How I listen to your music

[gavbrown]

Hello colleagues,

I listen to everything which is posted here since I have joined a few months ago, and have even gone back through past postings and listened to everything which has been posted in the last year or so. I don't always listen to the pieces in their entirety. Mostly what I am listening for is for you to grab my attention in the opening seconds of your music. If that "grab" doesn't happen, I generally do not pay much more attention. Sometimes, if you have a piece that I can fast forward through - like SoundCloud pieces - I will skip ahead a few times, looking for something which does rouse my interest.

This is partly a reflection of my own compositional interests - I am a seeker of new things, new sounds, or new variations, and am thus only attracted to music which shows this. Even where new-sounding works appear, I am still looking for something which is not only new, but (in my own limited estimation), beautiful in a new way. If I hear such a piece, even if I feel it is only partially successful, I comment on it.

I am on several composer forums and one thing I have noted on all of them is a general quality of sameness - the music on all of them generally sounds the same to me.

One person's opinion only,
Gavin

[Kevin]

To some extent I can agree with the same-ness of some music. I realise that my music will never break any mounds but then I write for performance and have to ensure that the music reflects what people want to listen to. However one of the great things about SOS is that there are composers here that don't write like anyone else. We have some unique voices on these pages.

[Joseph]

Feb 8, 2016 4:18:20 GMT gavbrown said:

Hello colleagues,

. . . Mostly what I am listening for is for you to grab my attention in the opening seconds of your music. If that "grab" doesn't happen, I generally do not pay much more attention . . . 

One person's opinion only,
Gavin

Ah, the Sesame Street syndrome . . .

[gavbrown]

Kevin, thanks, I appreciate your reply. We all seek what satisfies us, I think. Zepposnonno, ?

[Deleted]

Feb 8, 2016 19:56:57 GMT Joseph said:

Feb 8, 2016 4:18:20 GMT gavbrown said:

Hello colleagues,

. . . Mostly what I am listening for is for you to grab my attention in the opening seconds of your music. If that "grab" doesn't happen, I generally do not pay much more attention . . . 

One person's opinion only,
Gavin

Ah, the Sesame Street syndrome . . .

It may be Sesame Street, but it's far more common than that. I heard the same from Santa Barbara Music Publishing when I submitted a score to them. One reason they didn't accept it was because it wasn't sufficiently attention grabbing at the opening. It's a fact of life that a composer has to do something to grab an audience's attention, this is especially true in a performance situation or they'll talk through your music.

[Joseph]

Feb 9, 2016 14:14:38 GMT @pantonality said:

Feb 8, 2016 19:56:57 GMT Joseph said:

Ah, the Sesame Street syndrome . . .

It may be Sesame Street, but it's far more common than that. I heard the same from Santa Barbara Music Publishing when I submitted a score to them. One reason they didn't accept it was because it wasn't sufficiently attention grabbing at the opening. It's a fact of life that a composer has to do something to grab an audience's attention, this is especially true in a performance situation or they'll talk through your music.

This is what I've typically heard from the Pop music world, where you most often have 3 to 4 minutes to tell a complete story.  It allows for no gradual unfolding of ideas, no character development.  Everything must be done immediately.  Hence my sentiment that it is a 'Sesame Street syndrome' where it all gets done in about thirty seconds to accommodate the attention span of their viewers.  In Pop music, three or four chords allows for a quick grasp of the entire episode with no need to pay much more attention, heaven forbid modulations beyond the bonk on the head step up at the next iteration.  Some lovely music has been produced this way, absolutely. Hell, I grew up on it!  As I grew, I learned to read novels as well as comic books, my ability to pay attention has improved. Sadly, we too often seek instant gratification due to limited attention spans foisted upon us by the media.  This obviously is my opinion, but if you give up on an idea after thirty seconds you may miss an opportunity to discover something valuable.  Yes, we all seek what satisfies us.  I am not so easily satisfied.  I enjoy savoring a multi-course meal over a span of three hours, anticipating the dessert course even if I don't know what it will be, supplanting a ten minute stop at McDonald's with the same old burger, fries, and apple pie.  As always, to each his/her own . . .

[adrianallan]

Feb 9, 2016 16:20:47 GMT Joseph said:

Feb 9, 2016 14:14:38 GMT @pantonality said:

It may be Sesame Street, but it's far more common than that. I heard the same from Santa Barbara Music Publishing when I submitted a score to them. One reason they didn't accept it was because it wasn't sufficiently attention grabbing at the opening. It's a fact of life that a composer has to do something to grab an audience's attention, this is especially true in a performance situation or they'll talk through your music.

This is what I've typically heard from the Pop music world, where you most often have 3 to 4 minutes to tell a complete story.  It allows for no gradual unfolding of ideas, no character development.  Everything must be done immediately.  Hence my sentiment that it is a 'Sesame Street syndrome' where it all gets done in about thirty seconds to accommodate the attention span of their viewers.  In Pop music, three or four chords allows for a quick grasp of the entire episode with no need to pay much more attention, heaven forbid modulations beyond the bonk on the head step up at the next iteration.  Some lovely music has been produced this way, absolutely. Hell, I grew up on it!  As I grew, I learned to read novels as well as comic books, my ability to pay attention has improved. Sadly, we too often seek instant gratification due to limited attention spans foisted upon us by the media.  This obviously is my opinion, but if you give up on an idea after thirty seconds you may miss an opportunity to discover something valuable.  Yes, we all seek what satisfies us.  I am not so easily satisfied.  I enjoy savoring a multi-course meal over a span of three hours, anticipating the dessert course even if I don't know what it will be, supplanting a ten minute stop at McDonald's with the same old burger, fries, and apple pie.  As always, to each his/her own . . .

Isn't it ironic that in the world of literature, the short form, the poem, is considered superior to the longer novel.
It is considered superior on this basis:

"Prose: words in their best order; poetry: the best words in the best order" (samuel taylor coleridge)

[Deleted]

I loved how you compared classical music and pop songs with long meals and McDonald's!

[Joseph]

Feb 9, 2016 22:20:14 GMT @shadocapital said:

I loved how you compared classical music and pop songs with long meals and McDonald's!

that's kind of unfair on my part, I happen to love Pop (I think I mentioned I grew up on it) music.  Time and attention span were the essence of my post . . .

And Adrian, some poems are book length . . .

[gavbrown]

I have been in this discussion before and it is always the same discussion. Why should classical music composers not be expected to grab attention at the beginning of a piece? To say that this reflects some "lowbrow-popmusic-no-attention-span-no-appreciation-of-real-music" perspective seems to me to avoid the question by attempting to delegitimize it. It seems to me that *all* music should be compelling from the beginning.

[Deleted]

Ah, but if you listen to classical music, so much of it does grab your attention right from the beginning. Think of the Beethoven symphonies: how long does it take before you know exactly what you're listening to & whether you want to hear the rest of it?

1st symphony - one chord
3rd symphony - two chords
5th symphony - four notes
6th symphony - 2 bars
7th symphony - takes longer to get going, but what a huge & wonderful introduction!

Making an immediate impression and then sustaining it over time are two completely different and unrelated things. The point is that if a pop song goes over 4 minutes, it's almost certainly Bohemian Rhapsody . . . . . .

[Deleted]

It'll take half a minute into the 9th symphony before you realise the orchestra isn't tuning

[Deleted]

I've always thought the opening of Beethoven 9 sounded like the primeval soup before the first amoebas appeared. Tuning up is a much more appropriate image!