I read a review of Frank Zappa and the And this week – and despite its negativity, it got me thinking about the ways in which our world views impact the ways in which we interpret meaning in music. Being simplistic about it – if one looks at the world through a Marxist lens, the chances are you will be suspicious of (what you perceive to be) authority (such as universities or academics), not to mention the ‘truth’ that institutionalised narratives impose. Likewise, if you regard music to be ‘absolute’ (when its beauty is itself), semiological (where it has the potential to refer to meanings outside of the music itself) or spiritual (where it has some relation to the divine) – your world view will play a big part in helping you decide what the music ‘MEANS’.
For me, as outlined in Gadamer’s ‘Truth and Method’ – real objectivity is impossible. We can’t help but ‘know’! However – we have to try!!
So – my question is: Where do the meanings of music lie – and how do we overcome the prejudices of our ‘methods’ to produce ‘truth’? I don’t have any definite answers to this – but am interested in ideas/responses.
A year or so ago, I wrote a blog about how the singer Rumer sounded like Karen Carpenter - and how the music industry could be seen to be using a proven formula (i.e The Carpenters) to sell the public music. This is not the topic of this blog – but more related to taking this theory back a few years – this time to the relationship between The Carpenters and the Les Paul/Mary Ford duo. I have been a big fan of Les Paul for most of my adult life – but have always listened to his records with a ‘guitar head’ – ie his amazing solos and use of technology for overdubbing. However, when one listens to Mary Ford’s vocals – they have, to my ears at least, a clear relationship to Karen Carpenter. For example -
‘I’m a Fool to Care’ (1954)
For me, this has not only similarities in vocal timbre, but also in the use of technology to create those amazing vocal harmonies, made famous in songs such as Goodbye to Love
Goodbye to Love (1972)
How high the moon
In both cases, these harmonies only exist in a virtual space – as they are multiple instances of the same singer/singers. I write this, as it is interesting to trace what I would call the ‘primary signification’ of influences such as this (where these is little difference between the sound and what it stands for – for me at least). Taking this thought process back a stage further – the same influence can also be heard between Les Paul’s guitar style (both rhythm and lead) and Django Reinhardt – see the examples below
The Sheik of Araby
For me, these sort of relationships can be viewed from two perspectives
1) the authentic influences of the artist, who have simply listened to the influence and therefore begin to sound like them (ie Les Paul and Django)
2) the music industry machine – where the artist is ‘told’ to sound like another artist or incorporate a specific style (examples to numerous to mention)
If an artist is fortunate enough to be able to be successful and portray their ‘natural’ influences – and these influences resonate with the industry,which in turn have the potential to resonate with the public, all well and good. My question is – are opportunities like this becoming rarer and rarer? Is it only possible to obtain success by positioning your music into a ‘category’ (be it sound, dress, style, etc)? I realise this is always been the case to a greater or lessor extent – so am interested in examples of music that break this pattern. What music is out there that is truly experimental and ground breaking?
Well – I finally got my copies of my Zappa book last week – so this will probably be the last time I blog about it (hip – hip……). I would really appreciate anyone helping with the social network side of things by liking/sharing/etc etc. You can read a sample chapter from the link below – and if you are interested in a copy – I think direct from Ashgate is the best bet at the moment.
Thanks to those of you that have given the book support over its development
Zappa and Modernism: An Extended Study of ‘Brown Shoes Don’t Make It’
Martin Knakkergaard
With only a couple of months to go before the Release of Zappa and the And – I need to get a move on to ensure I cover all chapters via my blog. So – here is the into to Chapter 10 – by Martin Knakkergaard. Martin has actually published on Zappa before, and this chapter is one of the few musicological chapters in the book – a detailed essay on Brown Shoes Don’t Make It.
Frank Zappa is an outstanding figure in Western musical, cultural and even political life of the twentieth century, with a musical legacy of extraordinary stylistic breadth and complexity. His musical universe comprises an abundance of styles and genres across historical, artistic and musical boundaries, yet still constitutes an intellectual whole, a cohesive musical oeuvre that can rightfully be acknowledged as Modern. Modern not just in its everyday sense, but also ideologically, it contests tradition, resists norms, neutralises the morally good and functionally useful, and insists on staging the dialectic continuum between secrecy and scandal.
Taking the collage-composition ‘Brown Shoes Don’t Make It’ as an exemplar, this article weaves a mosaic of analyses, ranging from strictly structural, to purely discursive and hypertextual, constructing the case that Zappa’s work, rather than being a wild profusion of styles, is instead a highly coherent and stringently complex work of meaning. It is an oeuvre in which subtle correspondences between music styles, titles, lyrics, texts and more, critically reflect central aspects of modern culture and human life in a psychological, sociological as well as philosophical exposition. In addition to a close reading of the primary text and citations of other artists’ work, the article includes references to much of Zappa’s discography and aims to point out how the musical coding in Zappa’s work take on a decisive modernistic role in an almost Adornian sense, expressing the historical necessity of complexity and opposition.
Due to DIY responsibilities at home, I have spent most of the day listening to some great music – something that has prompted this post. The main album I listened to today was the 60 track Plunderphonic compilation by John Oswald. After coining the term in the mid 1980s – what is interesting about the technique is the issue of using copyright material overtly – without getting sample clearance. Unlike some artists – who use sampling as a starting point for creativity – then ensure the original sample is disguised beyond recognition – Plunderphonics ensures that the samples are obvious – it is in effect a protest against the restrictions of copyright. Unlike later uses of sampling – from what I can gather – a Plunderphonic piece often just uses samples from one artist and in Oswald’s case – he uses a similar cut and paste philosophy on his albums covers -
Oswald seems to be a forerunner of Mashups – although I rarely see his name credited. When listening to the album – it seemed to be full of so much meaning for me – as I heard ghostly snippets of tracks I either recognised directly, or ‘sort of recognised’ from my childhood. In fact many of the tracks were full of Primary Meaning – rare in popular music.
Although I don’t understand how it got copyright clearance – the entire album can be heard on Spotify. I suggest you put a few hours to one side – and see what it means to you.
I recon that the Primary Signification is age related – with many of the tracks possibly become less obvious to listeners as the years go by. It may be that younger people may not get any direct Primary Meaning what so ever!
I have written about this sort of thing before – but it will be interesting to consider at some point how the copyright laws can be tweaked to ensure this sort of creativity can take place – it’s great music in my view. If it is passed on without being ‘sold’ – why can’t composers legally engage with this sort of process?
I suggest you listen to the album – check out the essay below – then see what you can recognise. After that – look at the album notes – which has details of what what the samples are.
When considering the analysis of a piece of music for the first time, it is sometimes useful to start with the ‘elements of music’. As a first step – try placing the following elements in order of priority – in other words how important isthe element to the analysis of the track? For example – if a piece of music only has one chord throughout – it may be argued that the element ‘harmony’ will receive a low grading? In Dylan’s music – it could be argued that lyrical content would get a high grade. The elements are as follows
Melody
Harmony
Lyrics
Form
Texture
Tempo
Metre
Timbre
Dynamics
Mix
Listen to one of the following pieces – (‘Car Wash’ by Rolls Royce; ‘The Times They Are A changin’ by Dylan, or ‘Sir Duke’ by Stevie Wonder, and give them a grade (1 to 9) followed by a reason for your choice.
I wrote a book chapter a while ago as part of an edited collection entitled ‘De Canonizing Music History’. The chaper looks at the position of the electric guitarist as a jazz composer. Anyway, I have noticed that the book does not appear to be turning up in any searches on the electric guitar – so this is an attempt to put this right. I have copied the abstract below to give any interested parties a feel for what it is about. If you want the book however – be warned – it is nearly £40!
This article addresses the often underrated role jazz guitarist composers have
played in redefining the jazz aesthetic, specifically through fusing jazz with other music forms. Most publications and broadcasts on jazz history have a tendency to overlook this issue, Ken Burns’ most recent TV series being an indicative example, omitting arguably four of the most influential and experimental jazz musicians of the last 40 years – Pat Metheny, Bill Frisell, Larry Coryell and John McLaughlin. Additionally, although there have been numerous ‘non academic’ texts written about the technical
proficiencies of many electric jazz guitarists, there is no academic material examining their compositional impact on the jazz canon. During the late 1960s – early 1970’s, it will be suggested that the guitarists’ assimilation of jazz with the emerging rock genre was more an expression of cultural and social paradigms than an overt attempt to fuse the two styles. In direct contrast to the pervasively quoted pioneer of fusion, Miles Davis, who incorporated the rock aesthetic into his music to ‘reach the people’, or
‘Third Steam’ musicians such as George Russell and John Lewis who fused classical and jazz musics for intellectual reasons, the post 1970’s guitarist/composers were often natural embodiments of both styles, simply being products of their generation. A good example of this paradigm can be seen in the work of Jazz-Rock pioneers John McLaughlin and Larry Coryell, who could both be considered authentic practitioners of both Jazz and Rock traditions during their work prior to the fusion movement. Echard (2005) describes two aspects of tradition that can have a profound impact on the
perceived originality of an artist He describes clichés as “strongly and exclusively correlated to their tradition in the sense that, even if the feature appears elsewhere, surrounded by elements coded as belonging to other traditions, it will still function as a reference to it’s own tradition” (p.46)1. Typical Features on the other hand “are an integral part of a tradition but are not unique to that tradition” (p.46)2. He goes on to elaborate the effect of these paradigms on the originality of an artist, commenting that “clichés make it more difficult to elaborate a singular and unique persona since they
come with so many specific prior associations” (p.46). This argument is important when outlining the contribution and originality of artists such as Coryell and McLaughlin. When closely examining the inaugural Mahavishnu Orchestra album, The Inner Mountain Flame (1971), or many of Larry Coryell’s early recordings such as Coryell (1969), it is noticeable how few clichés or typical features one would readily associate with Jazz at the time. It is also apparent how the stylistic paradigms of both albums became more pervasive in jazz in the years that followed. Gestures on the recordings such as distorted guitar, rock based grooves, modern production techniques,
in addition to visual factors such as specific dress codes and stage behaviours could indeed have been regarded as clichés of Rock, but today can be conceptualised as typical features of the jazz canon. It is recognised that musicological factors alone are not enough to classify the qualities of any musical work, and when discussing the stylistic ambiguity of Frank Zappa’s portfolio, Gracyk comments
I seem to be on a roll at the moment in terms of thinking of bands that continue Frank Zappa’s legacy. I band that I have been aware of for a while now is ‘Mr Bungle’. Although they yet again don’t cite him directly, you can hear the sense of the unexpected in their music – so simply can’t predict what is going to happen next. Hear is a video of them live followed by Spotify links for two albums.
Although there is no direct link, it is interesting to find new bands that somehow embrace Zappa’s sense of encapsulating his ‘Anything, Anytime, for No Reason At All’ philosophy. Here is a young band from Sheffield called ‘Rolo Tomassi’ who seem to do this naturally.Really interesting Band.
