The word "language" connected to Music

pianothor wrote:

If you know any contemporary pieces that might evoke happiness/cheerfulness, please let me know because although I have searched, I haven't found any

Fun, so I imagine it is cheerful

http://www.pianoconcerto.it/forum/index.php?/topic/6374-prezioso-documento-con-john-taylor-e-diana-torto/

pianothor wrote:

I thank you for all the replies; as soon as I have a moment of free time, I will read them all with extreme attention!

PS: In the post accidentally deleted by Frank, I was talking about tonal, modal, and pantonal language to highlight the fact that in the first two expressing sadness and happiness is rather easy while, perhaps due to my ignorance, pantonal/chromatic language does not allow for the expression of happiness and consequently (forgive my cheekiness) could be defined as a "limited" / "incomplete" language. If you know any contemporary pieces that might evoke happiness/cheerfulness, please let me know because although I have searched, I haven't found any.

See you soon

There is a nice 21st Century section in the forum, why don't you take a good look around?

http://www.pianoconcerto.it/forum/index.php?/topic/6207-danilo-lorenzini-hänsel-e-gretel-preludio-2016/

What do you think of this one?

Open content (youtube)

It won't be contemporary, given when it was written, but it gives me an incredible sense of joy and it is non-tonal

Open content (youtube)

Without falling into self-citation... 2' of searching on the tube I only needed the first 10'' to understand that the composition will have a fun development and I don't even know who this Mark Lackey is

Open content (youtube)

Frank wrote:

Without falling into self-citation... 2' of searching on the tube. The first 10'' were enough for me to understand that the composition will have a fun development and I don't even know who this Mark Lackey is

Among the related videos I found this

W women and music

Open content (youtube)

Frank wrote:

I had forgotten the instructions, do not evade the question. I think that you are - certainly in good faith - making yourself look ugly on your own.

The verb "to unite" should already light a few bulbs for you, not to mention "manner" (which implies way)... I am telling you this as someone who unites notes, probably not in a masterful or/and wonderful way, but who unites them in his own way.

....you still have time to explain to me how you can claim that a piece is wonderful. Without this answer, I will not proceed.

You know that sometimes you intimidate me?

I don't know what answer you expect or want from me, but I will answer very simply: for me, a piece is wonderful when, listening to it, I find it to be so... and think, it could even happen with your pieces.

That being said, I invite you to read this writing which outlines the general history of the relationship between language and music.

I am only interested in recalling some salient passages here:

A systematic reflection on the musical phenomenon as a language is absent, in itself, until the modern age, before which the concept of mimesis or "representative qualities" of music constitutes the shared horizon of musical signification.

During the 17th century, the gradual emancipation of music from verbal language occurs—that is, from its role recognized until then as the natural "handmaiden," or "sister," of the word, to become a language itself.

The term "musical language" arises in the 18th century, coinciding on one hand with the emergence of aesthetics as a distinct field of philosophy (formalized with the appearance of Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten's "Aesthetica" between 1750 and 1758), and on the other with the maximum crystallization of tonal language which, backed by a "natural" but highly codified harmonic foundation, rediscovers melody as a vehicle for infinite expressive potentialities.

In Romanticism, music is exalted as an a-conceptual language capable of expressing everything that cannot be expressed in verbal language.

The gradual fading away, starting from the early 20th century, of the norms and grammatical codes linked to tonality has modified the terms of the debate, returning it to its origins: is the naturalness of sound and the resulting tonal system the only basis for the formulation of musical utterances that justify the qualification of "language"? The "quantitative" push of the art of sounds re-emerges with the search for new criteria for organizing what is now universally recognized through assimilation as "musical discourse." The debate on the structural and linguistic values of serial and post-serial music stimulates new reflections on the analogy between language and music tout court.

The use of the plural becomes increasingly frequent when referring to the linguistic dimension of music, while the raw material—the single sound—goes from being a natural "word" to be combined and related to other sounds, to becoming an autonomous object of analytical investigation through new technologies, first electronic and then digital. The composition of sound becomes part of the creative process. (...) It could be said that practice has taken hold of theories and has brought the very concept of musical language into crisis, both from the perspective of norms and codes and, above all, from that of communication.

danielescarpetti wrote:

You know that sometimes you intimidate me?

I don't know what answer you expect or want from me, but I will answer very simply: a piece is wonderful to me when, listening to it, I find it to be so... and think, it could even happen with your own pieces.

No intimidation Daniele, of course not.

You find a piece wonderful, despite others, because it communicates something to you. That something (I don't even want to define it) uses a medium, which I fear is precisely language. Or rather, how can/could we define this "vector"?

Frank wrote:

No intimidation Daniele, of course not.

A piece you find wonderful, despite others, because it communicates something to you. That something (I don't even want to define it) uses a medium, which I fear is precisely language. Or rather, how can you/we define this "vector"?

No Frank, not as language, at least in the sense that I believe is right to give to the term language and, excuse me if I repeat it: language is the capacity humans have to express concepts, thoughts, and meanings through a complex code. Now, surely Music is endowed with a complex code, but if those ideas, those concepts, and those meanings do not find a common and corresponding understanding on the part of those who listen to them, it is not a language but an attempt to say something through the non-word, which however can be understood or interpreted in many different ways.

And for this reason, I think that Music cannot be understood as a language but - this yes - as an alternative way that humans have to express themselves, but which, in its expression, is tied to the individuality of the one who composes it - primarily - and in opposition to the understanding of the millions of individuals who may eventually listen to it and who will not necessarily grasp that message and, if they wish, will give it something else entirely or nothing at all.

Let's take an example that is very significant and illustrative for me of what I mean: Beethoven's Ninth Symphony.

The Ninth is today, commonly and absolutely recognized as a hymn to freedom and brotherhood among all people in the world - someone truly argued that it was only circumscribable to the Teutonic world, but let's leave that aside - and yet, to do this, Beethoven certainly had to work on the material of form and musical construction compared to the past, but if that message was intended to be truly explicit, he had to especially resort to the Voice, to spoken text, and thus to a real language in its own right.

Because if Beethoven had made the Ninth musically exactly like the one we listen to today: a first movement that begins with that process of accumulation which then repeats several times in the first movement, then inverting what in the classical rules of the symphony is the second movement with the third, introducing two sudden outbursts from the orchestra in the Adagio, then starting the last movement with an explosion that recalls chaos and proceeding then with fragments of the first, second, and third movements and finally introducing the main theme with all its connected variations, I challenge anyone to understand that all that "musical monument" wanted to tell us: gentlemen, be all brothers, because if it is true that there is a God in heaven, it is also true that it is from here, on Earth, that we must begin to build our Paradise. (excuse my simplification)

In reality, Beethoven was deeply aware that through music alone, no one who listened to it would ever, ever understand his underlying message.

We actually begin to understand that message exactly when, after Beethoven - he first among all composers - introduces the "Window Form" within one of his compositions, i.e., opens musical gaps into things - movements - that have already occurred - performed - only to have them followed by the voice intoning: O friends, not these sounds let us intone, but others more pleasant and more joyful. And it is from this point that Schiller's Ode to Joy begins.

Therefore, Music becomes language only when actual language makes it so, and not just in the sung part but in the work as a whole. But without the sung word, Music is - excuse the pedantry, you will hate me for this - solely and uniquely Music that represents only itself.
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Many times, even here on the forum, the necessity has been discussed. Why does a composer write music? It has often been said out of the need to express and externalize one's own feelings.

I wonder at this point... Why did Chopin write the étude op. 10 no. 12 (Revolutionary) and not a text in which he recounted his own emotions?

Perhaps because, for a composer, it is easier to externalize and describe one's own emotions and thoughts through music rather than literature.

Or perhaps because there are likely internal dynamics of the human being (who tends to simplify) that are easier, arrive sooner, and are more communicative through music.

If this were true, then it would be impossible for music to not be a language—albeit different from conventional language and not necessarily in agreement with the standardized description of language—capable of externalizing something from a deeper SELF better than the word? In essence, a non-language language... The mental connection is very subtle, but I cannot find a better definition for this.

Daniele, capisco bene quello che sostieni... per cui potrebbe anche essere che debba cambiare il mio dritto punto di vista strambo. Come succede anche nelle questioni analitiche, ogni soggetto in causa si serve di mezzi comuni per scopi diversi: il compositore usa l'analisi per uno scopo, l'interprete per un altro, il musicologo per un altro ancora. A proposito dell'argomento del topic, la questione nasce dal fatto che io sono uno di quelli che scrive la musica e sono certo di non essere l'unico a non scrivere a casaccio ma secondo, possiamo dirlo?, "codici". Per me l’uomo, oltre ad esprimere concetti, pensieri, significati può esprimere anche ben altro...appunto sensazioni, emozioni, reazioni (e non solo a chiacchiere)...che sono parte dell'uomo al pari di pensieri,concetti e significati, anzi, voglio osare, sono anche più "profondi" e spesso i meno controllabili dalla sfera razionale che è presa appunto da altro.

EDIT

Ah, non è un'ipotesi ma esperienza diretta, per cui mi esprimo anche tramite la musica e non solo tramite la parola...controindicazioni?

It seems to me that I've beaten you by a breath, Frank...

TheSimon wrote:

I propose a new approach to the discussion...

Several times here on the forum, the topic of necessity has been discussed. Why does a composer write music? It has often been said, out of a necessity to express and externalize one's own feelings.

I wonder at this point... Why did Chopin write Etude Op. 10 No. 12 (Revolution) and not a text in which he recounted his own emotions?

Perhaps because, for a composer, it is easier to externalize and describe one's own emotions and thoughts through music rather than literature.

Or perhaps because there are likely internal dynamics of the human being (who tends to simplify) that are easier to achieve, arrive sooner, and are more communicative through music.

If this were true, then is it not possible that music is a language—albeit different from conventional language and not necessarily in agreement with the standardized description of language—capable of externalizing something of a deeper SELF better than the word? In essence, a non-language language... The mental connection is very subtle, but I cannot find a better definition for this.

I think that anyone who has the natural gift—because naturally, it is such a gift—of being able to express themselves through letters or through an Art, always expresses something of themselves; and therefore, any Art that is not based on words can be defined as a non-language language. However, a non-language language certainly has an advantage over a true language: unless explicitly explained by the composer, it remains incomprehensible—or at most subject to interpretation—for those who listen.

Let's think of Shostakovich, for example, who benefited immensely from this advantage: his music is full of those feelings that he could not express freely toward the Soviet regime and Stalinist power in particular. And, in fact, if he was attacked by the leaders of the regime—and by Stalin himself—it certainly wasn't because his music was considered dangerous to power, but because it was too difficult for the people to understand in its musical construction. At most, he was reproached for not making music sufficiently laudatory of the regime: something he eventually did in the post-war period. In reality, the worst moment—as luck would have it—occurred when he staged an opera for the theater, *Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District*, which is to say, music supported by a story and by words.

But we can only grasp these feelings by knowing exactly his personal history and History with a capital H in which he operated.

If, however, we extrapolate that music—like any other music—from its personal and historical context, it too will tell us no more than what music can say in its absolute purity.

I think that music is a language because, as already stated in this topic, it has rules that men have chosen to organize sounds; the rules can change with the changing type of music, but what matters is that there is someone "composer" who organizes these sounds.

The problem arises when asking whether music expresses something or not (usually a language serves to express something: road signs, for example, tell us how to behave with the car), I am convinced that music cannot express anything, in the sense that if it expressed something, this something would have to be perceived by everyone in the same way (99% of people stop if they find a red light), but it is not so; music is perceived subjectively, but it is a language because it is constructed with objective rules that determine its harmony, its form ...

Music evokes something (it evokes memories, it evokes feelings and emotions), it does not express it, in the sense that the emotions we feel while listening to music are not due to the music itself, but to the way we perceive it subjectively.

It is a language that does not serve to communicate (unless music is used for something else: to indicate the time with bells, to indicate the wake-up call with the trumpet in the barracks) but serves to evoke, to make it so that we can perceive something (as a consequence of how it is constructed).

This does not mean that music is something totally detached from the rest, on the contrary, but that music is an atypical language, which finds the reasons for its existence within itself. Emotions change over time, they pass, while the form of a musical piece always remains what it is regardless of subjective perception; this is what makes music a language, namely the fact that music has internal rules.

I have thought about this topic several times; part of the issue can become clearer by delving deeper into Kierkegaard, and in particular through his work Either/Or. For the curious, a couple of insights: only words and music can be addressed to the ear, respectively ethics and aesthetics, and language belongs to the world of mediation, therefore to ethics. Ethics and aesthetics, in the logic of either/or, are "exclusive."

Dato che so che l'amica Bianca ha studiato Filosofia, se avesse voglia e tempo magari può sviscerare la questione.

Frank wrote:

I have thought back to this topic several times; part of the issue can become clearer by delving deeper into Kierkegaard, and in particular through his work Either/Or. For the curious, a couple of insights: only words and music can be addressed to the ear, ethics and aesthetics respectively, and language belongs to the world of mediation, and therefore to ethics. Ethics and aesthetics, in the logic of the either/or, are "exclusive."

Dato che l'amica Bianca so che ha dato con la Filosofia, se avesse voglia e tempo magari può sviscerare la questione.

Dear Frank, as you say, Kierkegaard's reflections on Don Giovanni are certainly stimulating, but I believe the many essays written on the subject can do better than I can.

What this reference of yours to Kierkegaard reminds me of, however, is another of your previous questions, which concerned why we write music. I had replied to you that we do it to avoid boredom, which, as it happens, would probably be exactly what this writer might have answered. Unfortunately, however, my response was not received in the right way, so I let the matter drop. Now, the fact that I am bringing you back to that discussion is not so much to digress, but because I think that in order to better understand anything, it is always appropriate to divert attention, i.e., to change point of view. This time, however, I would not want to take the matter too far, partly due to time and partly because everyone can do it themselves if they wish.

Of course, one must ask oneself some specific questions (which perhaps are not even easy to find among the many essays already written), such as - how could boredom have something to do with language? - and then try to give ourselves some answers, if we believe there might be any...

One possible track could be this: boredom and language meet by virtue of meaning: in fact, in Kierkegaard, boredom is a lack of choice, therefore indifference, therefore a lack of meaning; meaning is what language conveys, and thus...

I haven't replied anymore because I find myself in a rather static period... I am continuing to read / search for information on communication/language/arts that might make me doubt my own convictions and the convictions of others; this gives me the certainty that I am not the one who has the solution to the problems of contemporary music (perhaps it is better to say of contemporary "culture") because by reading, I disprove every solution I hypothesize (and perhaps I self-encourage myself to do better every time).

Regarding this topic, I found a Wikipedia page that might (perhaps) be useful to you as well and may lead us to new reflections; here is the link: https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comunicazione_interpersonale

Don't you think that if we insert music as "content," everything falls apart?

And therefore, if Music is communication (and I am certain that it is), can we call it a communicative process or not?

Also from Wikipedia, I found this:

The communicative process, according to the Shannon-Weaver model, is based on some fundamental elements:
the system (animal, human, machine) that transmits (the sender);
a communication channel, necessary for transferring information;
a reference context in which the process develops;
the content of the communication contained within the message;
the recipient of the communicated message (the receiver);
the information;
a formal code through which linguistic form is given to the information, i.e., it is signified.

These elements are necessary to construct a model of communication that also includes two communicative acts on the part of the sender and the receiver: the encoding and decoding of information.

The fundamental characteristic of most communication processes, however, is that the presence of the receiver does not necessarily imply the complete assumption of the information: this, in fact, depends both on the effectiveness of the channel and, above all, on the result of the interpretation (inverse signification) of the message by the receiver; such a result is strongly influenced by the level of sharing of the code when it is not unambiguous, as often happens in extremely complex languages and, therefore, ultimately, by the factors that influence the sender and the receiver. Therefore, specifically within the scope of psychological and ethological theories and usually in the most used general models of communication, "context" is introduced, because the latter affects the two processes of signification (of the sender and the receiver) and, therefore, constitutes the sixth fundamental element in such models and represents a space that is shared by all members who communicate.

In addition, curiously, above it reads: "such a result is strongly influenced by the level of sharing of the code when it is not unambiguous, as often happens in extremely complex languages and, therefore, ultimately, by the factors that influence the sender and the receiver."

If Music is the communicative process, then its languages/codes are the "modal," "tonal," "dodecaphonic" languages, and all the new languages of the 1900s, right?

So music is not a language, but a communicative process?

And... Therefore, [...] "context" is introduced, because the latter affects the two processes of signification (of the sender and the receiver) and, therefore, constitutes the sixth fundamental element in such models and represents a space that is shared by all members who communicate.

To me, this sentence, if connected to the complexity that music reached last century, makes me think that "context" is a bridge between composer and audience; consequently... What can be the bridge between composer and audience today? I think that the "clarity" of the intentions expressed by the composer is fundamental but is not the answer to this question. And perhaps "beauty"/"aesthetics" is the answer to my question?

PS: Beauty and Aesthetics understood objectively, i.e., as factors that undoubtedly appear "beautiful" to a human being (e.g.: Rhythm, various pitches of sounds)

P.P.S: Various pitches of sounds, better understood as a close connection between various pitches of sounds