So, while listening to Phyrna' Journey to the East (link below the title), I noticed that the description said: "This song was written for the Represent a Country 2 contest in the Audio Forum. The country I chose... China!", which left me quite sceptical, and she added: "Whoever said that you need weird instruments and oddball pitchbends to sound Asian? :P".
What do you think ? Does a music have to use only traditional instrument to evoke a country, or can we use other instruments ? And if we can, can we use only non-traditional instruments ? And, a most important thing: how about the writing style (for expl: pentatonic scale)?
I am very curious to see your answers to that, I highly suggest you use examples to illustrate your thoughts.
Many countries in the world have traditional musics and use traditional instruments. This permits to evoke their history, their culture and many other themes. Does a music have to use only traditional instruments to evoke a country ?
First of all, the best way to evoke a country with music is to use traditional instruments. We immediatly recognize the style, so the country represented by the music. For example, when we hear an european music and an Asian music, we see the differences and we understand which country or which ''place'' is evoked. Then, I think people can use non-traditional instruments to ''talk'' about their country because instruments are important but many other things count when you hear a music. The rhythm is also very important : slow, lively, soft, … Some musics are created for dancing, others just for the pleasure of hearing them. In my opinion, the feelings we have when we hear a music are an other criterium to evoke the country : it can be sad, happy, melancholic, depending on what the compositor wants to evoke : a bad event in the past, a victory, … For example, a national anthem evokes its country, sometimes with traditional instruments. But when there is no traditonal instruments (music copied out with a different style for example), we still recognize the rhythm and understand the message. Last but not least, the lyrics can add many things to a music : it helps us to understand the history or moment evocated. Moreover, we easily memorize a music when there are lyrics. Let's take a famous example : SundayBloody Sunday from U2 have lyrics that evoke an irish conflict.. On top of that, they didn't use any traditional irish instruments, but the lyrics and the rhythm are enough to explain this bad event that happenned in 1972.
To conclude, using traditional instruments are not the only condition to evoke a country. People can do it another way because there are many other criteriums to consider when you compose a music !
Thanks for answering ! I overall agree, but would like to point out that, in my opinion, evoking an event that happenned in a country is not the same as evoking the country itself. To take the example you used, "Sunday, Bloody Sunday", talks about tragedies, but does not remind us of Ireland in general. What is yout opinion?
Actually, I think you're right about that : evoking an event that happened in a country is not really evoking the country itself. But you partially evoke it because the event is part of its history. Sometimes both the event and the country are evocated, it depends on the compositor's objective : if he wants to present a specific part of the history of the country or if he wants to ''show'' us the country in general.
To start with, I would say that when I travel, I always put the radio on in the car, to listen to typical music and typical songs, and I like to "be part of" the country, to enter the soul of the natives, even though I don't always understand the words of the songs. I think the rhythm and use of different foreign instruments is part of the journey and part of the dream. But does a music have to use only traditional instruments to evoke a country? Do you feel far from home when you listen to Beyoncé right in the middle of the Grampians? In my opinion, music should keep its own instruments and form of writing; but my ideas as a tourist are different when I go back home ! I like hearing different sounds, coming from different backgrounds : I love when The Chieftains welcome Mick Jagger to sing "The long Black Veil". Traditional music with the icon of Rock n' Roll ! Fantastic ! Furthermore, if you listen to the different songs in the film "Django" by Tarantino, you can hear that there are several sources, and the travel to Candyland with the rap song by Rick Ross is just wonderful : "100 black coffins" while Django risks his life to save his beloved wife is intense and heartbreaking. The modernity of the rap song makes the fight against slavery, modern and timeless: the audience is part of the fight too.
As a conclusion, I would say that like all forms of languages, music should evolve and be open to others, and that's what we should all do, especially nowadays when migrants die to be freed from wars, poverty and obscurantism.
Hey, thanks a lot for answering ! Wait a bit before talking about the migrants, it's going to be the next topic I'll start : ) I'd just want to say that "the long black veil" is not a tradditionnal irish melody and didn't seem to have been adapted to sound as such when I listened to it. Other than that, I think I generally agree.
Since it seemed to be a popular example, I tried to look at the irish folk/tradditional music and celtic tradditinal music's writing characteristics, It would seem that they use modes, which in "scholary" music were abandonned after the Renaissance. Since I cannot recognize them by ear, I'll try to ask more knowledgeable persons for more info about which music uses them.
Music has been evolving over the centuries in many different ways, from classical music to hip hop or rap, music is an international way to communicate, to exchange and meet new people. Each country has their own style, which attracts many people every year.
On one hand, I think countries all over the world should keep their own way of playing, but also of seeing music. Every culture is different and it is a beautiful way I believe to learn about them through the art of music. We get to learn about their habits, their beliefs, but also how they see our world and how it is evolving. But on the other hand, international music, mostly sung in English, has become so popular that it is today the first way to communicate with people from different cultures and different countries. You can talk about your tastes for music with other people and discover plenty of new things and make new friends. Just look at what happened with the Gangnam Style: After this huge success, everyone started listening to Asian music!
To conclude, I think international music is very important and should be developed all around the world to help exchanging and communicating, but it is also vital that we keep our own way to see and play music ; it is our history, our heritage.
I think that music is one of the many aspects that form a culture and an identity. Indeed, since the very begining, music has been used to comunicate and express different beliefs. There are many examples where music has remained a very traditional art form. For example I went to Bali one year ago and throughout my whole trip, I only heard one type of music, with the same instruments. You can listen to an extract by typing Degung bali on Youtube. This music is used in Bali mainly for religious dances and rituals. On the other hand, though some cultures keep music very traditional, music in other countries constantly evolves and changes with time. For example in the USA, jazz, rock and rap were all very popular in different times. This also may have to do with the fact that the USA is a multicultural society. In addition to that, in our day and age, music can be produced by a computer and listened to throughout the whole world via the Internet. Therefore music is now becoming an international culture, beyond the culture of a country. To conclude, I think that music should be something different cultures share to learn more about each other.
How does music can reflect a national culture? Music is an expressive language. It tells a story, expresses ideas and offers opinions and share emotions of life's experiences. Music ties generations together and shaped the bases of a culture. At all times, people, used music to tell stories, teach lessons, to celebrate rituals, etc. It reflected their way of living, and it still does. To my opinion, music is able to capture the atmosphere of a certain era in a special country, like Jazz and Blues, born in America, (Chicago and New Orleans) that remember the flavors of the downtrodden during the hard times of Great Depression. Slave songs reflect America's history of slavery too, the toil it took on African American families, the pain, and strong faith in God. We can’t find this type of music anywhere else; there is a really close relationship between a country’s history and music. Some examples of music reflecting the USA: We can think about the Big Band Era and its patriotic lyrics that reflect the American Culture of patriotism during World War Two. Or the songs of the 1950 burst with optimism of a culture that is booming with prosperity, post WW2. Let’s introduce here the notion of Music Geography which is related to our topic. This is the study of music production and consumption as a reflection of the landscape and geographical spaces surrounding it. This notion aims to establish relationship of music to landscapes and regions, either with the type of music produced or in lyrics that are inspired by these areas. Nowadays, globalization, migration process and cultural diffusion have allowed all styles of music to be consumed globally. Music has no more borders, but still reflects a certain culture and a national identity. The diversity in music, music forms and production is a reflection of the diversity in human societies.
I completely agree with the fact that each place, and each time, saw the birth of a different type of music. Now the problem is to know how some musics can EVOKE a country's GENERAL musical traditions. 'ya see?
Music is a part of every culture and more general of every countries but we can say that just traditional instruments can evoke a country ? I think music is not based only on instruments to belong to a country. In fact we have many parameters such as current themes or sounds. Indeed in Arabic music , we have in general the same instruments but with themes we can find out from which country the music is( it's better in that case to speak Arabic) . To conclude , a music has such different ways to evoke a country and not just traditional instruments because a country is not define with one aspects but with plenty of them.
Most of the countries today have traditional instruments and music but does a music have to use only traditional instruments to evoke a country ? Some composers play on the fact that certain instruments have (or had) associations with particular social contexts and countries. Social or historical contexts are maybe associated not only with instruments but also with types of music. For example, fanfares can recall the hunt. There is no temptation to argue that music is a language. To understand a musical work would be to understand how it is put together, the musical meaning would consist in the coherence of the structure of the work, and the significance of the different elements would be linked to their contribution to the creation of this structure. Cultural communities vary widely in the ways they experience their own musical practices. It seems quite apparent that a German art song, an Irish folk song, or a Mexican pop song will carry its full symbolic meaning only for those who are capable of understanding the language in which it is set. Similarly, the sounds of music played in a certain way on the "shakuhachi", the bamboo flute that originated in China, may evoke specific intracultural meanings for persons familiar with the history of the instrument. To conclude, a music doesn't have to use only traditional instruments to evoke a country because there is not only one way to recognize the style, so the country represented.
To begin with, music is everywhere and everybody likes music. Some songs have different fonctions like to suscit emotions or to suscit admiration in front of the instruments which are used by the players. However how to represent our country in music ? Can we represent a country with just typical instruments ?
First of all, I think like the others that the typical instruments influence the kind of music and can represent a country! It's a great to expose their culture to the would by the music. For exemple in Scottish, we have the ' cornemuse ' which is really popular in all the world ( like the man with the skirt who plays the 'cornemuse'.
However, I think we can represent a country not especially with typical instruments. For instance, we can talk about the Eurovision which is a show were some famous ( or not for France) singers represent their country. In that, many people just sing without instruments like Céline Dion or France Gall for France! The style of writing is also a criterium to represent a country and show how the people see their country.
To conclude, we can represent a country by several manners not just with typical instruments. If you like to represent a country, you have to be volunteer and to show by words or rythmn your love for your country.
I apologize, I think my title may have been misleading. By "representing" a country I actually meant: to evoke it (and I think you understood something like "to be its herald" (?), which would be a totally different problem). I still totally agree with your first paragraph, thought (btw: "cornemuse" = bagpipes, and it is, indeed, very linked in our minds to Scotland).
Anyway, thanks for answering me, I really appreciate it!
So, while listening to Phyrna' Journey to the East (link below the title), I noticed that the description said: "This song was written for the Represent a Country 2 contest in the Audio Forum. The country I chose... China!", which left me quite sceptical, and she added: "Whoever said that you need weird instruments and oddball pitchbends to sound Asian? :P".
ReplyDeleteWhat do you think ? Does a music have to use only traditional instrument to evoke a country, or can we use other instruments ? And if we can, can we use only non-traditional instruments ?
And, a most important thing: how about the writing style (for expl: pentatonic scale)?
I am very curious to see your answers to that, I highly suggest you use examples to illustrate your thoughts.
Many countries in the world have traditional musics and use traditional instruments. This permits to evoke their history, their culture and many other themes. Does a music have to use only traditional instruments to evoke a country ?
ReplyDeleteFirst of all, the best way to evoke a country with music is to use traditional instruments. We immediatly recognize the style, so the country represented by the music. For example, when we hear an european music and an Asian music, we see the differences and we understand which country or which ''place'' is evoked.
Then, I think people can use non-traditional instruments to ''talk'' about their country because instruments are important but many other things count when you hear a music. The rhythm is also very important : slow, lively, soft, … Some musics are created for dancing, others just for the pleasure of hearing them. In my opinion, the feelings we have when we hear a music are an other criterium to evoke the country : it can be sad, happy, melancholic, depending on what the compositor wants to evoke : a bad event in the past, a victory, … For example, a national anthem evokes its country, sometimes with traditional instruments. But when there is no traditonal instruments (music copied out with a different style for example), we still recognize the rhythm and understand the message.
Last but not least, the lyrics can add many things to a music : it helps us to understand the history or moment evocated. Moreover, we easily memorize a music when there are lyrics. Let's take a famous example : SundayBloody Sunday from U2 have lyrics that evoke an irish conflict.. On top of that, they didn't use any traditional irish instruments, but the lyrics and the rhythm are enough to explain this bad event that happenned in 1972.
To conclude, using traditional instruments are not the only condition to evoke a country. People can do it another way because there are many other criteriums to consider when you compose a music !
Thanks for answering !
DeleteI overall agree, but would like to point out that, in my opinion, evoking an event that happenned in a country is not the same as evoking the country itself. To take the example you used, "Sunday, Bloody Sunday", talks about tragedies, but does not remind us of Ireland in general.
What is yout opinion?
Actually, I think you're right about that : evoking an event that happened in a country is not really evoking the country itself. But you partially evoke it because the event is part of its history. Sometimes both the event and the country are evocated, it depends on the compositor's objective : if he wants to present a specific part of the history of the country or if he wants to ''show'' us the country in general.
DeleteTo start with, I would say that when I travel, I always put the radio on in the car, to listen to typical music and typical songs, and I like to "be part of" the country, to enter the soul of the natives, even though I don't always understand the words of the songs. I think the rhythm and use of different foreign instruments is part of the journey and part of the dream. But does a music have to use only traditional instruments to evoke a country?
ReplyDeleteDo you feel far from home when you listen to Beyoncé right in the middle of the Grampians?
In my opinion, music should keep its own instruments and form of writing; but my ideas as a tourist are different when I go back home !
I like hearing different sounds, coming from different backgrounds : I love when The Chieftains welcome Mick Jagger to sing "The long Black Veil". Traditional music with the icon of Rock n' Roll ! Fantastic !
Furthermore, if you listen to the different songs in the film "Django" by Tarantino, you can hear that there are several sources, and the travel to Candyland with the rap song by Rick Ross is just wonderful : "100 black coffins" while Django risks his life to save his beloved wife is intense and heartbreaking. The modernity of the rap song makes the fight against slavery, modern and timeless: the audience is part of the fight too.
As a conclusion, I would say that like all forms of languages, music should evolve and be open to others, and that's what we should all do, especially nowadays when migrants die to be freed from wars, poverty and obscurantism.
Hey, thanks a lot for answering !
DeleteWait a bit before talking about the migrants, it's going to be the next topic I'll start : )
I'd just want to say that "the long black veil" is not a tradditionnal irish melody and didn't seem to have been adapted to sound as such when I listened to it.
Other than that, I think I generally agree.
Since it seemed to be a popular example, I tried to look at the irish folk/tradditional music and celtic tradditinal music's writing characteristics,
ReplyDeleteIt would seem that they use modes, which in "scholary" music were abandonned after the Renaissance.
Since I cannot recognize them by ear, I'll try to ask more knowledgeable persons for more info about which music uses them.
Music has been evolving over the centuries in many different ways, from classical music to hip hop or rap, music is an international way to communicate, to exchange and meet new people. Each country has their own style, which attracts many people every year.
ReplyDeleteOn one hand, I think countries all over the world should keep their own way of playing, but also of seeing music. Every culture is different and it is a beautiful way I believe to learn about them through the art of music. We get to learn about their habits, their beliefs, but also how they see our world and how it is evolving.
But on the other hand, international music, mostly sung in English, has become so popular that it is today the first way to communicate with people from different cultures and different countries. You can talk about your tastes for music with other people and discover plenty of new things and make new friends. Just look at what happened with the Gangnam Style: After this huge success, everyone started listening to Asian music!
To conclude, I think international music is very important and should be developed all around the world to help exchanging and communicating, but it is also vital that we keep our own way to see and play music ; it is our history, our heritage.
I think that music is one of the many aspects that form a culture and an identity. Indeed, since the very begining, music has been used to comunicate and express different beliefs. There are many examples where music has remained a very traditional art form. For example I went to Bali one year ago and throughout my whole trip, I only heard one type of music, with the same instruments. You can listen to an extract by typing Degung bali on Youtube. This music is used in Bali mainly for religious dances and rituals.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, though some cultures keep music very traditional, music in other countries constantly evolves and changes with time. For example in the USA, jazz, rock and rap were all very popular in different times. This also may have to do with the fact that the USA is a multicultural society. In addition to that, in our day and age, music can be produced by a computer and listened to throughout the whole world via the Internet. Therefore music is now becoming an international culture, beyond the culture of a country.
To conclude, I think that music should be something different cultures share to learn more about each other.
How does music can reflect a national culture?
ReplyDeleteMusic is an expressive language. It tells a story, expresses ideas and offers opinions and share emotions of life's experiences. Music ties generations together and shaped the bases of a culture. At all times, people, used music to tell stories, teach lessons, to celebrate rituals, etc. It reflected their way of living, and it still does.
To my opinion, music is able to capture the atmosphere of a certain era in a special country, like Jazz and Blues, born in America, (Chicago and New Orleans) that remember the flavors of the downtrodden during the hard times of Great Depression. Slave songs reflect America's history of slavery too, the toil it took on African American families, the pain, and strong faith in God. We can’t find this type of music anywhere else; there is a really close relationship between a country’s history and music.
Some examples of music reflecting the USA:
We can think about the Big Band Era and its patriotic lyrics that reflect the American Culture of patriotism during World War Two. Or the songs of the 1950 burst with optimism of a culture that is booming with prosperity, post WW2.
Let’s introduce here the notion of Music Geography which is related to our topic. This is the study of music production and consumption as a reflection of the landscape and geographical spaces surrounding it. This notion aims to establish relationship of music to landscapes and regions, either with the type of music produced or in lyrics that are inspired by these areas. Nowadays, globalization, migration process and cultural diffusion have allowed all styles of music to be consumed globally. Music has no more borders, but still reflects a certain culture and a national identity.
The diversity in music, music forms and production is a reflection of the diversity in human societies.
I completely agree with the fact that each place, and each time, saw the birth of a different type of music. Now the problem is to know how some musics can EVOKE a country's GENERAL musical traditions. 'ya see?
DeleteMusic is a part of every culture and more general of every countries but we can say that just traditional instruments can evoke a country ?
ReplyDeleteI think music is not based only on instruments to belong to a country. In fact we have many parameters such as current themes or sounds. Indeed in Arabic music , we have in general the same instruments but with themes we can find out from which country the music is( it's better in that case to speak Arabic) .
To conclude , a music has such different ways to evoke a country and not just traditional instruments because a country is not define with one aspects but with plenty of them.
Most of the countries today have traditional instruments and music but does a music have to use only traditional instruments to evoke a country ?
ReplyDeleteSome composers play on the fact that certain instruments have (or had) associations with particular social contexts and countries. Social or historical contexts are maybe associated not only with instruments but also with types of music. For example, fanfares can recall the hunt.
There is no temptation to argue that music is a language. To understand a musical work would be to understand how it is put together, the musical meaning would consist in the coherence of the structure of the work, and the significance of the different elements would be linked to their contribution to the creation of this structure.
Cultural communities vary widely in the ways they experience their own musical practices.
It seems quite apparent that a German art song, an Irish folk song, or a Mexican pop song will carry its full symbolic meaning only for those who are capable of understanding the language in which it is set.
Similarly, the sounds of music played in a certain way on the "shakuhachi", the bamboo flute that originated in China, may evoke specific intracultural meanings for persons familiar with the history of the instrument.
To conclude, a music doesn't have to use only traditional instruments to evoke a country because there is not only one way to recognize the style, so the country represented.
To begin with, music is everywhere and everybody likes music. Some songs have different fonctions like to suscit emotions or to suscit admiration in front of the instruments which are used by the players. However how to represent our country in music ? Can we represent a country with just typical instruments ?
ReplyDeleteFirst of all, I think like the others that the typical instruments influence the kind of music and can represent a country! It's a great to expose their culture to the would by the music. For exemple in Scottish, we have the ' cornemuse ' which is really popular in all the world ( like the man with the skirt who plays the 'cornemuse'.
However, I think we can represent a country not especially with typical instruments. For instance, we can talk about the Eurovision which is a show were some famous ( or not for France) singers represent their country. In that, many people just sing without instruments like Céline Dion or France Gall for France! The style of writing is also a criterium to represent a country and show how the people see their country.
To conclude, we can represent a country by several manners not just with typical instruments. If you like to represent a country, you have to be volunteer and to show by words or rythmn your love for your country.
I apologize, I think my title may have been misleading. By "representing" a country I actually meant: to evoke it (and I think you understood something like "to be its herald" (?), which would be a totally different problem).
DeleteI still totally agree with your first paragraph, thought (btw: "cornemuse" = bagpipes, and it is, indeed, very linked in our minds to Scotland).
Anyway, thanks for answering me, I really appreciate it!