The instinct of music

Arte featured a very interesting documentary on its amazing magazine THEMA, about “The instinct of Music” (2009). It tries to make sense of music as a big mass, what makes it beautiful, moving, universal and such a fundamental need for many of us. Are music theories just the fruit of a random force or is it a series of structures that we can arrange, re-arrange, break and combine in infinite ways?

Music learning starts from very early stages of our existence, right in the womb. Babies perceive muffled sounds and melodies as they grow and respond positively to it with an increase in their heart rate. This is probably the first stages of communication between the inside and outside world. By the time we are born, even a baby’s cry is structured in a tonal system; a fundamental and its third or fifth, whichever is the most appealing maybe. Does that mean that music came before language? or is music a language by itself?

Music and math are tightly connected. Music is structured and ours ears are trained to like certain structures, and probably certain genres. You’d say it’s probably true for the Occidental tonal system because we made it this way, it was invented and written to be mathematically “perfect”. Well the Oriental and Far East tonal systems share the same Occidental basics, with some additions that would have never existed in our tonal system. But it’s also structured. Scales are fundamentally not be the same between two European countries. What’s consonant for one can be dissonant for the other und so weiter. However, the process of learning and accepting these differences is a process that takes time and that evolves with us thankfully. It’s certainly a question of culture, exposure, readiness and acceptance and a lot of curiosity too.

We like music and we rely on it in everything that we do, even as we speak. You might not be the best singer or yet even sing at all, but when you talk, you are actually using a tonal system. Take for example the word, Momma. The first syllable is a fundamental and the last one is a third. There you go, you just made music.

On the question, is music a universal language? If you still have a doubt about that, researches demonstrated that even a tribe who had no idea of our occidental tonal system, could recognize feelings from a piece of music played to them. What some musicians find interesting when jamming with people they don’t know, from different cultures, is the fusion of so many genres into one united structured piece. What I mean by structure is a tempo and a place in time on which everyone can write and perform. Tempo is essential as it dictates the feeling and mood, the space and time is where you fit in the jamming. Drums give the tempo, they can syncopate and create whatever pattern they want, still it’s a tempo. Others rely on it and build upon it within a structured order to avoid dissonance and make the jam appealing. People detach from the technical perception of what they are playing letting feelings do the job. Have you ever judged a crappy guitarist from a good one? Have you ever seen the hands of a pianist playing a soothing versus a raging passage? Without feelings, music is reduced to a complex mathematical equation with no meaning.

Nuance is everything and you can find it everywhere, even in the so called “cold” electronic music. It’s all there, hidden and structured differently. It’s in the subtle chords of the track, the simple melody, the repetitive patterns, additions and retractions, the roaring and raging end of a break. All the elements are there. Electronic music lifts you up and moves you in more extraordinary ways than any other genre would do, because it’s easier to do it, because time is not a constraint. Every instrument however electronic in a track makes sense to you, it’s easy for your mind to process and it gives room to do something else, be it dreaming, projecting yourself in other dimensions and living the moment. It’s a time of total disconnection from the “real world”.

Music is an endless learning subject. Some think that too much rationalization of it can inhibit free expression. It’s maybe true, and is probably what blocks me in composing. It’s the red record button syndrome I have, whenever I need to “write” stuff down, things get jammed. I used to keep the record button on throughout my jamming sessions, in case I could re-use something I played. It would usually work as I’d forget that I was recording, but then I stopped doing that. We’ll see how 2012 will look like music wise for me, I do hope I’d be able to write some stuff down since I have been wanting to immortalize some tunes. This is maybe what you could wish for me for this new year

Until then, keep listening and living music. There’s nothing like it in the whole world.

Peace and an early Happy New Year!

PS : For those who watch Arte, the documentary will be aired on the following dates:

L’instinct de la musique
(France, 2009, 101mn)
31.12.2011 à 11:50
03.01.2012 à 03:05
09.01.2012 à 10:55