Bob Maxey <written_by@xxxxxxx> writes: > >>>It boils down to this -- why does it always seem to come down to > *being hard*? Why do you care? Does it really matter if that > lighting / note / whatever is easy or hard? Shouldn't it matter > whether it's *the right one* for the place it was used more than > anything else?>>> > > I am still trying to figure that one out myself. I am not sure I can > come up with a solution that both of us would agree with. About all > I can say is there is a big difference between being able to play an > instrument and using technology to "duplicate" the music. Talent, > ability, and musical knowledge must count for something. We may well not end up agreeing on everything here, or even the important things, but (at least so far :-)) I'm enjoying the discussion and I think I'm refining my opinions and learning things about your opinions. Yes, they certainly do. The question is, does doing things "the hard way" somehow increase those things? I can't see it, myself. Well, maybe "musical knowledge"; I haven't heard of any way to learn to transpose, for example, that isn't "the hard way". Some electronic instruments will do it for you, but then you haven't learned how, you've bypassed the need; this is useful and sensible if your musical identity is "player of this electronic instrument", and not so useful or sensible if your musical identity is "musician", it seems to me. Still, that kind of crutch can help somebody keep focus and interest until they understand the need for the hard work well enough to motivate really doing it. But the "easy way" in music is often *not the same* in its results in the hard way. The obvious example is all the little subtleties of control that any of the breath-powered instruments have beyond whatever you're doing with your fingers (both breath and lip action usually, and no doubt more -- I don't play). Trying to emulate those via a keyboard controller may work okay for a background horn chorus, say (I think it often does), but rarely works well for a solo line. When the results aren't the same, I can easily see the need for "the hard way". If you want to learn to play trumpet, I really see no point in starting with a keyboard synth, and thinking maybe you'll switch to a real trumpet later! On the other hand, somebody learning orchestration can get his synth to show him what something sounds like without having to hire musicians to play for him. Some people learn to do this in their heads much quicker and better than others, and it's not at all clear to me that how quickly they learn that correlates with how good they'll be at orchestral composition when they reach their peak. There's nothing wrong with using a "crutch" if it lets you walk places you couldn't get to otherwise. > >>>Making things easier is unambiguously good, by my standards. Being > lazy is a *virtue* -- one of the greatest ones. Essentially all > "progress" is made by lazy people working very hard to make things > easier for everybody.>>> > > I think you might be right. To a point. Much could be lost when > technology makes some tasks easier. That said, I once used a > typewriter and there is no way I would return to the Selectric after > using Word. Yes, definitely to a point. The classic programmer example is spending three hours writing a one-shot script to automate something that you could do by hand in half an hour. If you only need to do it this one time, that's a bad expenditure of time (but if the task is repetitive and boring, as they usually are, may still make the programmer happier). > >>>Why is it so critical to you how hard the musician worked to create a > sound? And, if some clever musician finds a way to make it easier, > how is that a bad thing?>>> > > I am not sure it is unless you start thinking about what it means to > master an instrument. If you believe that a banjo track added using > electronics is every bit as equal as Earl Scruggs playing the track, > then it really does not matter. I think the answer to that has to come from listening to the result. I don't think banjo is something they synthesize very well yet. The instrument produces weird harmonic complexities, and the "user interface" lets a good player do all sorts of things that the modern keyboard synth banjo settings don't provide. On the other hand, what about harpsichord, or piano? Then there's the electric guitar, which is not much like an acoustic guitar, but is a very rich instrument on its own. > >>>Making things easier makes them accessible to more people. I'm very > certain there exist people with remarkable artistic vision, who are > put off enough by the plodding technical exercises that they never get > to expressing their vision. Making things easier brings those visions > into the pool, and I think makes us all richer. >>> > > I agree. I think. But who says everyone should have an easier > life. Again, talent must still count for something or we are in > trouble. I can back a rich pool of art and music, but not if it is > created by those without much talent, or we will find ourselves > drowning in a vast pool of mediocre art. I would never dream of saying all art is equally valuable, important, whatever measure we're using. I just say that removing arbitrary hurdles along the way increases the pool of *good* art. You're quite right that it *also* increases the pool of *mediocre* art, and I suspect it's true that it increases the pool of mediocre art *more* than it increases the pool of good art. I have a, perhaps completely unwarranted, considerable amount of faith that the good art will be found and appreciated. Also, what's good and what's mediocre remains a matter of opinion. If ten million people get something out of a piece of art, can we really say they're *wrong*? Possibly, in some far-future utopia (which, remember, means "no place"), lives could get so easy that it became necessary to invent artificial challenges to promote proper development. My personal feeling is that we're so *very* far from that now that it's premature to start worrying about it yet. > (Snip) > > >>>But there has to be a lot more to it than that; *every time* something > is made easier, a bunch of people complain that others should have to > suffer as they have suffered. Often they can't make a case for why.>>> > > I am not sure what to say. Perhaps I should ask you if you think > talent still counts for something. Some things are very hard to do > and if technology lessens the need to learn, it is, in my opinion, a > bad thing. I'm not sure what talent *is*; but in the way I use the phrase, at least, it "counts for something". As often as not, it counts for a "free pass" for *some* of the learning you need in a field. (I know a bunch of authors; one of the best theories I've heard from that group on "talent" is that every author gets pretty much a free pass on one or maybe two aspects of writing -- character, dialog, plot, structure, or various other small subdivisions; but that you then have to work your butt off to get enough of the others to produce passable work, and even harder than *that* to produce first-rate work.) And we do seem to have a basic difference here at the end. I think that, if technology lesses the need to learn, it's a *good* thing. -- David Dyer-Bennet, <mailto:dd-b@xxxxxxxx>, <http://www.dd-b.net/dd-b/> RKBA: <http://noguns-nomoney.com/> <http://www.dd-b.net/carry/> Pics: <http://dd-b.lighthunters.net/> <http://www.dd-b.net/dd-b/SnapshotAlbum/> Dragaera/Steven Brust: <http://dragaera.info/>
