Sometimes the music is saying the opposite of what the words are saying. The words are one with the music and a fascinating tapestry is created. The words are important, but so much more is going on in vocal music beyond the words. The listener has to use his imagination equally with vocal music as with instrumental. Vocal music whether a song, an opera aria, a choir, is about much more than lyrics. I don’t concur with the comparison of instrumental music being a book, while vocal song is a movie. But listen to a real singer, and the whole perspective changes. Not much pop music is done by singers with such voices, so it becomes all about the lyrics. That such musical sound can emanate purely from the singer, without using an instrument outside his body, is a wonder and touches the listener in a very different place from instrumental music.
Amplifier song instrumental plus#
Vocal music usually includes the instrumental music of the accompaniment, plus the magical resonance of the vocal sound.
My soul is my antenna, I am the instrument + the guitar is my amplifier.ĭear Ottmar, I am moved to defend vocal song, given that we have a singer with a beautiful, expressive voice. Ideally music works the same way, and every musician would probably agree with me that for us the biggest high is when a group of musos spontaneously performs something they have never played before. Like the Zen painter who creates his work in seconds on very thin paper – so thin that it might break under the weight of the brush if he hesitates or thinks for a moment. Instrumental music will rain on the brain, can fall through the cracks. If the mind is a pool of water, instrumental music will sink + vocal music will float.
Amplifier song instrumental movie#
It doesn’t work very subtly – just as in a movie a lot of the subtleties of the book are lost. The voice of another human being happy or in distress. By that I mean that vocals always catch our attention. There is an attention that songs demand, that makes them coarse. Instrumental music works on several different levels: as background music to work by, to think by – or as foreground music when the listener tries to relive the artist’s emotions or intentions.
The mere sound of language changes the way we listen. Techno is mostly instrumental because lyrics get in the way of trance. Secondly I admit there are lyricists who are more abstract and less literal than others, but even the most abstract lyrics pull us out of the music. However I am trying to compare the active process of reading with the passive process of watching.
Some of you will point out that a book has words too. W/o that imagination a book is just words and the music is just notes. In order to get the picture from instrumental music, the listener has to invest something, has to let the music resonate within him, has to flesh out the mood the music portrays, just as a reader has to fill the words with life. Instrumental music can be ignored easier than vocal music. Instrumental music works on our intuitive mind whereas vocals/lyrics seem to push us into the intellectual mind. The listener becomes the center of attention, rather than the singer. The lyrics, the singing rule the listener. In a song a hero or heroine will tell their story. A better movie will move your mind, will challenge your perception, but your mind is not as active as it would be while reading a book. When you go to a movie, you sit and watch. You imagine the scenery, you imagine the persons talking, imagine how they look and move. When you read the book your imagination fleshes out the story. Instrumental Music is to vocal song what a book is to the movie. I believe it was published in Musician Magazin around that time. This is something I wrote circa 1993 – link.
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