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It only counts if it's in the BOOK!
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Posted: |
Aug 24, 2019 - 2:59 PM
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By: |
Octoberman
(Member)
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I get the influences from different cultures and time periods. But regardless if I hear heroic music from Star Trek or Wonder Woman (either the TV series or the recent films) I just hear heroic music. Its interchangeable and not race or gender specific.
That is a really good point.
If I'm understanding correctly, it suggests, without bias, that how we may perceive the emotional impact of a musical piece depends somewhat at which point in time we first experience it.
For instance, a younger person may not have the same perception of, say, 60's-era hippy music as someone who lived through it. Of course, that hypothetical younger person may be very well educated on the culture, but it would not be quite the same as having been there during its earliest incarnations--when the "fight" began, so to speak.
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Lukas- No snark remarks from me. I appreciate you putting the effort into explaining your views on the subject. I generally don’t disagree with what you wrote. I also agree most of what you stated are objective facts.
Maybe I read it wrong, but where it goes off the rails for me is to suggest, music was written for a heterosexual white male, instead of the fact heroic music was written for a character who happened to be a heterosexual white male.
I get the influences from different cultures and time periods. But regardless if I hear heroic music from Star Trek or Wonder Woman (either the TV series or the recent films) I just hear heroic music. Its interchangeable and not race or gender specific.
I appreciate your response.
The distinction you are making in the second graph is quite subtle. I had assumed that the one notion, the one you object to, naturally implies the second, the one to which you do not. Maybe that's just from my own having had a background in this literature.
As for the heroic music, I actually think it is not interchangeable at all. The themes for Wonder Woman (both 1970s and the new movies) are specifically "female" to me in ways that are subtle but conclusive. Maybe it's a use of chromaticism, or certainly orchestration. Or simply my own association after hearing them for quite some time. But I do not think a composer would create those themes for male character. I think Hans Zimmer's innovation of the electric cello for the current Wonder Woman was really brilliant. I also think if you compared Goldsmith's theme for Supergirl to Williams's for Superman, you would also be able to analyze differences in harmonic structure and possibly even tempo that accommodate what listeners, at that time, expected of a female superhero. It's not an analysis I have undertaken, and it's one you have to do carefully because readers could take offense that you are being sexist. But I do think if you mixed and matched the themes, they would sound "wrong" for a whole bunch of complicated and often problematic reasons. Feel free to analyze it yourself, but be warned, you would then be undertaking "gender studies"!
Lukas
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I've never understood the notion that music is a universal language. Aside from mathematical properties, the instruments, styles and associations vary so much within and between cultures. Some music is almost onomatopoetic, like harps representing water, but most musical associations seem to be learned. I'd like to think the singing test - if you vocalize (hum or sing) music and get an emotional reaction in yourself - would reveal if it's "universal" because of an instinctive reaction. But since you are immersed in your own culture, it's hard to tell that it's not a learned response.
It's very innate. Have you ever noticed babies on still-wobbly legs bouncing in front of the stereo?
I have heard that tempo intrinsically affects us because of its connection to resting vs. active heart rates. That makes sense to me.
There is also quite a lot of research on the harmonic "overtones" which basically has to do with the frequencies of some notes being embedded inside other notes, because of how the sine waves interact. This is why we have octaves and the scale that we do, and why certain harmonies sound pleasant and others more unpleasant (as most people would interpret them).
Lukas
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Some instruments played in a certain way, like drumming, can get a reflexive response.
I find that it is most often percussive music that will almost always get that response.
Just something about dem tribal riddims. It always gets me, that's for sure.
There is also a lot having to do with the fact that we have two legs to dance with. Lalo Schifrin made this joke, I dimly recall, about the Mission: Impossible theme (or perhaps some other piece) being in 5/4—and for people with more than two legs.
Waltzes (in 3/4) lead to one type of dancing; others, in 4/4, to other forms.
Lukas
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Posted: |
Aug 24, 2019 - 3:37 PM
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By: |
Solium
(Member)
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Lukas- No snark remarks from me. I appreciate you putting the effort into explaining your views on the subject. I generally don’t disagree with what you wrote. I also agree most of what you stated are objective facts.
Maybe I read it wrong, but where it goes off the rails for me is to suggest, music was written for a heterosexual white male, instead of the fact heroic music was written for a character who happened to be a heterosexual white male.
I get the influences from different cultures and time periods. But regardless if I hear heroic music from Star Trek or Wonder Woman (either the TV series or the recent films) I just hear heroic music. Its interchangeable and not race or gender specific.
I appreciate your response.
The distinction you are making in the second graph is quite subtle. I had assumed that the one notion, the one you object to, naturally implies the second, the one to which you do not. Maybe that's just from my own having had a background in this literature.
As for the heroic music, I actually think it is not interchangeable at all. The themes for Wonder Woman (both 1970s and the new movies) are specifically "female" to me in ways that are subtle but conclusive. Maybe it's a use of chromaticism, or certainly orchestration. Or simply my own association after hearing them for quite some time. But I do not think a composer would create those themes for male character. I think Hans Zimmer's innovation of the electric cello for the current Wonder Woman was really brilliant. I also think if you compared Goldsmith's theme for Supergirl to Williams's for Superman, you would also be able to analyze differences in harmonic structure and possibly even tempo that accommodate what listeners, at that time, expected of a female superhero. It's not an analysis I have undertaken, and it's one you have to do carefully because readers could take offense that you are being sexist. But I do think if you mixed and matched the themes, they would sound "wrong" for a whole bunch of complicated and often problematic reasons. Feel free to analyze it yourself, but be warned, you would then be undertaking "gender studies"!
Lukas
I guess it depends for me. I can hear a feminate musical styling for Goldsmiths Supergirls theme. But wasn't Goldsmith writing what was visually presented to him with Supergirls ballerina type moves?
Take away the "Wonder Woman" chorus and using strictly the thematic television material I think it would work perfectly for Spider-Man.
Regarding the Wonder Woman film I think the music is pretty non gender specific. I can see it working for the Flash or Aquaman or even something as masculine as 300.
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I guess it depends for me. I can hear a feminate musical styling for Goldsmiths Supergirls theme. But wasn't Goldsmith writing what was visually presented to him with Supergirls ballerina type moves?
Take away the "Wonder Woman" chorus and using strictly the thematic television material I think it would work perfectly for Spider-Man.
Regarding the Wonder Woman film I think the music is pretty non gender specific. I can see it working for the Flash or Aquaman or even something as masculine as 300.
I'm out the door, but briefly, about Supergirl—a very good point, about Goldsmith creating her music in part because of her balletic flying sequence.
Are women or men, culturally and historically, more likely to be interested in and associated with ballet dance? (Baryshnikov and Billy Elliot aside!)
I don't think a superhero movie with a male hero has a ballet-like scene in which he explores his powers...and thus I don't think such a film has that kind of musical theme.
Lukas
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Posted: |
Aug 24, 2019 - 3:46 PM
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By: |
Thor
(Member)
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I have heard that tempo intrinsically affects us because of its connection to resting vs. active heart rates. That makes sense to me.
It does. There is actually a long, scientific tradition exploring this issue. Didier Anzieu talked about a 'sonorous enveloppe' in which we find enjoyment in music because of the sounds we heard in the womb, like heartbeats/rhythm. Then there are the later structuralists, who believe we find enjoyment in the recognition of structures, and the comfort in returning to a tonal centre, or a home-away-home again form as in the sonata. Which again is why we often find atonal music so discomforting at first (untill we've become accustomed to it). There are many, many more. I actually wrote about this in my own thesis back in 2004, and it's a neverending topic that has continued to develop further since then.
As for the male/female dichotomy that seems to rile people up, there is interestingly a similar use of terms in narrative theory, wherein traditional, horizontal, causal narratives are sometimes labelled 'male' whereas more circular forms of narrative are labelled 'female'.
I realize this has probably nothing to do with STAR TREK or even the subject of the thesis in question, but a related ad hoc thought I had, since the discussion was going that way.
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Posted: |
Aug 24, 2019 - 4:00 PM
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By: |
Wedge
(Member)
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Maybe I read it wrong, but where it goes off the rails for me is to suggest, music was written for a heterosexual white male, instead of the fact heroic music was written for a character who happened to be a heterosexual white male.
I get the influences from different cultures and time periods. But regardless if I hear heroic music from Star Trek or Wonder Woman (either the TV series or the recent films) I just hear heroic music. Its interchangeable and not race or gender specific.
I think the point is that in the cultural milieu of the era "heroic music written for a heterosexual white male" and "heroic music written for a generic hero character" was not really a distinction of any great significance. Such music may not have been race or gender specific as a matter of intent, but because of the absolute predominance of heterosexual white male heroes across all media it became de facto race and gender specific. We can imagine that perhaps Sol Kaplan (for example) would have written the exact same heroic music for a hypothetical gay black female captain as for Kirk. The point is we can NEVER KNOW because such characters simply did not exist in popular media. Hence, the music became "coded" irrespective of intent, by consistently reflecting a particular brand of masculinity. If a bell rings every time a dog gets its dinner, it doesn't really matter if there's a singular Pavlov performing an experiment ... the association is going to be formed.
I suspect that what some people bristle at (not pointing fingers at anyone here) is the idea that they somehow shouldn't ENJOY such music ... that because art was created largely by and for a culture of white male heterosexual dominance, and may reflect biases inherent in that culture, it is therefore tainted by association -- and to celebrate it or even take pleasure in it is to tacitly condone or participate in race or gender discrimination. (See, for example, the many think-pieces about whether enlightened persons can enjoy Wagner without guilt.) Maybe there are some who make such arguments. But in my experience, most academics just want to get people to think about these things; to go beneath the surface and cross-examine the intersection of art and culture. They're scholars ... it's kind of their raison d'être. But I don't see anyone in this thread making the argument, even implicitly, that Star Trek music is not worthy of celebration -- least of all Lukas Kendall!
And there is another side of the coin here. We don't like to think of ourselves as biased. We like to think that we, as individuals or a culture writ large, have outgrown such petty biases; that we've attained a more enlightened state where heroic music is just heroic music that can be applied equally to man and woman, black and white, straight and gay -- so why bother even analyzing it in those terms? Perhaps you and I are indeed just such enlightened souls. But the funny thing about bias is that it's often unconscious ... something we're blind to because it seems so thoroughly normal to us, like the operation of our lungs. Scholarly examinations of historical bias are valuable, even when we don't suffer from the same biases, because they keep us on our guard. They challenge us to examine the unconscious assumptions that underpin our daily lives, to ask if what seems normal and unremarkable to us today is really as benign as we would prefer to believe. Wherever you land on that question personally, I maintain that the act of critical examination (of which academia, love it or hate it, is a primary tool) is a vital and necessary social function. Otherwise, there can be no hope of cultural or societal change.
Which is really the heart of the matter for some people, isn't it? Not everyone thinks the culture needs to change, or ought to change. Many would like it to stay exactly as it is -- or even return it to how it was (or how they imagine it to have been) forty or fifty or more years ago. At best, some will say, things might need a little tinkering around the edges -- but no serious change, please! Again, this is based on what I see and hear and read broadly speaking; I'm not trying to peg anyone on this board specifically ... though if that happens to be your position, I suppose we must end the conversation here lest we wade into political waters beyond the scope of this forum.
At any rate, I'm glad Lukas posted this article. I think it's an important conversation to have, and an interesting piece regardless of whether you agree with the author's conclusions.
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Academic analyses is a really bad idea for the Arts. Especially music.
Keep it in the scientific and sociological spheres.
We'd all be a lot happier!
Sorry, Thor
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