tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2808406058173173703.post6701061704360725313..comments2023-06-28T05:54:47.372-04:00Comments on Music 000001: 12. A Phylogenetic TreeDocGhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17359004200002936544noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2808406058173173703.post-39646472900638623842013-03-09T04:18:45.733-05:002013-03-09T04:18:45.733-05:00sadly, Hucbald is a good measure of popular opinio...sadly, Hucbald is a good measure of popular opinion, and evidence of a greatly impoverished and distorted world view subscribed by the majority, with its roots in racist ideologies of the past few centuries, invented to justify colonialism. zhaohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14353325572641788305noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2808406058173173703.post-15912498638885496772007-06-04T09:57:00.000-04:002007-06-04T09:57:00.000-04:00Hucbald,I'm hoping I have misunderstood your comme...Hucbald,<BR/><BR/>I'm hoping I have misunderstood your comment here - because it insinuates (and implicitly states) some horrible things. However, I probably have not.<BR/><BR/>No other culture's music is worth studying? It's all just local color? I don't even know where to begin, so I won't. Sounds like you assert that Ethnomusicology is worthless and also a waste of time.<BR/><BR/>When shared with some friends of mine, they physically recoiled in disgust.<BR/><BR/>I couldn't let that comment stand, and while Victor and Evan restrained themselves from pointing out the lunancy of your "opinions" (which you try to present as facts), I could not. It disturbs me greatly that such ill-conceived sentiments as yours still crop up from time to time.<BR/><BR/>Sorry about the rant, Victor, but I had to say something.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2808406058173173703.post-11186254012895684942007-06-01T15:08:00.000-04:002007-06-01T15:08:00.000-04:00Huck,Would you also consider it a waste of time to...Huck,<BR/><BR/>Would you also consider it a waste of time to study the languages of cultures that lack a writing system? Certainly, a literate society has many cultural advantages over a non-literate one, but writing is an abstraction (as is musical notation) and its existence doesn't qualitatively change the underlying system it denotes.<BR/><BR/>In fact, if we only considered languages with written forms as significant, we'd be doing a disservice to the study of the human language faculty, because every language has something to teach us.<BR/><BR/>I'm a linguist, so that's why I draw this analogy; Victor is taking a similar approach, but with music.yEvb0https://www.blogger.com/profile/07969538633202725294noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2808406058173173703.post-74935795541418253232007-05-25T10:15:00.000-04:002007-05-25T10:15:00.000-04:00Greetings, Hucbald. It's always a pleasure to hear...Greetings, Hucbald. It's always a pleasure to hear from someone who disagrees with me. I mean that sincerely, because it gives me the opportunity to go more deeply into certain issues I might otherwise have neglected. But I disagree with you in so many different ways and on so many different levels that it's hard to know where to begin. I'm sure you realize that your viewpoint is one that would now, by most musicologists, ethno or otherwise, be considered not only ethnocentric but also hopelessly outdated. That's OK, by the way. My work is probably also considered hopelessly outdated by some, since I'm trying to revive the "dead issue" of comparative musicology.<BR/><BR/>Much more is now known about the roots of what you call "western culture" than had been known by music historians of previous generations. For one thing, polyphony and even counterpoint are found in abundance among many indigenous peoples. And much of their music, once it is understood, is by no means primitive by ANY standard. By comparison there is much in OUR musical culture that's primitive, as evidenced by our dependence on notation for the performance of types of polyphonic music that indigenous peoples manage by ear.<BR/><BR/>For another, we now have a far better grasp of how profound an influence African music has had on the western classical traditions you value so much. Many of the Renaissance and Baroque dance forms that are of such central importance historically have their origin in the dances colonists picked up from African slaves in the Americas. This includes the Saraband, the Chaconne, and possibly all the other dance types employing a ground bass, as the basic principle behind the ground is characteristic of much African music. When you consider the influence that this type of bass oriented music had on the development of the bass-oriented "modern" tonal system, you will see that there could be a good deal that is as yet little understood about the possible roots of European art music in Africa.<BR/><BR/>When considering the roots of European church and court music one cannot possibly rule out the influence of all sorts of folk (i.e. peasant) traditions. There is good evidence that polyphony itself could be due to such influences. Amost certainly medieval hocket was. A great many dances have peasant origins as well. <BR/><BR/>I could say a lot more on this topic, but will conclude by suggesting that what you seem to be referring to, really, is the history of music theory, not music per se. But even in that realm, western theory owes a great deal to other cultures, especially Arabic culture.<BR/><BR/>For me, the truly "Great Tradition" in music is the tradition outlined (for better or worse) in my phylogenetic tree. Western art music represents only one small twig.DocGhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17359004200002936544noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2808406058173173703.post-11162893764283966782007-05-25T00:34:00.000-04:002007-05-25T00:34:00.000-04:00Interesting, yet a waste of time from my perspecti...Interesting, yet a waste of time from my perspective (And mine alone: No insult intended).<BR/><BR/>The five elements of pure music - harmony, counterpoint, melody, rhythm, and form - have only ever been properly explored by western culture. The history of western art music - the evolution from monody through polyphony, and then finally to homophony (Roughly 600 AD to 1900 AD) - is a reflection of the proper intuiting of the implications of the harmonic overtone series. No other culture has ever managed this, because no other culture was ever musically literate: There was no sheet music previously, and so no way to precisely bequeath to posterity one's advances. Not only that, but the west and the west alone provided the socio-economic and political institutions necessary for such an evolution to take place.<BR/><BR/>Though every culture has musical manifestations present in it - and this can be interesting in a trivial way (IMHO, of course) - none but the western one is really historically significant (Ancient Greek if you account for my ancient namesake and his descendants taking from classical writings). <BR/><BR/>All the rest is just local color for whatever time period. I find it interesting that people put so much effort into stuff like this. It is a curiosity at best. But more power to you: You know your stuff... and I'll put you on my list of interesting music weblogs. ;^)<BR/><BR/>Cheers,<BR/><BR/>Huckleberry the BaldHucbaldhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17111826753868595100noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2808406058173173703.post-11009465327602184622007-05-23T16:02:00.000-04:002007-05-23T16:02:00.000-04:00Very interesting. I see now how your research is ...Very interesting. I see now how your research is going in a different direction than I'd imagined. Interesting!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com