available. Over time, I edited the post a lot. I removed some excessively critical or self-deprecating bits. It still seems quite unlike the typical slick, concise, lesson ad. And it's brought me some students who expressed appreciation at how refreshing my post felt.<br />
<br />
As much as I dislike the centralized ad-tracking businesses like <a href="https://plus.google.com/+AaronWolfguitarteacherOregonCity" target="_blank">Google</a>, <a href="https://facebook.com/wolftune-lessons" target="_blank">Facebook</a>, and others, I decided to get listed where people will actually see the listing (including <a href="https://www.yelp.com/biz/aaron-wolf-oregon-city" target="_blank">Yelp</a> and others). I'm certainly <i>not</i> inclined to pay for pushing more ads on people, but I might as well be included when people search. I will <i>never</i> post anything on those systems exclusively. All my postings will be available here on my website, and, if anything, I'll post links on those other proprietary silos.<br />
<br />
I also contacted past students to get <a href="https://plus.google.com/+AaronWolfguitarteacherOregonCity/about" target="_blank">some reviews</a>. I have every reason to think they wrote sincerely, but I feel a bit uncomfortable in the extent of their glowing and enthusiastic reviews calling me the most brilliant and best teacher they've ever had. Of course, I shouldn't complain about that — it's great to feel appreciated. Yet, I also feel conscious of the ways I can keep working to further improve my teaching.<br />
<br />
I found other listings for music teachers online. One notable site seems to have won a top slot in Google searches: <a href="https://www.thumbtack.com/or/portland/guitar-music-science-lessons/1248841" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Thumbtack.com</a>. For that reason alone, it was worth investigating. Initially, I had mixed feelings their business model, but it's actually more reasonable than many others. Students post an inquiry. Teachers get notified and choose to pay around $3 to send a "quote" to the prospective student. Only after that goes through can the teacher and student directly communicate. This could seem just a way to get lots of teachers to pay for quotes, but they limit each request to 5 quotes and refund the payment if the quote does not get viewed in 48 hours.<br />
<br />
I'm still not fully <i>endorsing</i> Thumbtack (after all, they apparently include separate third-party ads on their site — but I don't see them because of AdBlock, of course). However, it has worked for me: I've actually met with 11 students through the system over less than two months, and every one of them decided to go ahead with lessons. Some turnover is inevitable, of course. Some students try lessons but end up too busy, too tight financially, or move away. All in all, I spent <i>many</i> hours setting things up online, writing messages to interested folks, and regularly following up about quotes. I'd save a lot of time if I used generic cookie-cutter ad-copy, but I've chosen to write out things personally more often than not. Perhaps that comes across and is why students have chosen me over other options.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQ_iHvtJCDgEPA9f5037QgaNtvE4Bj5B0sqQSLskZ3jqUmJiN9n135IHljvjbex4Kdp5y5dwznTtEoyxfKV4LuaCkzHXHgJqVpypZtokRIiDL-b5J7DyXVnM08xivqAUqT7FpJFX2Bi6Y/s1600/lesson-yard-sign.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQ_iHvtJCDgEPA9f5037QgaNtvE4Bj5B0sqQSLskZ3jqUmJiN9n135IHljvjbex4Kdp5y5dwznTtEoyxfKV4LuaCkzHXHgJqVpypZtokRIiDL-b5J7DyXVnM08xivqAUqT7FpJFX2Bi6Y/s1600/lesson-yard-sign.jpg" width="281" /></a>I also put up a yard sign outside my home teaching studio. I'm not sure if it's led to anything, but it was a one-time expense. I still feel uncomfortable with putting more ads out into the world, but I tried at least to be as tasteful as I could.<br />
<br />
I've also done the standard flyering. Like the Craigslist post, I've written out longer stuff that sounds more quirky and human and as unlike corporate advertising as I can muster while staying concise and appealing enough.<br />
<br />
All in all, it seems my conscientiousness may pay off. I am very sensitive about how my messages treat people. I try to be personable, sincere, and go out of my way to avoid the gimmicky quality of most advertising. And at the rate I'm going, I'll be totally busy and have to start a waiting list in just a few months. But until I get there, I'll keep working to recruit students.<br />
<br />
This blog post is just one piece of my ongoing efforts to let everyone get behind-the-scenes and relate to me as a real person. I <i>wish</i> everyone would reject all the services and products that advertise at us in more manipulative, disrespectful ways. Perhaps others who read this will feel inspired to be thoughtful and ethical in any marketing they do. Or maybe this post is mainly just my attempt at penitence for my own advertising sins.<br />
<style class="ublock-postload-1ae7a5f130fc79b4fdb8a4272d9426b5">[href^="https://plus.google.com/share?url="]
{display:none !important;}</style>Aaron Wolfhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9131476869173021866.post-61853593388379134792014-09-06T00:30:00.001-07:002014-09-06T00:32:22.047-07:00Guest on the Unformatted podcast with Ryno the BeardedThis past week, I was a guest on a podcast show called Unformatted. The host, Ryno the Bearded, does podcasts dedicated to Creative Commons music, and Unformatted is the looser chat/interview show.<br />
<br />
Check out the podcast at <a href="http://rynothebearded.com/2014/09/mere-exposure-effect/">http://rynothebearded.com/2014/09/mere-exposure-effect</a><br />
<br />
The show is a bit over two hours long and covers topics including: copyright, music business, economics, participatory vs performance-based music, philosophy of art, barbershop harmony, software freedom, and more. Overall, it's a good casual summary of my whole personal story of my life and career and how I came to my current understanding and feelings on these topics.Aaron Wolfhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9131476869173021866.post-54136881650776817442014-08-10T21:12:00.002-07:002021-07-05T15:21:53.364-07:00Many Ways to Introduce Guitar (or related instruments)There's no one right way to start learning the guitar.<br />
<br />
Even within the scope of strict classical guitar, teachers debate all sorts of things: Should we start with the plucking-hand alone or including the fretting-hand right away? Start with rest-stroke or free-stroke? Start with only rote listening and following of a teacher or use standard notation? Start with single note melodies or with chords and arpeggios?<br />
<br />
Break out of classical assumptions and the options grow exponentially. Start finger-style or with a pick? Start with standard tuning or open tuning or other alternatives? Learn simple songs or simplified versions of more complex songs? Focus on solo guitar or guitar as accompaniment to singing or guitar as in a band context? Use tab or notation? Start with blues, rock, pop, Flamenco, folk-songs, or another style?<br />
<br />
Even all those options have cultural assumptions. So, I prefer to start by teaching the basic physics of the guitar (which are truly universal to all styles and approaches). Then, we can explore the options creatively! However, despite my love of open-ended creative exploration, I've found that many students do best with the plain old traditional approaches. It varies from student to student based on personality, interests, and experiences from other studies (both musical and otherwise). With so many different things to learn, even advanced guitarists with decades of experience may remain totally unaware of some of the basics in other directions than the ones they know.<br />
<br />
I already posted a lesson video on the <a href="http://blog.wolftune.com/2014/03/rhythm-guitar-lesson.html" target="_blank">rhythmic foundation of guitar</a>. That's one great way to start. Today, I'm sharing a handful of other lesson videos which are still are only a sample of the countless approaches to the instrument.<br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="360" src="https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/videoseries?list=PLQuXRsH3a7trHzz_tNkTrpZ4U631LoSmp" width="640"></iframe>
<br />
<a name='more'></a><br />
All these lessons can be adapted easily to related instruments, by the way. <br />
<br />
<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gestalt_psychology#Gestalt_laws_of_grouping" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;" target="_blank"><img border="0" height="83" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/22/Gestalt_proximity.svg" width="200" /></a>The first lesson on drone-melody style draws from a mix of international musical influences. The psychology of the number of notes in a scale is fascinating; it involves questions about working memory. There's also significance to the unevenness of the notes (some close, some farther apart) as in the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gestalt_psychology#Gestalt_laws_of_grouping" target="_blank">Gestalt grouping</a> in psychology (usually shown visually, but the rules also apply to sound groupings).<br />
<br />
The drone approach also works well with open tunings (especially tuned to open 5ths, just two blended pitch-classes such as tuning all strings to either D or A). This approach can work with a slide as well. All sorts of scales and patterns can be explored, both traditional and novel. This approach lends itself to everything from Indian ragas to folk songs to techno-dance music (if you mix it with electric effects and beats) and more.<br />
<br />
The second lesson on guitar physics is the first overview. Strings vibrate at different speeds depending upon mass and tension (and string mass is in two dimensions: thickness/density and length). Continuing this direction of study means learning about the harmonic series and the interactions of different partials of the spectra of simultaneous strings. That leads to understanding more about the impact of <i>which</i> particular combinations of vibrations will have what effect due to various physical phenomena like interference beats and difference tones.<br />
<br />
The third lesson on power chords can lead to more and more advanced rock/pop styles or transition into jazz chord theory eventually. Another alternative direction is to use power chords as a simple foundation for songwriting and then spend most of your time and energy on the nuances of expressing different lyrics and stories in song.<br />
<br />
I use Richie Havens' story as an inspiration for students to pursue their own direction and not stick to one of these boxes. As I alluded to, you can still find ways to engage with the culturally relevant music you like. Check out how Richie plays a song by George Harrison, quite dramatically changing it in his way:<br />
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/VuWirtKRC1Y?start=9" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe><br />
<br />
Now, as inspiring as Richie's music is, I want my students to follow his path of creative expression and not just copy his playing style. That said, Richie made so much music by adapting the songs of others. Don't shy away from blatantly copying or taking inspiration or even tiny details from others. All music and art is derivative. The goal is to find your own path without falling into the <a href="http://blog.ninapaley.com/2009/12/28/the-cult-of-originality/">cult of originality</a>.<br />
<br />
So, while we explore our own paths, nothing beats the value of a great teacher. In the video, I mentioned Richie not having a teacher, but I since was told that he did learn directly at some point from Dino Valenti, whose strumming approach Richie adapted into his astounding rhythm playing. In fact, my favorite Richie Havens performance is his powerful rendition of Dino's song, <i>What About Me?</i><br />
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/ZzmCPQ7jXcc" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe><br />
<br />
All the approaches I've shared here have infinite potential for deeper study and advancement. I could go on for hours, weeks, even years building and expanding on each approach into advanced levels.<br />
<br />
With all the options, it can seem overwhelming. Among my natural strengths and weaknesses as a teacher, I feel confident in taking complex ideas and explaining them clearly, but I have struggled with being decisive. With so many things to learn and all of them so fascinating, how can one choose a focus?<br />
<br />
Generally, I have a few strategies for choosing a direction. In some cases, students have clear preferences already, so we go with that. In other cases, I simply share with students whatever I happen to be into at the moment. I teach best when I'm teaching things I'm excited about and working on myself. Other times, I pick out a book or a student might already have a book, and we use that as a reference for focus. I simply go through and explain interesting things the book left out or share insights into where the book got things wrong.<br />
<br />
In the end, I'm not wishing to simplify too much. The possibilities are vast, and we should embrace that and learn to live with it. Appreciate the diversity of life. It helps that I arbitrarily ended up focusing on guitar, of course. The scope there is broad enough, although I try to keep that in perspective too and acknowledge the whole range of possibilities in music and even beyond into all of the rest of life's pursuits. <i>Whew</i>. Enjoy the journey!Aaron Wolfhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9131476869173021866.post-19491199394503846972014-03-06T22:18:00.000-08:002019-01-13T16:59:02.701-08:00Rhythm Guitar LessonI've been teaching guitar lessons professionally for around 15 years, and certain things keep coming up. I've been wanting for a long time to record the core set of lessons that I teach various students on day one. I can't teach every student everything, but there are a dozen or so ways to get started playing guitar. Each approach has a different focus.<br />
<br />
Here's the first of the series:<br />
<br />
<video src="https://archive.org/download/RhythmGuitarLesson/Rhythm-guitar-lesson.mp4" src="https://archive.org/download/RhythmGuitarLesson/Rhythm-guitar-lesson.ogv" controls></video>
<br /><br />
Of course, there are a lot of details not covered in the video. So here I'm sharing further notes that touch on things I typically cover in the next several lessons (with varying amount of detail, depending on each student).<br />
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<a name='more'></a><br />
<b>Rhythm</b> is not actually the pulse itself. Rhythm is the relation of different events over time. We perceive different parts of the timing as separate events that we group (technical term is "chunk") in our minds. Each group has a mental focus or <i>accent</i>. At its core, <i>accent</i> just means anything that sticks out. When you say someone has an "accent", you're saying their manner of speaking sticks out, given whatever is common in those around them. Likewise, you can paint the trim in your house with an "accent color" to make it stick out.<br />
<br />
Rhythmic relationships, i.e. groupings and accents, can exist without any real periodicity or regularity. Yet in the in the English-speaking world at least, <i>most</i> music has a regular beat that forms the backdrop against which rhythmic groups and accents are framed.<br />
<br />
Most music not only has a steady beat but also has a regular accent. Every so many beats, there is extra conscious attention. This regular accenting is called <i>meter</i>.<br />
<br />
So, in counting 1&2&3&4&, there are a lot of assumptions. This counting works for what is called <i>duple meter</i> where there are hierarchies of accents in pairs. Each number gets more focus than the &'s, and the numbers 1 and 3 are more accented than 2 and 4. The number 1 is the most accented of all.<br />
<br />
Really, I'm only talking about <i>metric</i> accents. In lots of music, beats 2 and 4 or even the &'s can get accents of other sort. In other words, they can stick out in other ways. Any place in the meter can stick out loudly or have a noticeably long note or high pitch or unusual timbre (the sound quality that differentiates trumpet from violin).<br />
<br />
Whenever any of these other accents do <i>not</i> match the regular metric accent, we experience <i>syncopation</i>. That means somewhere in our mind, we expect a certain regular focus point, but other things make an event stick out in a different place. The tension and complexity of syncopation is so fun and enjoyable that music without syncopation is almost never heard anymore. Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star has no syncopation, but you won't find any popular music today that isn't totally filled with syncopation.<br />
<br />
For true beginners, getting comfortable with rhythm can be a complex process. Although my <i>one rule</i> is to keep moving, some rhythmic patterns are easier than others. If you make sound on the metric accents (i.e. on the down-strokes which are the numbered parts of the counting), it will be easier. If you play on an upstroke "&" but miss the nearby downstrums, it will feel syncopated. For some this is easy, for others, it takes some getting used to.<br />
<br />
There are many good ways to practice:<br />
<br />
Try putting on some music you like and just strumming along with muted strings so the chords don't clash. You can match rhythms in the recording or add your own cross rhythms to the mix.<br />
<br />
One thing to note (this is a teaser for later rhythm lessons): overall patterns can be either <i>straight</i> (the upstroke "&" is right in the middle between each down strum) or<i> swing</i> (the upstroke is a little delayed and so is closer to the down strum that <i>follows</i> it, creating a strong up-DOWN… up-DOWN… up-DOWN feeling). Popular music uses both straight and swing rhythms but usually any particular song (or version of a song) is one or the other. Swing and straight rhythms are not usually mixed together.<br />
<br />
Try planning specific rhythms and work on them in a loop until you feel comfortable. I've uploaded a simple <a href="https://archive.org/download/RhythmGuitarLesson/RhythmChart.pdf" target="_blank">rhythm writing chart</a> you can use to write different patterns. I found that writing X for sound and O for miss works well. It's important that there is a symbol for the silent beats because that helps us focus on them even though they are silent.<br />
<br />
Later, you can add other variations. You could use a / (slash) symbol to mean a real chord and mix that with silence and with muted strums. You could use a box to indicate a percussion slap on the guitar. You could play more on the thicker versus thinner strings. The options go on and on. <b>Be creative.</b><br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flow_%28psychology%29" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" target="_blank"><img border="0" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f6/Challenge_vs_skill.svg/300px-Challenge_vs_skill.svg.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>note</i>: Skill level is relative to <i>yourself</i> not to others.<br />
This is about finding whatever you do best<br />
and challenging yourself to go just a little further.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b>Most of all, enjoy the process.</b> Music doesn't exist if we jump to the end. Skip to <br />
the very end of the song and there is no song.<br />
<br />
<b> </b>A beginner with the right attitude enjoying each discovery and musical experience has a better time than an advanced musician in one of the all-too-common bouts of wondering what the whole point is. The goal is to find the sense of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flow_%28psychology%29" target="_blank"><i>flow</i></a> where you challenge yourself just the right amount and got lost in the moment.Aaron Wolfhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9131476869173021866.post-35516147189634182282014-01-28T13:39:00.000-08:002016-09-06T15:22:18.179-07:00Homage to Pete Seeger 1919-2014<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pete_Seeger" imageanchor="1" privlyhref="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pete_Seeger" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;" target="_blank"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiC2laanUo6CQzyF300WC2aqEdIBejkQMvyA2uSXF6Ivuccl569WT6x8PDxXSbKQU7BhsZjWR2zb_nyUDtY6w0ZjYnRsMgR0_OhRXToUBW1DDv-VSf-_fNqwNRjcBg29zQp1JtUbUEeqGs/s1600/415px-Pete_Seeger_NYWTS.jpg" width="276" /></a>Today, I reflect on the passing of one of my few great heroes. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pete_Seeger" privlyhref="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pete_Seeger" target="_blank">Pete Seeger</a> was first and foremost known as a musician, but he was much more than that. For Pete, <br />
music was a vehicle. At his core, he was an activist for cross-cultural understanding, civil rights, a healthy environment, love, justice, and inclusion.<br />
<br />
In my own <a href="http://blog.wolftune.com/p/lesson-details-philosophy.html" privlyhref="http://blog.wolftune.com/p/lesson-details-philosophy.html" target="_blank">essay about my teaching approach</a>, I quoted from Pete's guitar book which somehow cut right to the core in a way none of the other 400+ guitar books I've read have done. His sense of perspective was just wonderful, and he cared about people more than about music.<br />
<br />
I don't need to provide any biographical overview here as Pete has been, thankfully, recognized and honored by millions of people. The Wikipedia page linked from the picture above goes through the details. The simple fact is: the core energy that Pete had was unfortunately unusual. He was a man of deep integrity who lived all his life working for a better world.<br />
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<a name='more'></a><br />
<br />
I grew up listening to his music and conscious of his notable roles in the civil rights, environment, anti-war, and labor movements. Still, it wasn't until I began my own deep explorations of folk musics from around the world and struggling with my own feelings about my music career that I really came to appreciate Pete more deeply.<br />
<br />
As a musician, <b>Pete was the essence of what I call being <i>expressive</i> instead of <i>impressive</i>.</b> <i>Im-</i> means <i>in. </i>To <i>impress</i> someone means that the energy goes inward from them to you. By contrast, to be<i> expressive</i> means to send your energy <i>out</i> as a gift to others. That is the core of Pete Seeger as a musician: a performer who didn't care about his performance. Every element of his music was about tearing down any walls between himself and his audience. Unlike other sing-along concerts and pop music idolatry, nothing about a Pete Seeger experience was contrived. He cared only about making everyone else feel appreciated, welcome, and connected. He wanted nothing more and nothing less than for everyone in the world to join together in harmony, recognize our common human heritage, and work together for peace and justice worldwide.<br />
<br />
I could go on and on about how the core values that Pete expressed inspire me and provide such a great model for a life well-lived. For what it's worth, I know Pete would celebrate the cultural freedom and open participation that I am promoting now through my website: <a href="https://snowdrift.coop/" privlyhref="https://snowdrift.coop/" target="_blank">Snowdrift.coop</a>.<br />
<br />
Pete Seeger lived a humble and sincere life of great service. I encourage everyone to learn about his legacy and continue the important work needed to achieve a peaceful, healthy world where we can all sing together in harmony while celebrating our connections with each other and the rest of living things as well as our marvelous diversity.<br />
<br />
Addendum: Probably the best example of Pete <i>other</i> the prototypical examples of his most famous songs, <i>All Mixed Up</i> written in 1960:<br />
<br />
<iframe width="640" height="360" src="https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/NpSVMfiIM30?rel=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>Aaron Wolfhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9131476869173021866.post-57731478132580396642013-08-01T18:22:00.000-07:002014-10-28T20:17:20.187-07:00Move to Oregon, announcing Snowdrift.coopUp to now, I've been negligent in updating this site in 2013. Here's the brief explanations and highlights:<br />
<br />
After 15 years of teaching in the Ann Arbor, MI area, nearly moving on to various other directions over the years (a time in a touring rock/jazz/jam band that was also a barbershop quartet, an almost move to California for a PhD), I've moved on to a new stage. My wife got a fellowship position through Portland State University and, on unfortunately short notice, we moved 2,300 miles across the country to our new home in Oregon City. We don't know how long-term this is, whether we'll stay in Oregon after this or what.<br />
<br />
<i>(UPDATE: We stayed in Oregon! Moved into Portland in August 2014! Future not absolutely certain, but, at this point, we're settling in here.)</i><br />
<br />
I plan to keep teaching and may try video-chat lessons over the internet, although I know that won't be the same and won't work as well for certain sorts of lessons.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://snowdrift.coop/" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;" target="_blank"><img border="0" height="90" src="https://snowdrift.coop/static/img/logo.svg" width="320" /></a>Most importantly, this move has allowed me to focus on the major project that has become my main passion over the last year: <a href="http://snowdrift.coop/">Snowdrift.coop</a>.<br />
<br />
<a name='more'></a><br /><br />
I've avoided making big announcements as the site is still in early development, but we're starting to reach out to more people now. We're especially interested in finding volunteers who support our vision.<br />
<br />
In summary, the purpose of Snowdrift.coop is to be a platform which will bring together communities of supporters to help creative projects of all sorts that will all be of the highest ethical standards. The projects we support will all be free to everyone to access, modify, and share. They won't have obnoxious ads nor spy on you. The way we envision achieving this is by a new type of matching pledge system to bring everyone together to fund development. Visit the site to read about the details.<br />
<br />
Aside from the hassles of moving, most of my time has recently been spent on Snowdrift.coop. Learning some programming and other new skills has been challenging and fascinating. I've met many amazing and interesting people and communities.<br />
<br />
Still, if you happen to be near <strike>Oregon City</strike> Portland and interested in guitar lessons, or want to try online lessons, let me know! Teaching has always been and continues to be my passion. I just hope to be able to share my insights and resources more widely with the whole world with the support of Snowdrift.coop once we have it actually operational.<br />
<br />
Thanks especially to all my students in Michigan who I had the privilege of teaching over so many years! I wish you all the very best, be in touch!<br />
<br />
I'm not sure what the future of this site will be, but if you want to keep up with my progress in the near future, get involved with us at Snowdrift.coop.Aaron Wolfhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9131476869173021866.post-42151627164480001172012-10-25T20:26:00.001-07:002012-11-03T13:15:37.204-07:00Screencast: scary sounds with AudacityToday I made my first screencast using my KXStudio GNU/Linux system.<br />
<br />
Summary:<br />
In <a href="http://audacity.sourceforge.net/" target="_blank">Audacity</a>, use any random sounds (import any recordings or make new ones). Go to Effects - Change Speed and choose a very slow speed. Add echos and reverbs and other effects to taste, the more reverb the better. That's it!<br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" frameborder="0" height="360" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/IusGRX7rjSM" width="640"></iframe>
Video editing done in Kdenlive. <br />
Read more about these and other Free/Libre Open Source audio and other software at my <a href="http://blog.wolftune.com/p/software-recommendations-and-more.html">Software Recommendations and more</a> page.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
Happy Halloween!</div>
Aaron Wolfhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9131476869173021866.post-79194521171540614192012-09-14T23:04:00.005-07:002022-03-09T09:08:04.167-08:00A Framework for Studying Human Experience<h2>
Intro</h2>
I've always felt in-touch with both holistic and analytical ways of seeing the world. Breaking things down into distinct parts can be a valuable way to make sense of reality. But human cognition does not have the capacity to deal with great numbers of broken parts all at once — let alone the capacity to recognize how the parts could fit back together again. Sometimes, we need to step back and try to take in the whole picture. When we then return to analyze separate parts, we may not be able to comprehend <i>all</i> the connections, but we can at least try to keep context in mind while looking at any particular item.<br />
<br />
I have always been interested in music, but as a student, I was uncomfortable with the degree to which music study seemed divorced from broader context. In the years since finishing my Bachelor of Music, I've grappled with cross-disciplinary questions that led me to study physics, biology, psychology, sociology, philosophy, anthropology, linguistics, and other fields. I can't claim expertise in these areas, but I've learned a lot. And through my studies, I have gained insights into <i>music</i> which seem more profound and valuable than the things I learned in my music courses.<br />
<br />
Recently, I've been considering a return to academia, but I've struggled with choosing the right direction. I now recognize that there are many angles to get at the same questions, and I want to be sure that any program I pursue has a good perspective on how different fields of inquiry fit together.<br />
<br />
One of my main concerns is the apparently persistent divide between science and humanities. I appreciate much of what I've seen at conferences and such, but I often feel that the bias for certain angles of study is greater than what would be expected just because people have their particular specialties. Humanities folks (a group which includes the majority of music-related researchers) seem to make <i>everything</i> about culture. Of course, there have been countless debates about universals versus cultural differences, debates about different approaches to scholarly inquiry, debates about nature versus nurture, and so on. There is enough material for scholars to make entire careers out of just studying the history of these debates as a meta-topic. Trying to make sense of all of this, I've developed my own framework to address the different angles of inquiry, and that's what I going to describe here.<br />
<br />
<h2>
My interdisciplinary framework</h2>
The deep questions most of us have are basically about understanding the nature of our own experience. We will never be able to know or explain everything, of course. But while our abstract models are imperfect, they may still be useful.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgg5lDY9VbKW46X5s5w73DBaghDPqntiZMjB_oZQizyBKoew7ylixX8_oLnKZDwTBkyo2hyIGuQCzcpAD9t57nCSfRQ4u8ldeWbWOadEGxz3HqFBrudw9lrdfu-oqvZXkxRDQIsdfnu23w/s1600/study-levels-diagram.png" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgg5lDY9VbKW46X5s5w73DBaghDPqntiZMjB_oZQizyBKoew7ylixX8_oLnKZDwTBkyo2hyIGuQCzcpAD9t57nCSfRQ4u8ldeWbWOadEGxz3HqFBrudw9lrdfu-oqvZXkxRDQIsdfnu23w/s400/study-levels-diagram.png" width="353" /></a></div>
The figure to the right is a diagram of an intellectual framework which I find useful for contextualizing understanding, research, and experience. I don't think any element here is overall more or less important than the others. To reasonably explain any of our experiences, all these levels need to all be acknowledged.<br />
<b>The figure represents a hierarchy of unidirectional restrictions</b>. We live in the inner circle and only experience the outer levels indirectly. We necessarily experience and understand physics through our subjective and culturally-influenced
perspectives. Yet while culture influences physicists, culture cannot alter the basic physical laws of the
universe. Physical reality imposes absolute restrictions on the possibilities within all the lower levels, not vice versa.<br />
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<a name='more'></a><br />
<br />
Some clarifications about the terminology in this figure:<br />
<ul>
<li>"Psychology" is meant to refer to common human psychological properties, not necessarily every subject within the academic field of psychology.</li>
<li>"Innate personality" is outside of culture because this framework is for describing an individual's subjective experiences. Cultures as a whole have arguably larger scope than personalities, but the innate aspects of one's personality are not defined by culture. There are biologically-determined congenital traits which have notable influence. Again, this influence is unidirectional. Considering only <i>hereditary</i> personality traits, we can acknowledge that these affect the way we relate to our surrounding culture, but culture cannot change our genes. <span style="font-size: xx-small;">(Well, in principle, it is possible for cultures to influence genetics by influencing who pairs up to become parents, and maybe cultural factors influence hormones and gene activation/deactivation, especially in today's world with medical hormone treatments and with chemicals polluting drinking water and so on…).</span></li>
<li>"Habitus" is a term from sociology which refers to something like<i> </i><i>an individual's dispositions which come from surrounding</i><i> cultural influences</i>. I intend here a slightly broader interpretation which acknowledges that one's dispositions are influenced by all of one's particular life experiences.</li>
<li>Finally, "mood" generally refers to temporary subjective mental state, but I am considering this level as including all aspects of short-term situational context that impact our subjective experiences.</li><li>"Subjective events" is the level of immediate conscious experience. <br /></li>
</ul>
The problem I see with the humanities in academia is that it lives primarily at the cultural level and so develops cultural theories for experiences that may be more defined by the other factors. I usually find entirely-cultural explanations unsatisfying. Cultural theorists may assume that outside factors are a given and need not be mentioned, but unless these factors are <i>actively</i> considered, we risk attributing things to culture that don't make sense; or we might ignore profound influences that may be more relevant to explaining a given experience; or we may color our own perspectives by over-emphasizing the cultural elements.<br />
<br />
On the other hand, I understand some of why culture gets so much focus (aside from being truly interesting). In our diverse globalized world, it is relatively easy to notice when someone is being ethnocentric. And the the answer to ethnocentrism is to give respectful attention to cultural differences. The fact that we can recognize ethnocentrism is actually evidence of substantial universal human biological and psychological similarities. It is because of common human factors that we have capacity to
empathize with those in other cultures, and it is through such empathy
that we come to recognize our cultural biases. It is harder to recognize our species-centrism because we don't communicate as well with other creatures, and we have less in common, so it is more difficult to relate our experiences.<br />
<br />
Overall, I don't want to diminish cultural concerns. On the contrary, I think culture studies are <i>strengthened</i> by clarifying the boundaries of what is and isn't cultural.<br />
<br />
Similar issues occur when physicists and mathematicians reduce human experience to measurable physical phenomena. There is a long history of prescriptive theories that try to make the world fit nice, clean mathematical formulas. Yet even when nuance and deviation are acknowledged, descriptions of physical states are still not the same as descriptions of subjective experience.<br />
<br />
Consider the classical philosophical question: <i>if a tree falls in the forest and nobody is there to hear it, does it make a sound?</i> Well, this question simply highlights a linguistic/semantic problem with the word "sound." If "sound" refers to the outer physical level of my framework, i.e. certain types of waves in air, then yes, hypothetical falling trees make physical waves in the hypothetical surrounding air. If "sound" refers to the biological level, i.e. our perceptual experience, then no, a perceptual experience does not occur if nobody is there to have it. So the question turns out to be mundane instead of profound (we can make this even more mundane by pointing out in any hypothetical situation, the person positing the situation could simply decide anything they want about what is true in their imagined fantasy world). We could instead ask an actually profound question: if someone <i>is</i> there to hear the tree fall, how will they react? What will they experience overall? To answer those questions, we have to work our way through the rest of the levels of my framework.<br />
<br />
If we word our questions better, with full respect to all these levels of inquiry, we can go about finding useful and insightful answers. Otherwise, we risk fooling ourselves into thinking that things are simpler or are more complex or more ineffable than they really are. I propose that all our claims, theories, and hypotheses be clarified as to where they fit within my framework. Effort should be made consider all the levels because we may make mistakes or miss important insights if our focus is too narrow.<br />
<br />
<h2>
The framework applied to the study of music </h2>
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</div>
<h3>
<u>Physics</u></h3>
The physics of music includes sound waves and their behavior in various physical contexts. This is a deep field of research which impacts the design of acoustic spaces, musical instruments, recording devices, electronic amplification, and so on. It includes topics such as the harmonic series, inharmonicity, wave propogation and interaction, and more. The majority of the information stored in analog or digital audio recordings is basically a description of physical phenomena.<br />
<br />
In the teaching and study of music, physics should be a foundation. Starting on day one with new music students, I teach the most basic physical concepts: A string with more mass vibrates at a slower rate. More tension increases vibration speed. Concurrent vibrations interact and can cause interference patterns (i.e. <i>beats</i>). Once a student understands these things, they have a framework for examining their observations as they learn. They can recognize that duplicate tones on stringed instruments aren't due to an arbitrary cultural decision but are an inevitable feature of physics (once we have more than one string and the capacity to shorten the vibrating portion or change tension). The function of frets makes sense when understood physically, but the position of frets is not defined by physics. Fret position is due to lower factors.<br />
<br />
More complex physical concepts in music include combination tones, resonance, formants, the nature of distortion, nyquist limits in audio recording, and fourier transforms. Musicians don't need to fully understand all these things, but recognizing their existence is valuable. There are certainly times when these elements are relevant to one's actual experience working with music.<br />
<br />
<h3>
<u>Biology</u></h3>
The nature of life itself is a fundamental topic in understanding our experiences. We live in a biological context with all our living systems interactions: food, disease, reproduction, biological development, death, and so on. The biological factors most relevant to music include the structures of
our ears and the other relevant physical and neurological make-up of
the human body when engaged with music-making. <br />
<br />
There is an area of study sometimes called biomusicology which engages with cross-species and other biological topics. How does birdsong relate to human music? Do other primates exhibit musical qualities? Is music an inherent part of human biology or a cultural invention built on biological foundations that are not themselves strictly musical?<br />
<br />
While these are interesting questions, the vast majority of all musically-relevant aspects of biology are those we study to gain insights into psychology. Perhaps one day someone will show that certain combinations of harmonic vibrations have an effect on cell health or something, but that's tangential to actually studying music. To reiterate the purpose of the framework: proper study of psychology requires some understanding of biology. Thankfully, psychologists today usually acknowledge the significance of broader biological contexts (unlike some researchers on the other side of the science/humanities divide).<br />
<br />
<h3>
<u>Psychology</u></h3>
Essentially, music is entirely psychological. Physical qualities of sounds and patterns identified in musical forms must be perceptible and psychologically meaningful to be considered aspects of music itself.<br />
<br />
Of course, the holistic experience of those engaged in music includes the broader context. Imperceptible aspects of the physics of sound can be relevant for making, manipulating,
and studying musical tools of all sorts. And musicians who study these things will likely have a different mindset during their experience of music. Believing (accurately or not) that there is a physical pattern in a piece of music will affect one's experience even if the (supposed) pattern is not actually perceptible.<br />
<br />
For the most part, psychological research — especially the statistical quantitative sort — emphasizes generalizations about the human species or subgroups. For practical reasons, most research is strongly biased toward the study of college students in developed countries. Researchers have their own personal and cultural biases as well. Regardless of these practical concerns, the ideal goal in psychology is to explain the nature of the human psyche generally.<br />
<br />
Music is remarkable for integrating an exceptionally disparate
variety of psychological features. Most sub-fields of
psychology are easily tied to music. Music
has strong connections with language, motor movement, social
relationships, emotion, expression, expectation, pattern perception,
time flow, arousal, memory, and more. With so many elements involved in music, different people and contexts may emphasize very different aspects.<br />
<br />
In my framework, "psychology" represents a level for general principles of human perception and cognition. For example, there are limits to human working memory which limit our processing of long and/or complex musical phrases. Our auditory system works in certain ways which define our ability to resolve pitch perception issues. There are gestalt principles which explain much of the groupings we conceive in music. Statistical learning explains much of how we develop of schemas for different musical genres. These are universal factors for all normal people.<br />
<br />
Furthermore, it seems that various musics have emotional and
expressive qualities that are universally perceptible to some degree. This is similar to facial expressions which are known to have a biological basis and be mostly universal (even congenitally blind people make the same universal facial expressions when feeling the same emotions). I think music has similar qualities. For example, there is a certain attitude within
blues music that both transcends the blues but also lacks any other
adequate description in words. Of course, the cultural context in which the blues evolved was largely responsible for the form of the music as well as the attitude, and the attitude itself impacted the musical choices. But just as anyone from any culture can watch a blues guitarist's face and identify the feeling to some extent, I believe the same occurs when the listener closes their eyes and listens to the sound of the music. Likewise, upon first hearing a flamenco singer, any person would recognize the raw emotion and passion of the style. At a more basic level, fast, high-density music is universally more arousing than
slow ambient music. And universal perceptive and cognitive factors
cause us all to process acoustic events similarly enough that we
agree about which music is fast and which is slow. <br />
<br />
The universal
features of music are not adequate to fully define how people will interpret specific music — we must account for the inner levels of the framework, and these are far from universal. But while the cultural contexts of any music must be understood, the manner in which people become enculturated is itself governed by universal human psychology. Still, of the potentially universal features of psychology that have musical relevance, few are utilized by all musical styles. But this lack of universal <i>use</i> of features is not evidence against universal <i>perception</i>. There are universal psychological features in music which cross cultural boundaries and which must be acknowledged for a complete understanding of the phenomenon of music. It is not my purpose here to describe which features are universal but only to clarify that the issue exists.<br />
<br />
<h3>
<u>Innate Personality</u></h3>
We are all a complex product of genetics interacting with the world. Our genes are engaged and disengaged in various ways in early development based on prenatal hormones from our mothers and further developmental factors. While we have much in common with other humans, we have a range of differing personalities.<br />
<br />
Although our real-world personalities are greatly influenced by our surrounding culture, we have innate temperaments that culture cannot overcome. This is profoundly shown in twins who have common traits even after substantially different life experiences. In all cultures, there are some people who are more reserved and others who are more outgoing. Some people are curious and creative, while others are more conservative.<br>
<br>The most widely accepted psychological model for personality traits is the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Five_personality_traits" target="_blank">Five Factor Model</a>: Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness, and Neuroticism (and some argue for a sixth main trait of Honesty-Humility). Like my framework, such a model is a simplification, but as long as we keep that in mind, we can use such models to help with comprehending and considering our personality differences.<br />
<br />
In his 2006 book <i><a href="https://amzn.to/3Jc9H9v" target="_blank">Making Comics</a></i>, Scott McCloud introduced a new framework specifically for artistic personalities. I find McCloud's ideas extraordinarily compelling, and I would like to one day create a thorough analog of his work applied to the medium of music. For now, here is a summary of his artistic personality framework:<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center">
<table>
<tbody>
<tr>
<td></td>
<td>Art</td>
<td>Life</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Tradition</td>
<td><b>Classicism</b></td>
<td><b>Animism</b></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Revolution</td>
<td><b>Formalism</b></td>
<td><b>Iconoclasm</b></td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
</div>
<br>
McCloud describes the <i>classicist</i> as focused on aesthetic beauty, perfection, and craft; while the <i>animist</i> is focused on the story and meaning. <i>Formalists</i> are curious about the medium itself, how it works, its limits, and its potential. <i>Iconoclasts</i> question and critique things and care about authenticity, truth, and real life.<br />
<br />
There is meaning to this quadrant layout as well. The left side emphasize <i>art</i>, while the right side emphasizes <i>life</i>. The upper quadrants celebrate <i>tradition</i>, while the lower ones engage in <i>revolution</i>. The opposing diagonals contrast beauty (classicist) versus truth (iconoclast) and form (formalist) versus content (animist).<br />
<br />
Obviously, McCloud and I are both formalists — otherwise we would not be so interested in analyzing these things and writing about them. But regardless of one's tendencies, everyone has the capacity to recognize the values of all of these perspectives, and most of us are a complex combination. Broad cultures may celebrate certain perspectives over others, but there are probably innate tendencies within each of us that lead us towards these different attitudes. These diverse individuals generally find their way to sympathetic subcultures within their larger communities even when their immediate family or initial cultural surroundings are different.<br />
<br />
The application to music is obvious: classical academies teach careful technique and precision, while folk and popular musicians emphasize expression, story telling, worship, and so on. Some formalist theorists and composers really question the way music itself is put together. And postmodern critics question the others' perspectives, emphasize the broader context, and express concerns about bias and discrimination.<br />
<br />
I think each of us also have innate dispositions for other particular attitudes and emotions. Given the partially-universal elements of music expression within human psychology, there may be individual factors that draw us to certain musics over others. Even within a given culture, some people simply prefer more boisterous music, while others prefer more subdued music. Of course, most of us have wide-ranging tastes and appreciate different music in different contexts — which is an issue for further down the framework.<br />
<br />
Obviously, innate traits are not enough to limit people to a certain box. Where one ends up is greatly affected by all the lower levels in my framework. Still, I suspect that I would be <i>relatively</i> creative and questioning compared to my peers even if I had grown up in a completely different culture. On the other hand, I am reasonably moderate overall (I come out pretty balanced on all personality tests I've taken), so external factors surely have pushed me in different directions. I believe we all have innate tendencies which connect to these generalized models, but we also have innate traits that are too subtle and nuanced to fit any simplistic abstraction.<br />
<br />
<h3>
<u>Culture</u></h3>
So we exist within the limitations imposed by the physical world, our basic biology, and common human psychology. Individuals with varying personality traits then live together within the social constructs of various cultures. By putting culture at this level in the framework, we can acknowledge
the common pressures that shape all cultures without making
assumptions about specific universals.<br />
<br />
Although cultural issues can be brought up in relation to nearly any topic from any field of inquiry, most cultural study is done within the field of <i>cultural anthropology</i>. Although there are systematic and cross-cultural comparative studies, the main focus of cultural anthropology is on describing the particular behaviors and beliefs of specific communities. Of course, the complex history of each culture is acknowledged along with its influences and interactions with other cultures.<br />
<br />
The study of music in cultural context is called <i>ethnomusicology</i>. In many respects, the field can be seen as anthropology that focuses on musical aspects of cultures. Different cultures have distinct ideas about what music is and isn't, what music's place in everyday life is, how to learn music, who gets to participate in what ways in music, what the purposes of music are, and much more. Identifying these things and exploring their ramifications is a large part of most ethnomusicological research.<br />
<br />
There is also an historic tendency to lump in with ethnomusicology any sort of study of so-called "world music" (i.e. music outside of the Western art music tradition or mainstream Western pop music). There is great variation among the world's music including different tuning systems, different rhythmic structures, different sorts musical instruments and ensembles, and so on. These differences are intertwined with broader cultural values, but some differences are arguably arbitrary.<br />
<br />
The majority of music has certain general features that are governed by general human psychology, as described above. The idea of variations on a theme is a common feature in much of the world's music, for example. But the starting themes as well as the ways in which they are varied are anything but universal.<br />
<br />
Everyone becomes enculturated in connection with particular musical idioms which greatly affect our beliefs about music and which develop our familiarity with certain sounds and musical structures. We also learn to associate different musics with our own culture, with different subcultures, or with foreign cultures. Some scholars assert that these associations are the primary significance of music — that the emotional and psychophysiological experience of music participation has its essential meaning in connecting people with a particular cultural worldview. I find this idea to be an overemphasis of this one level of my framework, but the connection of music to cultural identity is undeniably significant for most people.<br />
<br />
There is, of course, much more to say about musical cultures, and vast libraries of publications exist on the topic.<br />
<br />
<h3>
<u>Habitus</u></h3>
Habitus is a sociology term that means basically <i>habits of thought</i>. Each of us have dispositions that we acquire through life experiences. Many scholars use this term to emphasize the impact of culture on our individual dispositions. So for some, "habitus" is a primarily cultural issue. But I want to be broader and acknowledge that individual dispositions vary within a culture. Cultural factors exist which create common elements in our dispositions, but each of us have differing individual life experiences. Our experiences may vary along an undefined continuum based on our particular families, friends, and other circumstances, or we may be impacted by particularly anomolous life experiences such as a traumatic car crash. Within the contexts of the outer framework levels, our particular life experiences shape us further.<br />
<br />
In music, our habitus is shaped by the particular music we listen to, concerts we've attended, formal music training, associations of music with events in our lives (particularly during adolescence, as documented by numerous studies), and, of course, our overall musical culture. In the modern world, we are used to hearing specific recordings and specific types of recordings. Listeners are able to identify musical styles from mere milliseconds of recorded music. Trained musicians develop analytical listening approaches as well as associations between hearing music and playing their instrument.<br />
<br />
Though the term is not used, much of the writing in popular music books is actually focused on habitus. There are countless biographies of famous composers or popular songwriters, and a common element of these writings is the relation of peculiar experiences and life contexts to the music that these people create. A songwriter expresses through song his anger at being abandoned by his father. A composer challenges the status quo in formal harmony in connection with her political views influenced by events of the time. A virtuoso instrumentalist plays to honor the master teacher with whom he trained for many years. I have a "bio" link above to an older website in which I tell a story of my own musical experiences and how I developed to have my current habitus and personal identity as a musician, scholar, and teacher.<br />
<br />
<h3>
<u>Mood</u></h3><p>
At any given time we may feel tired, hungry, excited, depressed, peaceful… Psychologists distinguish between <i>emotion</i> as discrete temporary reactions to specific events and <i>mood</i> as an overall state on a slightly longer time frame. Whereas I may feel emotional listening to the chorus of a song, I have an overall mood at the time of attending the concert. My mood will greatly influence my emotions, of course. If I am feeling irritable and distracted, I am unlikely to be as receptive to certain elements of music. If I am in a thoughtful mood, I will analyze the music more than when I am in other moods.<br />
<br />
Although the outer levels of my framework influence the overall way we are affected by various contexts, particular aspects of a given event will impact our mood. A concert experience is greatly influenced by factors such as who we are with, the particular lighting, experiences just prior to the concert, and our physiological states. The experience of the music itself can then alter our moods as well, thus impacting the way we experience later music in the same concert.<br />
</p><h3><u>Subjective experiences</u></h3><p>The only direct experience we ever have is raw consciousness. The contents of consciousness include thoughts and sensations. Broadly, thoughts include all forms of images whether language (which itself is usually a mix of sound images and kinesthetic images — images of the muscle movements were we to speak the sounds) or visual images or other forms. Sensations include pressure, pain, heat, sound, light, proprioception, and so on.</p><p>Patterns of thought create concepts by which we organize our conscious experience. We have labels, predictions, memories, and so on. Through mindfulness meditation, people can learn to somewhat drop the concepts and notice only the raw thoughts and sensations. Most of the time, our expectations, labels, and other thoughts distract us. We find our attention focused on the stories in our thoughts that give meaning to our experience. Usually, we are not even aware of this process. We get lost in thought without the meta-cognitive awareness of it happening.<br /></p><p data-select-link-text="1">Music may influence us in even subconscious ways (and we have some ways to study that), but I think we can interrogate most of music through conscious experience. I doubt that a person under general anesthesia has any music experience.<br /><br />We can experience music as a sound image in our minds with no external stimuli. We can hear sound recordings. We can produce music through singing, playing instruments, and dancing. Whatever the details, we will have our moment-to-moment experience of the musical events. The emotional, cognitive, and body experiences are the combination of everything at all the levels of my framework all leading to what is here right now in our consciousness.<br /></p><p>
</p><h2>
Conclusion</h2>
If our goal is to understand our experiences as fully as we can, we must acknowledge the entire context. My conceptual framework is a practical guideline for the multiple layers of reality to be considered. Because any level contains an infinite depth of details, it is easy to get absorbed in a limited focus. But even when specializing in one level or another, we may recognize the limitations of our scope by stepping back and seeing how it fits in the bigger picture.<br />
<br />
Music is one of the most multifaceted and least defined areas of human
life. Because of this, there are extremely wide-ranging opinions about
it. There are profound music-related studies to be found at every level
in my framework. During a musical experience, the physical sound arrives at our ears and is processed by our biological perceptual system. Our cognitive processing then analyzes the sound into various patterns which create expectations, cultural associations, a perception of emotional expression, induction of our own emotional reactions, memories, and more.<br />
<br />
As a teacher, I try to respect all these elements at the many levels. I can use this framework to acknowledge my own context and the context of my students in their process of learning and development. Also, by explicitly discussing the issues and assumptions within each part of my framework, I help my students to break out of their own biases and relate to other situations, other individuals, other cultures, and to think critically about their own experiences and learning process.<br />
<br />
I hope others find this framework useful. Please feel free to contact me or add comments if you have any questions or feedback. Thanks for reading!Aaron Wolfhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9131476869173021866.post-393891058184279242012-08-10T09:24:00.001-07:002018-09-27T13:15:54.586-07:00Copying Is Not Theft: Barbershop Arrangement pt2<i><b>see <a href="https://blog.wolftune.com/2012/08/copyingisfun1.html" target="_blank">part 1</a> to check out the original song and the context that inspired my version</b></i><br />
<br />
Announcing my first published barbershop arrangement:<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>Copying Is Not Theft</b> by <a href="http://blog.ninapaley.com/" target="_blank">Nina Paley</a><br />
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
The song is licensed <a href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/" target="_blank">Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike 3.0</a> (as is my entire website). This means I have full legal right to do anything I want with it as long as I credit Nina and I license my version the same way. Lots of people have already made tons of variations of the song from jazz to punk rock versions.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmJ3ed92z8XLcNyQl-zTelgMQwjEEhIncRGEheuNyw2KgvAQN4hQZaBUT4cBIdYhxGec44G67m7ihs6DnPc_kJ8Q-O6Rk-NottTqh7kQoWVynad7K80sP80wrMt9FwdiHFN9uzec4rKNw/s1600/Screen+shot+2012-08-10+at+12.02.47+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="165" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmJ3ed92z8XLcNyQl-zTelgMQwjEEhIncRGEheuNyw2KgvAQN4hQZaBUT4cBIdYhxGec44G67m7ihs6DnPc_kJ8Q-O6Rk-NottTqh7kQoWVynad7K80sP80wrMt9FwdiHFN9uzec4rKNw/s200/Screen+shot+2012-08-10+at+12.02.47+PM.png" width="200" /></a>I made my barbershop arrangement using the free open-source music notation software <a href="https://musescore.org/" target="_blank">Musescore</a>.
This software not only produces great looking results, but it supports
fine tuning of pitch. I adjusted all the pitches to match just
intonation tuning to 1-cent accuracy. If you play the file in Musescore,
the harmonies are all well tuned to get nice pure barbershop harmonies
(though the sound is a saxophone sample). <span style="font-size: x-small;">[side note: to play back with swing rhythm in Musescore, go to the menu display>Play Panel]</span><br />
<br />
Download the <a href="https://archive.org/download/CopyingIsNotTheftForBarbershopQuartet/CopyingIsNotTheft-barbershop.mscz" target="_blank">Musescore file</a>. Or Download a <a href="https://archive.org/download/CopyingIsNotTheftForBarbershopQuartet/CopyingIsNotTheft-barbershop.pdf" target="_blank">PDF</a>.<br />
<br />
I made a quick audio recording by overdubbing my own singing and created fast-paced and slightly slower versions, an old-timey mix with virtual vinyl record crackles and such, and dedicated learning tracks for each part (with select part on one side of stereo and the other three on the other side).<br />
<br />
Here's an embedded audio player:</div>
<iframe frameborder="0" height="240" src="https://archive.org/embed/CopyingIsNotTheftForBarbershopQuartet&playlist=1" width="500" webkitallowfullscreen="true" mozallowfullscreen="true" allowfullscreen></iframe>
<br />
All the files are available to download at the best free, non-profit media sharing website: <a href="https://archive.org/details/CopyingIsNotTheftForBarbershopQuartet" target="_blank">archive.org/details/CopyingIsNotTheftForBarbershopQuartet</a><br />
<br />
Archive.org
automatically creates many file formats, so you can download any format
you like of the audio and do whatever you want with it (just include
the CC-BY-SA license and credit both me and Nina if you release any modified
version).<br />
<br />
I really hope some talented animator is up for creating an old-timey cartoon, maybe inspired by Nina's original cartoon but with a quartet singing… And I hope barbershop quartets out there choose to learn the song and perform it and perhaps make new recordings.<br />
<br />
Whether for a video version or for live performance, I have some ideas about choreography. The way I arranged the song, the idea is: the lead sings the first phrase alone, but the baritone jumps in and cuts off the lead for the second phrase. Then they copy each other and sing the third phrase together, splitting into harmony at the end, and then the whole quartet joins in.<br />
<br />
Overall, the arrangement follows very traditional barbershop harmony, full of all the little embellishments and with a new tag at the end. I added a decent amount of complexity that makes it more advanced than the most basic arrangement might have been, but in the end I stuck with mostly accessible stuff.<br />
<br />
So go copy this! Have fun! Change it! Perform it! Whatever! I'd love to be notified when anyone does something with this, but there's no legal requirement to do so.<br />
<br />
In harmony,<br />
Aaron<br />
<br />
P.S. I added just the "Copying Is Fun" tag to the wonderful barbershop tag collection at <a href="https://www.barbershoptags.com/tag-2034-Copying-Is-Fun" target="_blank">barbershoptags.com</a>. Aaron Wolfhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9131476869173021866.post-28976032565055997492012-08-10T08:42:00.000-07:002017-09-27T12:56:54.363-07:00Copying Is Not Theft: Barbershop Arrangement pt1Over many years, my views on copyright have morphed and evolved in complex ways. At one point, I was a strong advocate for copyright. I registered my own published CDs with the Library of Congress, and I even bought multiple copies of CDs to sell to my friends when I wanted to share music. But the problems with copyright have become so absurd that I cannot defend the status quo any longer.<br />
<br />
Over the years, I learned more about the complexities of the music industry, the inconsistencies with what is copyrighted and what isn't, the nature of music styles as almost entirely derived from common cultural heritage, the value of open culture and sharing, and the complexities of 21st century media… I changed my views pretty dramatically, but my ideas are still evolving. I have described the issues and my philosophical position in an article called <i><a href="http://blog.wolftune.com/2008/06/rational-view-of-copyright.html" target="_blank">A Rational View of Copyright</a></i>. I've continually updated the article since first writing in 2008, and I plan to reformat it soon, but it covers a wide range of issues.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVUSGnhpFZIgZK3YqrnnzaMdE3Qgv-CJYpAHwa-OLMm7EQnV6qS_buuKlinqef5JOITYUAi0ltgpRKJY6_VLK3F4U8s45m7LWXrAHkRHHQ8WHk5t2iYXdKxgBnVe3oqFcOvyI4HkLZufU/s1600/Copying+Is+Illegal.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;" target="_blank"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVUSGnhpFZIgZK3YqrnnzaMdE3Qgv-CJYpAHwa-OLMm7EQnV6qS_buuKlinqef5JOITYUAi0ltgpRKJY6_VLK3F4U8s45m7LWXrAHkRHHQ8WHk5t2iYXdKxgBnVe3oqFcOvyI4HkLZufU/s320/Copying+Is+Illegal.png" width="212" /></a>
Recently, I was singing with my casual barbershop quartet and we decided to try an arrangement of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oh_Shenandoah" target="_blank">Shenandoah</a>, a traditional American folk tune. It would be easy enough to make an arrangement, and the song is public domain, but I decided to order four <i>legal</i> copies of an arrangement from the Barbershop Harmony Society. When I got the sheet music, I was dismayed by obnoxious text printed over the notes stating "COPYING IS ILLEGAL."<br />
<br />
First of all, copying is <i>not </i>illegal! The United States copyright law protects <i>fair use</i>. That means that I can legally make a backup copy for myself to archive. I can make a legal copy in order to write notes to myself without marking up the original. And I can legally copy this excerpt and show it here for the sake of this essay.<br />
<br />
Secondly, I paid for a legal copy of this music. Why is my copy defaced with this annoying mark‽ It makes it harder to read! This mark doesn't just discourage copying, it discourages buying and reading the legal copy in the first place!<br />
<br />
Unfortunately, the Barbershop Harmony Society is a nice large target for copyright lawyers, so the BHS has taken a particularly strong position on copyright. Ironically, a huge portion of the songs that barbershoppers sing were written before 1923 and so are public domain, including Shenandoah. So barbershop benefits greatly from music being free to share and access. The main activities of barbershop singers include getting together at conventions and singing songs with each other, often teaching people new parts. Like other great participatory music traditions, barbershop embraces sharing and derivation. For this type of rich cultural experience, restrictive copyright is an extreme burden.<br />
<span id="goog_40251392"></span><span id="goog_40251393"></span><br />
I was told by a chorus director recently that his chorus was singing some old song about an apple tree or cherry tree (I forget which). They wanted to switch the words from apple to cherry (or reverse, whichever it was) in order to fit it into the theme of some other songs for their concert. Being so hypersensitive about copyright (thanks to all the admonitions from the society), they contacted the copyright holder. After lots of effort they were <i>denied</i> permission. Despite my belief that the change they wanted is legal fair use, they chose not to go ahead with performing the word change.<br />
<br />
Often the bureaucracy of copyright licensing is so bad that it is simply impossible to get anywhere. Read this short article about someone <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20110510004203/http://www.arrangersagainstcopyright.org:80/?p=91" target="_blank">trying to legally license an arrangement of Don Henley's song <i>Desperado</i></a>.<br />
<br />
All this got my thinking about Nina Paley's wonderful song, <i>Copying Is Not Theft</i>.<br />
I decided this deserves a barbershop quartet arrangement, so I made one. Check out my arrangement in <a href="http://blog.wolftune.com/2012/08/copyingisfun2.html">part 2</a>.<br />
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<iframe frameborder="0" height="480" src="http://archive.org/embed/CopyingIsNotTheft" width="640"></iframe>
Aaron Wolfhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9131476869173021866.post-36303930792019597202012-06-12T11:55:00.000-07:002012-06-12T14:25:50.106-07:00Book Review: Guitar Zero by Gary Marcus<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1594203172/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=wolftune-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=1594203172" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;" target="_blank"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://garymarcus.com/books/guitarzero_files/blocks_image_0_1.png" width="196" /></a></div>
At 40 years of age, Gary Marcus had no music training and no apparent musical talents, but he loved music. With the excuse of testing the learning capacity of adults, he decided to commit to really giving music a try for the first time. In his 2012 book <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1594203172/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=wolftune-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=1594203172" target="_blank"><i>Guitar Zero</i></a>, he tells of his experience. More significantly, he somehow managed to condense a vast overview of diverse research in music psychology and the psychology of learning into a fun read for all audiences.<br />
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If you assume this to be an instructional book, you will be overwhelmed. To follow the path of Professor Marcus, first become a tenured faculty at a well-funded institution; then get a paid sabbatical. As Marcus clarifies, the lack of dedicated time is the primary obstacle for most adult attempts at learning new skills. So, now that you have time, funding, and professional connections to call on, the next steps are simple: Make arrangements to meet some of the most famous living musicians; go take lessons with several of the very best teachers; and get the top experts in music psychology and theory to personally answer your questions and advise you on what research to read. With these simple steps, you too can become an adequate amateur musician!<br />
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Of course, Marcus is not suggesting that others could follow in his steps exactly. Instead, this book is more about the science of music and the science of learning, as told through a quirky personal story. Simply put, there's been no way to test theories about adult learning versus child learning. Children regularly put in persistent commitment over many thousands of hours; and researchers can't find adult beginners able to do the same. So Marcus decided to be subject number one.<br />
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<a name='more'></a>As Marcus discovers and presents convincingly, there are many reasons to doubt the popular idea that success is purely a matter of hard work and persistence. While hard work is a requirement for success, it is not a guarantee. Besides having the right supportive circumstances, there are a range of hereditary strengths and weaknesses that greatly influence our outcome. Talents run in families, even when controlling for learning environments. Some people simply pick up some skills much more easily than others.<br />
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On the other hand, Daniel Levitin, author of <i>This Is Your Brain On Music</i> (2006), was surely overly harsh when he diagnosed Marcus with congenital arrhythmia. Marcus may not be gifted in rhythm, but with the help of better teachers and lots of work, he eventually developed a legitimate feel for rhythm. Being a little slower at learning something does not make it unlearnable. Furthermore, evidence for so-called "windows of opportunity" is scant. There are certainly differences in child-learning and adult-learning (and Marcus describes these in depth), but it may well be that the vast majority of skills remain <i>learnable</i> throughout our lives.<br />
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The main shortcoming of <i>Guitar Zero</i> is in its contemporary Western cultural assumptions. The seemingly basic ideas of harmony, meter, scale, even <i>song</i> are far from universal. In the past, I've been criticized for complaining about this ethnocentrism in other books. Most people point out how obvious it is that this is about Western pop/rock music (with jazz and classical music acknowledged too). Perhaps it isn't fair to nit-pick. Clearly the vast majority of all the people Marcus came in contact with, from music scholars to guitar teachers to performers, all share this general Western definition of music, as will most readers. Beyond that, some effort was indeed made to clarify cultural context, just not to the extent of actually talking to knowledgeable ethnomusicologists or otherwise really questioning the Western assumptions. At its best, <i>Guitar Zero</i> can be viewed as exactly what it claims to be: a documentation of an American casual listener and scientist delving into learning electric guitar, with all the inevitable assumptions and issues that entails.<br />
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When Marcus first picks up a beginning guitar book, it is inevitably one of the countless generic methods that teaches the canon of beginning guitar stuff. Of course, that means it assumes standard tuning, goes into all the jargon of the Western musical alphabet, chord names, and bunches of arbitrary chord shapes to memorize. And despite Marcus' expertise in developmental psychology, he never seems to question the methodology. Instead, he defers fully to this random book. Marcus even carries this into <i>Guitar Zero</i>, writing (wrongly) that the "aspiring guitarist has to memorize [the full fretboard chart with names]." Marcus describes one of the most challenging versions of an F major chord as "the simplest version of the F major chord" (presumably because the book said so). After struggling with generic ear-training software (the typical sort that teaches tempered intervals at random completely out of context), Marcus declares that learning music (and guitar in particular) is just inherently super-difficult.<br />
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Most baffling is that Marcus later learns about alternate guitar tunings, different learning approaches, and more, but he didn't revise the earlier sections of his book. He could have described his struggles without suggesting that they were inevitable. The real lesson ought not to be that the guitar is unusually complex, challenging, and bewildering. The real lesson is that generic guitar pedagogy is lousy. Unfortunately, it seems Marcus fell into the common trap of feeling positive and nostalgic about his first book, perhaps because it was a challenge he overcame… Now, readers of <i>Guitar Zero</i> will be going out and buying more copies of the same mediocre method book, only to face the same lousy struggles but without Marcus' funding, time, and great teachers to go to later for help. The message to readers <i>should</i> have been to skip this generic guitar method approach and find a better way to start.<br />
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Leaving behind the (lousy) guitar method book, Marcus looked up some teachers, and from this point on, <i>Guitar Zero</i> is a marvelous book. Several different teaching approaches are described, such as a wonderful Suzuki guitar teacher with deep enthusiasm for her students, engaging teaching concepts, and wonderful pacing. This is followed with a superb and brief critique of the Suzuki method's rigid repertoire, unhealthy perfectionism, and lack of creativity. Quick mention is made of several other music teaching approaches: Dalcroze Eurythmics, Edwin Gordon, and others (acknowledging Orff and Kodaly but without time to discuss them). The conclusion is that many of these are great, but the quality of the individual teacher is the most important factor.<br />
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While Marcus' journey as a guitarist and musician is
interesting, what I find truly remarkable is how well he synthesized a
well-rounded understanding of music research in such a short time. This
book provides a better and more accessible summary of the general concepts of
music than most works by life-long music scholars and teachers.<br />
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<i>Guitar Zero</i> has a bit to say about all these subjects: music evolution, music and language, beat perception, melodic perception, harmony and tuning, expectation in music, musical genres, music and memory, music and emotion, music in social context, statistical learning, the balance between novelty and predictability, attention, personality, self-actualization, creativity, music technology, and more. All of this is surprisingly up-to-date and accurate while still succinct. Of course, having already read much of the academic literature myself, I can't be sure how meaningful the little tidbits here will be for general readers. It is clear, at least, that Marcus did his homework and really understands the latest perspectives on the science.<br />
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In the end, Marcus agrees with Steven Pinker's infamous statement that music is "auditory cheesecake." In other words, music is a superstimulus — a cultural invention which somehow triggers a whole interactive series of brain responses that we enjoy. There is no music center in the brain. Instead, cognitive capacities which exist for other purposes are utilized in music. I would like to qualify this by stretching the definition a little, however. We may not be designed specifically for cheesecake, but we are designed to desire <i>food</i>. Likewise, music in the definition that Marcus sees it (chords, melodies, pop songs, etc.) is surely an auditory dessert; but entraining socially to a rhythmic beat, for example, is more fundamental. Responding to the emotional expression of prosody in the human voice is also part of our basic nature. Put just these music<i>al</i> bits together, and we have something (an emotional dance-chant sort of thing?) which many people would call music, even if it lacks all the qualities of modern music. Overall, Marcus (and Pinker) are correct, though. Music in the modern sense is a cross-modal cultural phenomenon, restricted by and deeply connected to our basic biology but not inherent to it.<br />
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Disregarding a few other nit-picky complaints, I was awed and humbled by this marvelous work. There is no more accessible introduction to these subjects that I've seen. <i>Guitar Zero</i> is fun, informative, and inspiring. I was especially pleased to see certain ideas which I promote myself in my teaching: the analogy of tempered tuning to impressionist painting, emphasis on the enjoyment of improvisation, rejection of the idea that generational music preferences are about rebellion (today, lots of younger people love the music from their parents' time), and even mention of the phenomenal recordings by Dave Soldier of the survey-based <a href="http://davesoldier.com/experimental.html#Peopleswill" target="_blank">"most wanted" and "least wanted" music</a> (check it out, it's hilarious).<br />
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Furthermore, I agree with the final conclusion, which I'll emphasize even stronger in my own words: Music technology is already remarkable and may even one day achieve adequate synthetic expressiveness and variation so that computer-generated music is as enjoyable to listen to as music recorded by people. The lesson of <i>Guitar Zero</i> is that the real meaning of music comes from participating in it. The process, both personal and social, of playing music is more valuable than simply listening to the end result. Gary Marcus will never be a renowned professional musician, but I expect he would do this all over even without a book deal or the funding support, just because he now knows that engaging in music is a deeply fulfilling pastime.<br />
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For those, like myself and like Gary Marcus, who don't want to just go through the motions but want to study scientifically how it all works, I highly recommend <i>Guitar Zero</i>. It is fun and personal enough to really engage people who might not otherwise tread into the science, and it is scientific enough to satisfy the most scrupulous academics. That said, it is just a fun cursory overview. If you really want to learn about the science, check out Marcus' thorough references section.<br />
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[note: it's a relatively quick read, so I recommend that you do as I did and support your community by borrowing the book from your local public library. If you want to buy it though, the link at the top of this article goes right to Amazon.com]Aaron Wolfhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9131476869173021866.post-63517035004802675812012-02-10T18:22:00.000-08:002012-02-11T07:35:41.022-08:00Absolute vs relative pitch — my take<a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0786613688/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=wolftune-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=0786613688" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;" target="_blank"><img border="0" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmfCtoUVa-lqZKS43lxr-dX3yfztkDH-P_4ht96NO0Y_jFLwHMwEzPlLpaJzsvhzQU7iQw6D6r63Q6GDAG5bO3o0kufPHaYjkk7uffGfWJf1aDkFIrkx-V1S80aHwe8hvC-QieqUmuA_U/s200/MBGJSFRB.jpg" width="110" /></a>I was practicing guitar — in this case, sight-reading through a book of intermediate/advanced exercises in all different keys — when I found myself, as usual, distracted by reflective ideas about how I was processing the music. In this case, I found myself modulating back-and-forth between processing the notes in an absolute manner versus a relative manner...<br />
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Sitting down to write this, I worry about how to take on one of the most controversial issues in all of music in a short article. Entire books and websites and learning programs have been made on this topic. I do not have time or space to review them all or cite all the vast amounts of research, but the Wikipedia articles are a good starting point: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absolute_pitch">Absolute pitch</a> / <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relative_pitch">Relative pitch</a>. <br />
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There is more than enough evidence to conclude that all normal people are sensitive to both absolute and relative pitch. Some rare people are highly sensitive to absolute pitch, including the ability to explicitly name any pitch regardless of context — a skill often called "perfect pitch." All my personal acquaintances who have this ability are children of piano teachers or at least started music training at a very young age. It seems that full development of "perfect pitch" requires explicit connection between consistent sounds and consistent names during a critical period in early childhood. Nevertheless, everyone seems somewhat sensitive to absolute pitch (see <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Levitin_Effect">The Levitin Effect</a>).<br />
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-hYwOoOD5vUw/TzXN2VVfZ-I/AAAAAAAABGM/8EVZwedACYU/s1600/SweetAnt.jpghttp://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0262582783/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=wolftune-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=0262582783" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" target="_blank"><img border="0" height="130" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwU7iUMhiNE28f-cym4Mb3CuUNQbzelCqpKhm9JpfI3cJWlCcP6diITBJARBfbleeUwLFbAS8Z7A_8sTgLyo88cExJGuzCYXEVJTorlwpZP6E7lXWDGcgH52OLOo9A1ky1PIojM1ZZwOI/s200/SweetAnt.jpg" width="107" /></a></div>
In his wonderful book <i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0262582783/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=wolftune-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=0262582783" target="_blank">Sweet Anticipation</a></i>, David Huron argues (among a great number of other insights) that absolute pitch is unremarkable (it is easy to understand a neuron firing for particular pitches, and absolute pitch is how most animals recognize sounds). In contrast, the uniquely human ability to recognize relative pitch patterns is more cognitively significant. He supposes that when most children pick up on the idea that songs can follow patterns independent of their exact frequency, sensitivity to absolute pitch is actively suppressed in favor of relative focus.<br />
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David Huron furthermore asserts that relative pitch may be more about tonal categories than about absolute intervals. This is the ultimate view of relative pitch. Neither the precise frequencies of pitches nor the objectively measurable distances between pitches are of important consequence in music. Instead, the important factor is our cognitive representation of a pitch's context, such as the tonic or dominant, part of a major or minor scale, the root or third of a chord, or simply higher or lower (by a lot or a little). Huron undertook numerous empirical studies that support this view, such as the response
time of musicians instructed to place a single pitch in a subjective
internal tonal context.<br />
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Thus the problem with the oft-taught emphasis on learning even relative intervals out-of-context: Major thirds and minor thirds, for example, may be objectively different, but they both have a somewhat major feeling when conceived in a major-chord context (or minor in a minor-chord context). Similarly, using songs as mnemonics for intervals is problematic. True, <i>My Bonnie Lies Over the Ocean</i> starts with a major sixth, but it only works well in the same context of the fifth to the third of a major key. This mnemonic might be partly functional in other contexts, but it sure sounds strange to me to try to think of <i>My Bonnie</i> when going from the third to the root of a minor chord! I don't know with certainty that everyone hears this way, but David Huron and I do, and so do all the students I've taught. I am basically in agreement with Huron's views, and I recommend his book to anyone interested in learning more.<br />
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So, how does this relative pitch emphasis relate to music teaching, learning, and performing in everyday context?<br />
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There are a wide range of opinions on whether music instruction should emphasize absolute versus relative pitch. In many ways, the symbolic systems we use are biased in one way or the other.<br />
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The alphabet naming system is mixed. Though letters can be fixed to A440, 12EDO temperament, and concert C; they can also be transposed for different instruments, guitar capo positions, and non-standard tunings. Still, the letter system is rarely or never used in a truly relative way where a certain letter consistently represents the tonal center. Once a tuning is chosen and a transposition is set, the letter names do not move to follow relative changes in the music.<br />
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Solfege (Do-Re-Mi etc) is often taught in a truly relative manner (at least in the U.S. and Britain). In other schools of thought or countries (e.g. Spain) it is fixed, thus being simply a substitute for the alphabet system.<br />
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<a href="http://draft.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=9131476869173021866" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="85" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhksAWw_iD_tCOucP4EDW2v-ywO0bQKbdXLf9KZtZ4UkKNZ4tc4o3fwHNsfRsoMlRrr3p_2MO0b9OHNjuIQcOMInXNU7BWjRhbSELPatdeq4fqIbg38rPNLOhWN7f7vg9cf5CjcgE4n19w/s200/notes-staff.png" width="100" /></a>The Western staff notation system is unspecified. The staff is fully capable of being a completely relative representation, but it is most often taught to instrumentalists in an absolute manner. Singers, on the other hand, are often taught a relative interpretation of the staff. And dealing with this dichotomy in my own subjective experience is what inspired me to write this article...<br />
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When students first learn to read staff notation, they are usually taught in an absolute-pitch manner. This usually means an instruction of mechanical action to do with their instrument whenever they see a particular symbol. As they advance, they are introduced to more and more symbols and then to the complex issue of key signatures. In different keys, visual representation is thus necessarily somewhat relative. Two sets of notes may look the same aside from key signature, and the difference is primarily in the relationships and where the tonic is located. Thus, students can either learn all the different keys as a set of absolute patterns (e.g. knowing which sharps are in the key of E), or they could learn to think more relatively.<br />
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<a href="http://musescore.org/" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;" target="_blank"><img border="0" height="107" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlwF25yI5c8jpQyMh7g-8BNvufO8GbJSaMIVJqD7c8dHOLLIjg-VesepWB-Is66ptn9dLyXgqFlKDdL-JD-ee833Bfn86UziYfF2qoygqQfYsAZLp4O2w3FDUUdXFGTRZtzXWMOLLd0QU/s200/oddstaff.png" width="200" /></a>In a relative-pitch approach, a key signature only specifies something about the relationships in a scale and where the tonal center is marked. This works great for singers who just need to know where the tonic is and then they can sing the same pattern for any scale as long as they treat it relatively. Of course, because of the historic Western bias of the notation, the "key" is typically either major or minor and there are strict requirements for what can be in the key signature at the beginning. But, in principle, it would be possible to have a staff represent a scale of any number of notes and of any variety, as long as the singer learns what the scale sounds like.<br />
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I believe that the absolute-pitch tying of a note to an exact mechanical movement and exact sound is analogous to the "perfect pitch" naming skill. This absolute pitch focus is useful when needing a particular sound in an unexpected context, but it is cumbersome and hampering when playing otherwise predictable patterns in unusual keys.<br />
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<a href="http://www.stick.com/" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;" target="_blank"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3LmQdGDT7UmwTxAcUi5ouDAU2cEmkEbrlY08eSOk0MXb06txQCnUKgESE9q7Jion7U2gco3cZ6B9CcOGXmLC4_ZBqsigYVrHrEpZDcdF7ctxPfSmWCsCg9l5UwYb8fi1xqTnRDLXjDEA/s200/tenstringgrand.jpg" width="116" /></a>Different instruments are more or less absolute in orientation. Wind and brass instruments are inherently tuned to certain primary keys and use specific mechanical motions for different notes. These instruments do not easily transpose, but, with extensive training, wind players can learn to mentally surpass the tyranny of absolute pitch. In contrast, the <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0262582783/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=wolftune-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=0262582783" target="_blank">Chapman Stick</a> is a string instrument that uses no open strings, no sympathetic drone strings, and is tuned in parallel intervals (the same proportional pitch change from string to string). The Stick is therefore an optimal relative-pitch instrument. Stick players have no need to learn multiple key signatures. The exact same scale shape will work identically in any key. Once a starting point is determined, a Stick player can read staff notation by simply following the relationships. The guitar is a compromise: an instrument with some consistent relationships and patterns but some other idiosyncrasies that favor keys around the open strings.<br />
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A more relative or more absolute perspective on pitch will lead to differences in how one composes and improvises, and this will lead to music that favors one approach over the other. And, as much as I wish that songbooks and music teaching method books were printed with numerals instead of letter names for chords; as much as I would like to see transcriptions of international music styles made by simply mapping different scales onto a basic staff; and as much as I dislike the awkward irregularities of the Western pitch naming and notation systems... my wishes not reality in the world of music today...<br />
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So as I was playing through this book of exercises in all keys, I found myself wondering whether I <i>ought</i> to be thinking relatively or absolutely. Is the goal to train myself to relate an exact spot on the guitar to that particular note given in the key of D-flat? Or would I be better off to just recognize the key, find my position, and then think about where the note falls in relation to the key?<br />
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Ironically, the key-signature system highlights the value of a relative-pitch mindset (because we can see the common patterns across keys instead of just thinking absolutely about a single key), yet it is also unnecessarily cumbersome for relative pitch. For a purely relative system, we might as well keep the tonic always on the same line and just mark what scale goes around it and where to tune the tonic.<br />
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In my experience, the absolute vs relative mentalities create fundamentally different sight-reading experiences. Even playing a bit from memory, if I look at my guitar and think about the absolute pitch, it is a different perspective than seeing the relative patterns. And though I can do both and have some awareness of both at all times, switching is often confusing. It is most comfortable to pick one mindset or the other.<br />
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My subjective conclusion: <b>relative pitch feels far more musical.</b><br />
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I can easily see the practical values of absolute pitch. By always connecting to precise sounds, even the most unexpected music can be transcribed by someone with "perfect pitch." Likewise, instrumentalists who know what to do when they see a symbol are capable of playing modern atonal compositions. Communicating with musicians in a modern Western context involves knowing letter names and reading precise musical notes. I've even had some awareness of my own sense of absolute pitch: a certain ineffable surprise upon hearing a familiar song in an unfamiliar key, for example, or an intuitive sense for guitar tuning.<br />
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But absolute pitch focus feels like recognizing particular paint colors instead of seeing a beautiful compelling image. Identifying the brush stroke angle and exact colors may make it easier to copy a painting, but this could be a purely technical exercise. I would rather notice my profound emotional response to art and then try to make my own art to replicate those expressive qualities, even if this focus meant missing some of the technical details.<br />
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These perspectives may be two sides of the same coin, and they certainly coexist for most of us, but they do not feel the same. To learn to sing barbershop harmony, my friend with "perfect pitch" told me that he had to learn to focus on the relative pitch and blend. Furthermore, he claimed that he stopped tracking the absolute pitch, though he can quickly stop and check the absolute pitch in his mind if someone asks. In suppressing his "perfect pitch," he learned to be open-minded and appreciative of music even when it deviates from his absolute expectations. And he became a better musician in the process, though he still has trouble sight-reading if the key is transposed from what is on the paper. At the risk of presumption, I think my experience in thinking absolutely vs relatively in sight-reading guitar music is the same underlying phenomenon as my friend's "perfect pitch," only perhaps a weaker version. And while I respect his skill, I'm not envious. I'm going to continue trying to diminish my own absolute-pitch sense in favor of thinking more relatively.<br />
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Having reflected on these issues, I am even more confident in emphasizing relative pitch in my teaching, even from the very beginning. I have many students use capos to change the pitch of songs, for vocal reasons, for small hands on large guitars, or just for novelty. I had been concerned that this might impede them in some way, but now I think that suppressing absolute pitch in favor of relative is actually positive. I really believe a focus on patterns and relationships is a more musical, more meaningful approach. I may be positioning myself in opposition to the loud voices who proclaim the value of learning absolute pitch, but I believe they work to be loud because they are fighting against the tide. The meaning and experience of music has nothing to do with whether a pitch is A or B or 100Hz or 120Hz. The natural state of music is more relative than absolute. Just as our eyes easily accommodate different lighting, our ears accommodate different contexts. Musicians and teachers who over-emphasize absolute pitch (such as symbol=letter=mechanism) can't see the forest for the trees.Aaron Wolfhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9131476869173021866.post-5540621841894014302011-10-08T11:22:00.000-07:002014-10-28T20:22:55.993-07:00Review: Musical Cognition by Henkjan Honing<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<a href="http://amzn/141284228X/?tag=wolftune-20" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" target="_blank"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjD9OcC-jjDr-aKsXZruMsfKeZFHUqiwVyst3lDF2T_l54VH3EZBzYIJvZtz8nEV5tjdXRaQ478VQ29VMY6sh6nfnEf8kXLJFvkTzyOQ8vfqktfZ7o0QJjgIv7MbEyp6VX4U_QZ6osZPjA/s1600/Musical-Cognition.png" height="200" width="136" /></a><a href="http://amzn/141284228X/?tag=wolftune-20" target="_blank"><i>Musical Cognition: A Science of Listening</i></a> is a short, concise book for popular readers that describes<span class="st"> University of Amsterdam</span> professor Henkjan Honing's particular views of music. This review is of the 2011 English translation recently published by Transaction Publishers.<br />
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With only 160 brief pages, this is a relatively quick read. The book is more like a long pamphlet introducing basic ideas but not getting deep. The writing style is very accessible and clean, with no technical jargon, notation, or traditional music theory. The 15 short chapters have clear internal breaks and section headings, so it is very easy to digest this in tiny chunks, which is something I appreciate in any book, whether popular or technical.<br />
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<a name='more'></a>The introductory content does a superb job of clarifying music as a cognitive process:<br />
<ul>
<li><b>Music is not language.</b> There are parallels and shared features between music and language, but they are quite distinct. Emotional prosody, shown most strongly in infant-directed-speech, show musical as well as linguistic properties. Yet attempts to find language-like syntax in music are misguided. Music is not restricted by semantics or strict lexicons. Music can be more or less surprising or stylistic, it can be more or less accessible, but music does not have rules of grammar that can be truly violated the way we have in language.</li>
<li><b>Music is not sound.</b> Music is a subjective experience within a listener's mind. We can ignore claims about mathematical properties and other structures that supposedly exist in music as a external object. Music is about perception and cognition. If we don't perceive a structure in any regard, then it is not in the music. [In this regard, of course, music and <i>language</i> are the same!]</li>
<li><b>People are innately musical</b>, whether or not they have any formal training, any performance skills, or any ability to explain anything about music. The act of listening to and enjoying music requires cognitive abilities that are remarkable and complex yet are present in basically all normal human beings.</li>
</ul>
Honing addresses the subject of music's evolution, arguing that music is an exaptation: it does not serve a necessary survival function, but is built on independent adaptive functions and has now taken on its own purposes in human life. We can see music as an exceptionally rich cognitive and social game — a game powerful enough to strongly influence our moods, emotions, and identities.<br />
<br />
I appreciate Honing's approach overall. He attacks the relativism and postmodern anti-scientific attitudes that pervade musicology these days. He uses the music/food analogy (see <a href="http://blog.wolftune.com/2010/10/some-perspective-how-music-is-like.html">my post</a>), pointing out that music notation is like a recipe — it doesn't itself provide nourishment.<br />
<br />
Honing also points out the relative nature of music. Absolute pitch or timing is not as important as the relationships between pitches and events. Just as we can still enjoy watching a TV show on different screens that have different color settings, we recognize and appreciate music even when played through fuzzy speakers or when pitches or timing are slightly different. On the other hand, we recognize and respond to subtle deviations in pitch and timing within the overall context. I disagree with Honing in his dismissal of the issues of tuning and temperament, but I agree with the focus on perception and cognition over purely mathematical theorizing. Pitch is not a matter of just math, it is a matter of cognition and human experience.<br />
<br />
Unfortunately, the only specific music cognition subject covered in in this book with any depth is rhythm — specifically the particular subjects of Honing's main research: beat-induction, timing, and syncopation. Other topics, when discussed at all, are glossed over without a lot more depth than I'm providing in this review.<br />
<br />
Honing uses the shave-and-a-haircut rhythm cliche to discuss syncopation (<a href="http://musicalcognition.blogspot.com/2011/08/4a-chapter-10-figure-101-p-87.html">click here</a> for the book's online supplement with audio). Initially he says, regarding the feeling of syncopation in the pause, "no matter how hard you try, you can't hear it any other way." This leads me to try, of course, and I <i>can</i> succeed at hearing it in other ways. If I consciously focus on the rhythm in a triple meter instead of duple, then there is no syncopation. Honing actually acknowledges and explains this himself a few pages later, but then why have the misleading incorrect initial comment? Furthermore (unacknowledged by Honing), it is possible, even with duple meter, to reduce the feeling of syncopation by simply de-emphasizing the note just before the pause and treating it more as a minor echo connected to the strong previous note, instead of as a lead-in to the pause. Of course, my points here fully support Honing's main emphasis that musical experience is all in the mind.<br />
<br />
A later chapter discusses how perceived and performed rhythmic timing varies greatly from mechanical exactness. Though not stated as such, the shave-and-a-haircut audio on the website is a perfect demonstration of awkward mechanical timing. I find it to be jarring how even the timing is in that example.<br />
<br />
For some reason, Honing seems almost antagonistic about the evidence of non-human beat induction found by Patel et al in <a href="http://youtu.be/sVXABiulo9k">Snowball the dancing cockatoo</a>. While acknowledging their results, Honing makes a point of sewing as much doubt as he can about the study. His prior belief that he does not want to give up is that beat induction is uniquely human. Regardless of the validity (the studies appear well-controlled and valid to me), there is no reason why human-uniqueness would have any impact on the significance of music. So humans and parrots both can feel the beat... hmm, very interesting. That certainly doesn't take anything away from my musical experience!<br />
<br />
On the other hand, Honing has no hesitation to jump to bold conclusions from his own <a href="http://cf.hum.uva.nl/mmm/newborns/index.html">research on beat induction in newborn babies</a>. I think there is a good chance his conclusions are correct, but his studies are arguably less controlled than Patel's. From what I can tell, Honing did not control for tempos, irregular timing, different sounds, or a number of other factors. His EEG study shows evidence of surprise in babies when a bass drum sound is missing from "beat one" in a rock beat. Maybe the surprise would not happen if the sound occurred a little earlier or late (instead of missing entirely). Maybe a change in sound would elicit surprise as well. Maybe a totally irregular rhythm (no steady beat) that still had events at a certain average frequency would elicit the same surprise when a longer than normal pause between events occurred. Honing's stimuli did not include missing of the bass drum sound at any other points in the beat, so we can't conclude that the babies felt beat "one" as most salient versus beat three or the upbeat after beat three. I expect that Honing is right that newborns have full beat induction, but his limited research is far from conclusive.<br />
<br />
Overall, I am in full agreement with Honing about the value of studying cognitive universals in music. Music exists in the mind and so is, in principle, a subject entirely contained within the field of psychology (though worthwhile research is, of course, not at all limited to the controlled psychology lab). However, Honing's emphasis on music as the act of listening, active as listening truly is, betrays some cultural bias for the Western concept of music. Honing would have a sense of steady beat that gives rise to beat induction as fundamental to music (acknowledging that a good beat deviates quite a lot from precise even timing). This denies those musical traditions that do not utilize a steady pulse. Also, Honing shows serious Western bias in his unqualified suggestion that harmonic progressions are fundamental in identifying songs. In this and other ways, cognitive music researchers too often are culturally-biased in how they devise their hypotheses, studies, and conclusions. But this is not the fault of music cognition as a field. I expect Honing and all his colleagues graciously welcome insights from cross-cultural perspectives, as long as they respect the idea of scientific inquiry and music as cognitive experience.<br />
<br />
It is exciting to be witnessing a cognitive revolution in the field of music, and Honing is one of the figures at the forefront. Each new book and research publication helps get closer to a new understanding of music free from the constraints of traditional assumptions about notation or talent or culture. I want to recommend <i>Musical Cognition</i> because I want more people to accept this overall viewpoint. However, I'm not sure that it is worth rereading much. It is a bit overpriced given the minimal content. It is something like a long position paper, worth reading once, maybe getting from the library...Aaron Wolfhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9131476869173021866.post-69680435468424457622011-07-05T18:54:00.014-07:002021-07-24T20:35:26.250-07:00Brain Parts Song VIDEO (and Creative Commons discussion)Several weeks ago, I posted a recording of my new <a href="http://blog.wolftune.com/2011/05/new-recording-brain-parts-song.html">Brain Parts Song</a>. I mentioned then that it called for a video, and I realized later that I couldn't rely on someone else to do it. But that doesn't mean I had to create everything from scratch. Thanks to the internet and <a href="http://creativecommons.org/">Creative Commons</a>, I was able to put together a very effective video:<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="390" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/vYwOtTMUz0c?rel=0" width="640"></iframe></div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">The player above is from YouTube, but I also uploaded to <a href="http://vimeo.com/26067401">Vimeo</a><br />
and </span><span style="font-size: x-small;">to <b><a href="http://www.archive.org/details/BrainPartsSongVideoByAaronWolf">Archive.org</a></b>, a great media site that is free, open, and non-profit! I also posted files with chords at that link.<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vYwOtTMUz0c"></a></span></div>
<br />
There's so much in this video packed into 3 minutes, so I highly recommend repeated viewings/listenings for anyone wanting to use this song as a memory/learning aid. The song lacks the exact repetitiveness of much pop music, but it can be pretty catchy after hearing it enough.<br />
<br />
I was concerned about my original audio-only recording for learning purposes because the brain parts are not the words being rhymed, so they could be wrongly mixed up and the song would still work musically. I think having the associated video content solves the problem. I'm a bit disappointed how the mistake/joke about the Anterior Cingulate Cortex isn't as surprising and funny as it is with audio alone, and other hidden subtleties in the recording are more obvious now that they are illustrated visually, but there's new subtleties and details in the video content, so it's all good.<br />
<br>
Side-note: as the video hints at, these ideas are simplistic beginning concepts. Besides plasticity, even concepts like having separate motor and sensory areas are wrongish. The whole neocortex has motor and sensory aspects. The main distinction within the cortex is more about which parts are most connected to signals from elsewhere in the brain and body. Don't take any of these rough elementary 101 ideas too strictly.
<br>
<br />
I had fun making this, and I hope everyone enjoys it and maybe learns something too.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
Read on for discussion of making this with Creative Commons, and for credits and lyrics</div>
<br />
<a name='more'></a><br />
<br />
<b>Issues with Creative Commons licensing:</b> <br />
<br />
For a mere three minutes, this took a lot of work. Google, Flickr, and <a href="http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page">Wikimedia</a> were great sources. In finding Creative-Commons-licensed material, however, I came up against an important-to-understand yet non-obvious situation:<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b>The <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/" target="_blank">Creative Commons Non-Commercial (CC BY-NC) license</a> </b>(and also the BY-NC-SA license)<b> substantially hampers the creation of </b><b><i>non-commercial </i></b><b>derivative works!</b></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
This non-commercial license is usually chosen by people who want to share their work with other creative artists yet still be paid royalties for any commercial use. However, a simple CC <i>share-alike</i> license is enough to stop traditional commercial enterprises from taking advantage of the artist's CC generosity. I doubt a network TV show, for example, would use a song licensed as CC BY-SA (other than by paying the creator under a regular copyright license), because they wouldn't want to license the whole show under Creative Commons. So any share-alike license will probably discourage major commercial exploitation. Small-time commercial uses that would happily accept a share-alike license are probably not going to pay much of anything anyway, and it'd be better for most creators to allow such use and benefit from the publicity.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
But here's the real problem with the NC license: <b>I made a non-commercial video but could not use any NC-licensed content because that is incompatible with the BY-SA content I used from Wikimedia and elsewhere!</b></div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Again, choosing BY-NC over the BY-SA license probably makes little or no difference regarding major commercial use. What NC primarily does is: stops people from mixing the content with anything from Wikimedia or any other BY-SA content. If someone writes a song, licenses it as CC BY-NC, they just stopped fans from making awesome videos using images from Wikimedia.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
I used lots of BY-SA content from Wikimedia. This would have otherwise been impossible. I don't have the ability to make my own accurate images of brain anatomy! Therefore, even though I was planning to license that way regardless, I am now <i>required</i> to license my video in the same way. This means <b>everyone is free to share and alter or use parts of my video and song, as long I am credited, any content I used from others is appropriately credited, and any new derivative is also licensed the same way to keep sharing.</b> Because this <i>allows</i> commercial use, I cannot include <i>any</i> material that restricts commercial use, even if my project and all its derivatives ever remain non-commercial. I still can't include NC-licensed material because allowing commercial use is incompatible with restricting it.<br />
<br />
The simplest take-away is: You saw my video; would you have liked it to have included <i>your</i> photo perhaps? The photos I used have been seen by many thousands of people, and I included credit and link-back for everything. Helping me make this video is great, and it also helps get attention for the work of these great photographers.<br />
<br />
Well, if you use a license with NC or ND restrictions (or not even any CC), then I skipped your photos, as did who-knows-how-many other neat projects.<b> If you liked my video, put a CC-BY-SA or CC-BY or CC0 mark on your work from now on.</b> My video wouldn't have existed without people doing that.<br />
<br />
I encourage all creative people to use CC BY-SA and contribute to the growing and valuable resources of Creative Commons!</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
I license this entire blog under CC-BY-SA too, as marked at the bottom of the site.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" target="_blank">Click here for the precise details of the CC BY-SA license</a>.<br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Side note: YouTube recently added the ability to mark videos CC-BY but no other CC license. Vimeo and Archive.org, on the other hand, both have full support for marking all Creative Commons licenses, thus making them superior places (at present) for CC content. Ideally, YouTube would just add CC-BY-SA. I'm ok with ignoring the problematic NC and ND licenses. Anyway, anyone can always say in the description and on the video itself what the license is.</span></div>
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
</div>
<h4>
LYRICS:</h4>
This is a song about parts of the brain<br />
I'm singing it to memorize the names<br />
The ideas here may be simplistic<br />
But matching meaning and rhyme is a tough logistic<br />
<br />
The cerebral cortex has four main lobes<br />
with names from the nearby skull bones<br />
<br />
Frontal does the thinking<br />
Occipital deals with vision<br />
Parietal senses objects<br />
and Temporal listens<br />
<br />
Inside these lobes there's specialties<br />
like Broca's Area which produces speech<br />
Wernicke's Area handles language comprehension<br />
and the Motor Cortex is for moving with intention<br />
<br />
The Sensory Cortex handles perception<br />
of touch, pain, temperature and proprioception<br />
<br />
There's two outer brain parts that are distinct <br />
They may seem separate, but everything's linked<br />
<br />
The Cerebellum does balance & coordination<br />
and has our memorized-movement archive<br />
The Brainstem sets heartbeat & respiration<br />
and other things that we need to survive<br />
<br />
The brain's inner parts are unique<br />
cut the Corpus Callosum to take a peek<br />
<br />
The Thalamus handles signal routing <br />
and the Amygdala's emotions can have you shouting<br />
<br />
The Hippocampus does our long-term memory saving<br />
and the Hypothalamus makes our sex and food cravings<br />
<br />
The Anterior Cingulate Cortex learns from mistakes<br />
and in controlling movement, the basal ganglia is the brakes<br />
<br />
The brain parts list is much longer, indeed<br />
But for my class assignment this is all I need<br />
<br />
<br />
-----<br />
<div style="text-align: left;">
Credits for images:<br />
<br />
Patrick J. Lynch, medical illustrator, and C. Carl Jaffe, MD, cardiologist:<br />
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Skull_and_brain_normal_human.svg<br />
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Brain_stem_normal_human.svg<br />
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Brain_human_sagittal_section.svg<br />
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Lungs_diagram_detailed.svg<br />
<br />
from Gray's Anatomy (public domain):<br />
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Gray720.png<br />
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Brain_diagram_without_text.svg<br />
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Schaedel-mensch-seitenansicht.jpg<br />
<br />
Human Eye by Rainer Ebert<br />
http://www.flickr.com/photos/rainerebert/3206069919/<br />
<br />
Rosenthal rotating cube in Ann Arbor, photo by Douglas Muth:<br />
http://www.flickr.com/photos/dmuth/477646651/<br />
<br />
Ear by David Benbennick<br />
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ear.jpg<br />
<br />
Breakdancing:<br />
http://www.archive.org/details/minitobozmoiBboy<br />
<br />
Touching Metorite by Bo-Gordy-Stith:<br />
http://www.flickr.com/photos/56981926@N00/2280381435<br />
<br />
Cast by Mark Tristan:<br />
http://www.flickr.com/photos/marktristan/453108653/<br />
<br />
Alpha shivering on the deck:<br />
http://www.flickr.com/photos/avlxyz/3063515370/<br />
<br />
Upside Down by Johnny Jet:<br />
http://www.flickr.com/photos/johnnyjet/2830416793/<br />
<br />
Balance Beam:<br />
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Balance_beam_GMM.jpg<br />
<br />
Juggling by Peter Fristedt:<br />
http://www.flickr.com/photos/fristedt/2124210791/<br />
<br />
Electronic phase control by Dmitry G:<br />
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Electronic_phase_control_relay.jpg<br />
<br />
Expression of Emotions by Guillaume Duchenne:<br />
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Expression_of_the_Emotions_Figure_21.png<br />
<br />
All We Need Is Smile:<br />
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jimmydavao/3140483621/<br />
<br />
Triste by Arwen Abendstern:<br />
http://www.flickr.com/photos/arwen-abendstern/2100162345/<br />
<br />
Scream and Shout by Mindaugas Danys:<br />
http://www.flickr.com/photos/mindaugasdanys/3766009204/<br />
<br />
Always Kiss Me Goodnight by Courtney Carmody:<br />
http://www.flickr.com/photos/calamity_photography/4640356465/<br />
<br />
Brooklyn Heights Pizzeria by Robert Banh:<br />
http://www.flickr.com/photos/robertbanh/3279100562/<br />
<br />
Human Heart by Mikael Häggström:<br />
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Human_heart.png<br />
<br />
Basal Ganglia by John Henkel:<br />
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:BrainCaudatePutamen.svg<br />
<br />
various images from BodyParts3D/Anatomography:<br />
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Animations_using_BodyParts3D_polygon_data<br />
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Animations_from_Anatomography<br />
<br />
----<br />
<br />
P.S. You think people could just ask for permission every time? It was a ton of work just finding resources and going through the due diligence to credit them all. It becomes prohibitive to have to ask permission all the time. Some people don't even have time to answer requests. There's tons of reasons why permission-culture is a broken model. Anyway, I couldn't use any such ask-permission-first material in this video for the same reasons stated above about NC. These extra requirements are incompatible with the license of the other CC-BY-SA sources. </div>
Aaron Wolfhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9131476869173021866.post-70589815550496727492011-06-06T08:28:00.001-07:002011-06-06T09:14:34.971-07:00Review: How Music Works by John Powell<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7RslEaxux2lDfOfdLP4wdfbnAlBnfkx5z2I7pOCv-J6HravpUbjC3jitpjYBPLqgS4bG_WuBZ-YKiDAYwSaQtzaJrrjmIua8iG7s11GCMY4kfk2sylyGBrWj17hV4zjPy4S23hG76tuY/s1600/How-Music-Works-198x300.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7RslEaxux2lDfOfdLP4wdfbnAlBnfkx5z2I7pOCv-J6HravpUbjC3jitpjYBPLqgS4bG_WuBZ-YKiDAYwSaQtzaJrrjmIua8iG7s11GCMY4kfk2sylyGBrWj17hV4zjPy4S23hG76tuY/s200/How-Music-Works-198x300.jpg" width="132" /></a></div>Since I first learned about things like tuning and temperament, the cognitive processing of rhythm, and the perception of timbre, I have had thoughts of writing some sort of universal how-music-works book. Music is usually taught through cultural context (sometimes without revealing this angle), and little to no mention of universal perceptual and cognitive facts. Clearly, however, I am not alone in having this idea of writing some universal music book. John Powell's 2010 book <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0316098302/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=wolftune-20&linkCode=as2&camp=217153&creative=399349&creativeASIN=0316098302"><i>How Music Works: The Science and Psychology of Beautiful Sounds, from Beethoven to the Beatles and Beyond</i></a> has a same main title that is included in the subtitle of the <a href="http://blog.wolftune.com/2011/01/review-music-instinct-by-philip-ball.html">book I previously reviewed by Philip Ball</a> from just earlier in 2010. These two books are far from alone in this burgeoning arena of authors hoping to enlighten the world to their grand universal insights on the nature of music. Unfortunately, these attempts all fall short of what I would like to see. If I had the same standards as John Powell, I would probably have already written my submission to the field. But I'm trying to learn from the attempts of others first and/or to find existing books I can truly recommend without qualification (<a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0262692376?ie=UTF8&tag=wolftune-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=0262692376"><i>Music and Memory: An Introduction</i> by Bob Snyder</a> being among the best I've yet found).<br />
<a name='more'></a><br />
It is interesting to note the stark contrast between John Powell's book and Philip Ball's. On the one hand, they could have swapped covers and titles with no impact. They both cite David Huron's superb book <i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0262582783?ie=UTF8&tag=wolftune-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=0262582783">Sweet Anticipation</a></i>, just one of many indications that the authors have overlapping background understanding. They both discuss tuning, physics, style, and psychology. They both are biased toward Western traditions even as they attempt to be otherwise. Yet Ball's book is dense, full of complex discussion and examples covering an immense range of topics especially cultural and historical and cognitive issues, and its audience is probably college students seriously wading into these subjects. Powell's book, however, is a light jokey volume glossing over the surface of a smaller set of topics focusing on physics and practical realities about instruments and technology; it is for a truly lay popular audience. <br />
<br />
The best parts of <i>How Music Works</i> cover (though mostly in only simple introductory style):<br />
<ul><li>The arbitrariness of the standard tuning of A440 </li>
<li>How perfect pitch is learned through very young music training and doesn't really have much relation to musicianship aside from the correlated value of young training (and, of course, how perfect pitch is now connected to the arbitrary A440 standard, but historically was not)</li>
<li>The dubiousness of specific keys (e.g. C vs D) having distinct emotions </li>
<li>how the vibration of strings gives rise to the harmonic series (particularly clear and well-illustrated for a static book)</li>
<li>basic instrument acoustics, how instruments work (though he unfortunately omits pitched inharmonic instruments like bells and gamelon gongs)</li>
<li>the general basics of timbre </li>
<li>understanding loudness perception and the screwy dB measurement system (in this particularly well-written section, Powell advocates convincingly for <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sone">sones</a> as a superior alternative to decibels)</li>
<li>how microphones and speakers work (clear but extremely brief and lacking detail) </li>
<li>how different media work and why dogmatic ideas such as vinyl discs being superior to CDs are nonsense (though admittedly some recordings on CDs were remastered in inferior ways to their original vinyl releases, that is not inherent to the media)</li>
</ul>Powell also has some debatable but good points about comparing popular and classical styles, about improvisation, and about music being just a skill anyone can learn rather than some mystical gift.<br />
<br />
Unfortunately, the book is more problematic when it comes to explanations of pitch. Powell is not hesitant to just proclaim things good and bad without explanation. He describes a poorly made souvenir bamboo flute with equally-spaced holes as horrendously out of tune, as though anyone would clearly hear how terrible it is. While his point holds about evenly-spaced holes <i>not</i> producing evenly spaced tones, I find the sound of the flute to be interesting and of musically valid potential despite being exotic to any tuning system I am used to. To teach about the psychology of music perception, we need to describe how we experience different tunings, not just label them right and wrong.<br />
<br />
Powell makes a biased and altogether mistaken assumption that the features of the 12-tone equal tempered system have always been the goal for all musicians. He goes on to say basically that Europeans found <i>the</i> solution to tuning in the mid-18th century and that's that. He even attempts a sort of self-deprecating humor by berating a British piano company for failing to move to the new system until well into the 19th century. He suggests that Pythagoras was aiming for modern equal temperament and just got it wrong. There's even a remark implying that transposing and modulating songs to different keys is a universal goal (in reality, the majority of cultures and music throughout history does not have this goal at all).<br />
<br />
Powell has a tendency to make vague claims with the apparent assumption that readers will just take his word for things and just think it sorta made sense. He says all pianos are tuned the same now and to simple equal temperament (not quite true, ask any piano tuner). He claims that steady drones as accompaniment to singing were <i>sung</i> as the next step after simple melodies alone, and that this happened in some vague ancient maybe even prehistoric time (these claims are dubious, the first drones were probably instruments, and we have basically no evidence about the details of singing in ancient times).<br />
<br />
Powell teaches the pentatonic scale as a universal foundation and tunes it according to Pythagorean chaining (meaning each note is a 2:3 ratio perfect fifth from the previous in the system, then adjusted for octaves). But then, Powell gives just intonation ratios like 4:5 and 3:5 as the tuning for the resulting scale. This is simply wrong. The implication is that musicians would tune one way to derive the scale but then either re-tune to get the simpler harmonies or that the scale works by approximating these simpler harmonies. These are totally questionable claims, and Powell doesn't even acknowledge them. Instead, he appears to suggest that (e.g.) 1.5 x 1.5 x 1.5 = 3.3333... (it really equals 3.375, and these may be very close but the difference is musically quite audible, a difference known as a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syntonic_comma">syntonic comma</a>).<br />
<br />
The entire discussion of pitch is basically the minimal showing of some patterns to convince lay readers that the claims are justified — without enough clarity to actually have readers understand the evidence enough to question it or even utilize it in learning.<br />
<br />
The section on traditional Western theory (notation, chord names, scales, etc) is unremarkable. Some explanations of chords and scales and rhythms are accurate enough. Nothing here is special or new. Some of it is wrong (he defines the word "harmony" as the progression of chords in a song). Mostly, this section has too much take-my-word-for-it bits, and the result is that real reasons for the patterns and names simply aren't accessibly explained. Readers who already know the Western jargon will get little new here. The biggest problem here is that focusing on the Western notation automatically biases the explanations toward certain things that this book is supposed to be going beyond.<br />
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There are many further criticisms I could mention ranging from specific problems with his tuning explanations to the total lack of reference in the book to the contents of the included CD (which is some select explanations of content from the book with narration and sound examples).<br />
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Overall, John Powell is clearly motivated in the same way as I am: to take broad scientific insights into music and deliver and new accessible introduction to a general audience. His result is mixed. Like a flashy television documentary, he is more engaging and accessible than many authors. Readers will certainly come away with some new insights and perspective. The overview of instrument acoustics is among the best I've seen. But there are problems here that really deserve better treatment. The whole package feels (like Philip Ball's book I reviewed earlier) like a jumbling together of a bunch of blocks of different quality that don't quite make a grand structure as a unit. Powell should be commended, however, for writing in a very accessible and fun style designed to reach a broad audience.<br />
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If you get this book through your local library, it may be worth a read, just keeping in mind the concerns I've presented here.Aaron Wolfhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9131476869173021866.post-12670361973996334292011-05-22T18:16:00.005-07:002011-05-23T07:41:34.410-07:00New recording: The Brain Parts SongAfter giving up the chance to start my PhD now, I'm pushing myself to get involved in lots of projects until I potentially re-apply to grad schools. Among other things, I'm taking an online class through the local community college: Human Development and Learning. This class relates to my interests in psychology and education, plus it will be valuable if I ever pursue formal teacher certification.<br />
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This week's assignment was to do something creative involving learning the basic parts of the brain, so I wrote a song, of course:<br />
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<a href="http://soundcloud.com/wolftune/brain-parts-song">Brain Parts Song</a> by <a href="http://soundcloud.com/wolftune">Aaron Wolf</a><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><object height="81" width="100%"> <param name="movie" value="http://player.soundcloud.com/player.swf?url=http%3A%2F%2Fapi.soundcloud.com%2Ftracks%2F15752564&show_comments=true&auto_play=false&color=005fff"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed allowscriptaccess="always" height="81" src="http://player.soundcloud.com/player.swf?url=http%3A%2F%2Fapi.soundcloud.com%2Ftracks%2F15752564&show_comments=true&auto_play=false&color=005fff" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="100%"></embed> </object></div><br />
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<tr><td><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVLh4mr3jQYzh1jU-oK67mqYdbI400UvW2uJUDMxS2OIvCi79uLx7AGmjFLYBpsFgaaT9mQIYuw_uAu5sRnaBN0mkWR8iDtUrXCYv7lDUczeN7xWWYmk6Chom_Kww3d4dZ8VhBN-0zpys/s1600/Screen+shot+2011-05-22+at+8.43.24+PM.png" width="300" /></td><td><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZPzy4S6SHz5AnEyOLIsk0h7uX8n44otAU6Y1rXCDGTW6ycuPTNoNOhMPZMk-vh-rcSCPzKyOAZ5j9k2GZnAkLSIZ35ADZaTzfU7ocb_BRkyz5NLylOXLy5FnC39b6_9uGrc0TwYdvF3Y/s1600/Screen+shot+2011-05-23+at+10.25.58+AM.png" width="300" /></td></tr>
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I had to fight the urge to be a perfectionist. I simply didn't have time to add all sorts of instrumentation or details or make a video... maybe another time, but I'm busy with other things.<br />
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This song is very purpose-driven: a song for memorizing. Unfortunately, I don't think it does that optimally. These brain part names are really hard to rhyme, so I resorted to rhyming words that fit descriptions of the parts. However, that choice means that <i>the names could be erroneously mixed up and the song would still work musically</i>. Plus, this might be too much content crammed into three minutes — it would be more memorable if there were room for more exact repetition. I'm happy with the result, and I did my best, but it may not be the best study tool for everyone... At least it's a fun song.Aaron Wolfhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04670838392000704327noreply@blogger.com0