I have found that in music, as in some "art", there are some pieces that are works of genius, and some that are gibberish. In music, simply flailing away with abberrant musical scales is similar to flinging paint at a canvas and calling the result, art. Sometimes, if you're lucky, it might come out okay. But mostly, it looks like paint flung at canvas. It is inaccurate to assume that all avant-garde music is art. Perhaps this is why some of it seems to be impossible for you to understand. I think that many times the "artist" himself does not understand it. He's just hoping that someone will see something in it. Sort of like an audio Rorshak(sp?) test. In many other cases, just a few well placed notes in a song can be the most artistic expression you've ever heard. With a music lover, like yourself, it is unlikely that you would be completely ignorant of the meaning of a piece. Unless that piece was meaningless. I have read your posts, and you are an intelligent guy. I doubt you would fail to see the meaning in an artistic piece.
Do You Understand Music?
First I want to describe something that repeats happening with me when I listen to the relatively new music to me.
There are a few examples that I want to describe:
1. I've acquired a rare CD of Cluster "One Hour" which contains one track that lasts exactly 1 hour. No matter how hard I've tried to listen to it as whole i was getting tired or just simply did not understand what's going on and was postponing a listening to the next session. Next session something similar happens and in curiosity I'm just trying to fast-forward to the last minutes of the track to hear how it ends. After few more trials to torture myself i quit and exchange this CD to the different offered by one of my best friend(Wobble-Parker). He digged in(meaning was able to listen the whole hour) from the third listening session and reviewed this music as one of the most magnificient projects created by Cluster for what I envy him to have a patience to understand.
2. Nearly the same thing happend with double CD album "Cobra" which is a project of John Zorn.
Some years ago I couldn't understand Ornette Coleman but now I realize that his music is like surrealistic art and has a divine presence. Same I can tell about Kronos Quartet.
Please share with me if you had a similar situations. Would you listen to the music that you don't understand? Would you try to understand it? Would you honor a "different" music and accept it as an art?
For me I'd rather listen to what I do not understand and try later-on to understand instead of just simply go to the Wiz and buy some Ricky Martin or Marc Anthony...
There are a few examples that I want to describe:
1. I've acquired a rare CD of Cluster "One Hour" which contains one track that lasts exactly 1 hour. No matter how hard I've tried to listen to it as whole i was getting tired or just simply did not understand what's going on and was postponing a listening to the next session. Next session something similar happens and in curiosity I'm just trying to fast-forward to the last minutes of the track to hear how it ends. After few more trials to torture myself i quit and exchange this CD to the different offered by one of my best friend(Wobble-Parker). He digged in(meaning was able to listen the whole hour) from the third listening session and reviewed this music as one of the most magnificient projects created by Cluster for what I envy him to have a patience to understand.
2. Nearly the same thing happend with double CD album "Cobra" which is a project of John Zorn.
Some years ago I couldn't understand Ornette Coleman but now I realize that his music is like surrealistic art and has a divine presence. Same I can tell about Kronos Quartet.
Please share with me if you had a similar situations. Would you listen to the music that you don't understand? Would you try to understand it? Would you honor a "different" music and accept it as an art?
For me I'd rather listen to what I do not understand and try later-on to understand instead of just simply go to the Wiz and buy some Ricky Martin or Marc Anthony...