[SanAntone]

A good composer masters balance, the art of preparation and resolution. Every kind of dissonance can be found in the music of Bach, but most people do not find his music harsh because the dissonances are prepared and resolved in a manner which in western culture we have grown to accept. In other cultures the idea of dissonance is often very different, as well as in atonal music.

With atonal music the same issues are present, only more concentrated. The same ideas of preparation and resolution exist among various dissonances and are manipulated by the composer.

It takes a certain amount of sophistication to discern this and an untrained listener can easily get lost in the thicket of dissonant sound. But what may sound harsh to one listener can be beautiful in another's perception.

I think the purest form of composition is in works for unpitched percussion.

 

[chipia]

But what may sound harsh to one listener can be beautiful in another's perception.

You are mixing things up. "Harsh" and "beautiful" is a false dichotomy. Harshness (or as more commonly called in psychoacoustics "roughness") can be measured objectively, for example by analyzing the partials of a chord and their distances within the critical bandwith*. The definition of Beauty on the other hand will vary wildly between listeners.

In fact there is no contradiction at all between harshness and beauty (maybe to some people, but not in general). While clusters generally sound harsher to me than major triads, I do think it is possible to create beautiful music with both of them. I also think that Messiaen's harmonies are very harsh compared to traditional tonality (which can be scientifically demonstrated by their higher proportion of partials within the critical bandwith) but I often find beauty in them.

*For more information on roughness in psychoacoustics you can check these articles:

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en.wikipedia.org

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en.wikipedia.org

The following quote from the second article is critical to this discussion and the claim that everything in music is mostly subjective:

Roughness is physiologically determined and therefore universal, but it is appraised differently in different musical styles. Some musical styles deliberately create large amounts of roughness for aesthetic effect (for example some polyphonic styles in the Balkans in which singers favor simultaneous second intervals) while others try to avoid roughness as much as possible or treat rough sounds in special ways (for example most tonal western music).

 

[SanAntone]

You are mixing things up. "Harsh" and "beautiful" is a false dichotomy. Harshness (or as more commonly called in psychoacoustics "roughness") can be measured objectively, for example by analyzing the partials of a chord and their distances within the critical bandwith*. The definition of Beauty on the other hand will vary wildly between listeners.

You are treating a chord in isolation, which is not how they appear in music. "Harsh" or "rough" may seem relevant to you - but in music these occurrences are relative. I think you seem to acknowledge this somewhat in the post - but you still appear to be tied to an idea of isolated harshness.

In western music the concept of dissonance has evolved. At one time the interval of the fourth was considered consonant, but later was classified as dissonant. But these ideas have nothing to do with harshness, only the idea of how a dissonance is resolved.

Also, the idea that tonality is an outgrowth of the overtone series has been debunked since within the overtone series every imaginable "harsh" dissonance exists.

There is nothing more "natural" about tonal music than atonal music. They are both found in nature.

 

[chipia]

Also, the idea that tonality is an outgrowth of the overtone series has been debunked since within the overtone series every imaginable "harsh" dissonance exists.

There is nothing more "natural" about tonal music than atonal music. They are both found in nature.

I have never claimed anything of this sort. That being said, one may argue that traditional tonality is based on the intervals that emerge from the 5 lowest partials of the overtone series. Modern approaches often expand this by adding higher partials, or even by specifically focusing on the intervals of higher overtones. I don't think that any of these approaches is inherently "better" than the other, but they all exhibit distinct measurable psychoacoustic qualities that influence the subjective experience of these styles.

 

[Chat Noir]

You are mixing things up. "Harsh" and "beautiful" is a false dichotomy. Harshness (or as more commonly called in psychoacoustics "roughness") can be measured objectively, for example by analyzing the partials of a chord and their distances within the critical bandwith*. The definition of Beauty on the other hand will vary wildly between listeners.

Oh? And yet the so-called 'consonance' perception is itself a mirage. Along the length of say, a harp string which is plucked, there are many differing overtones on that same string. Never mind chords.

Yet I find your definition unconvincing anyway because the application of the word 'harsh', which has a meaning wholly unrelated to measuring sound suggests a quality not present inherently.

What is it exactly that you are attempting to show/prove? I can't see the point.

 

[chipia]

Oh? And yet the so-called 'consonance' perception is itself a mirage. Along the length of say, a harp string which is plucked, there are many differing overtones on that same string. Never mind chords.

I don't see how this contradicts anything I've said. What is your point?

Yet I find your definition unconvincing anyway because the application of the word 'harsh', which has a meaning wholly unrelated to measuring sound suggests a quality not present inherently.

It is not "my" definition, but the definition of psychoacoustics, which was arrived at by scientific method, and which can be measured indeed.

What is it exactly that you are attempting to show/prove? I can't see the point.

I wanted to show that not all aspects of musical experience are just subjective. Some are objective, even measurable.

 

[Eva Yojimbo]

The accelerating technological advancements are important. In earlier times technology was bad and people had to compensate this by being very good as humans. With the accelerating technological advancements people can afford to be worse as humans and cultural beings. The technical advance makes cultural decline affordable. But I think this will not work forever. Avant-garde music already sounds much like a dystopia. A sign?

I don't think your first sentence is true at all: people were better humans when technology was worse? What is this based on? Statistics actually show that we're living in the safest, most peaceful time in human history, with violence having steadily decreased over the centuries. Humans seem to me to be much worse to each other when they're having to fight for resources. Technology has given us the ability to meet our basic needs efficiently without having to fight all the time, and even though the latter still happens it isn't as frequent as there's less need to.

I don't know what you mean by being "worse as... cultural beings." Technical advances in terms of culture have simply given more people the means of both producing and experiencing works of culture, as well as a much greater variety for what kind of cultural works can be produced. The vast majority of people these days have access to a phone that can take photographs and film video, as well as access to the internet for sharing both with the whole world. This has made culture much more egalitarian rather than something that's accessible (both creatively and receptively) only to a handful of the social elite.

 

[Eva Yojimbo]

A composer like Beethoven is acknowledged as a great composer. But that has nothing to do with whether someone responds to his music positively.

No, but it seems to have everything to do with the fact that a lot of people respond to his music positively, which then suggests we're judging greatness by consensus (or "polls" to go back to StrangeMagic's old analogy).

 

[Chat Noir]

I don't see how this contradicts anything I've said. What is your point?

My point is simple. You're delving into the measurement of sound to make an isolated point about consonance/dissonance which I don't think has any meaning to composer/listener.

It is not "my" definition, but the definition of psychoacoustics, which was arrived at by scientific method, and which can be measured indeed.

No, the word 'harsh' is a function of the English language, not 'psychoacoustics'. As such it is a value judgement as applied and I suspect one carefully chosen.

I wanted to show that not all aspects of musical experience are just subjective. Some are objective, even measurable.

Well I don't think it has succeeded, because no matter what the final end point is listener perception. If this was an objective matter the outcome would be pretty much the same. Like the fact that objectively no matter who you are if you touch a high-voltage apparatus, you get a massive electric shock. Listening to music is not like that. This 'science' detour is irrelevant really.
There are indeed things we can discover. Like e.g. knowing that the sea, which is decibels higher than a buzzing fridge motor is still considered 'urgent' because of the shape of its waveform. In the end though this 'fact' is of little relevance with regard to whether someone prefers that latter sound or wanted to use it as specific sound to a specific end.

 

[mmsbls]

...I wanted to show that not all aspects of musical experience are just subjective. Some are objective, even measurable.

What's interesting about dissonance (or harshness) is that, depending on what you mean, it is both subjective and objective. You are correct that the physics of beating of multiple tones can be precisely measured. The response to such tones cannot today (perhaps in 1000s to millions of years from now it will be). We had an interesting thread on TC that discussed a particular experiment that tried to understand how dissonant chords were perceived. People listened to various dissonant chords (i.e. just the chord itself) and recorded their assessment of the dissonance. They were then "trained" in identifying the middle tone. After the training their assessment of dissonance was reduced. Exposure to the dissonance reduced the psychological harshness.

 

[Eva Yojimbo]

I watched a documentary on Charles Ives and there was a wonderful quote: "My God, what does sound have to do with music?" This might seem to be a flippant statement, but I think Ives is getting at the crux of the problems in this thread.

Music is more akin to architecture than sound. IOW, composers work at putting things together (that is the entomology of the word), building aural structures which develop over time.

Too much time is taken up on TC with talking about what something sounds like, and not enough on what the composer was doing with the materials. But this is natural with a mostly unprofessional group of fans.

The simplest definition I know of music is "organized sound," and I don't think you can strip away half of what makes music music and decide it's all about the organization rather than what's being organized. I remember ages ago reading a book on the history of jazz and I think it was Louis Armstrong (I could be wrong here; memory is fuzzy) talking about how he'd often practice for days playing a single note, working on all the different ways he could get it to sound, because within those different sounds were analogies with different emotions, tones, feelings.

Obviously the way in which sounds are organized is incredibly important as well, just not vastly more important than the sound of what's been organized. I don't begrudge composers for being fascinated by the architecture and tools of organization, just as I don't begrudge any professionals who are interested in the techniques of their art, but the vast majority of people (and this even includes many of those professionals) are always going to care more about what kind of sensory, emotional, tonal, aesthetic experience the final work creates rather than the technique that went into making that work. One analogy is that most people care more about how the food tastes than what went into making it.

 

[Forster]

You are mixing things up. "Harsh" and "beautiful" is a false dichotomy. Harshness (or as more commonly called in psychoacoustics "roughness") can be measured objectively, for example by analyzing the partials of a chord and their distances within the critical bandwith*. The definition of Beauty on the other hand will vary wildly between listeners.

In fact there is no contradiction at all between harshness and beauty (maybe to some people, but not in general). While clusters generally sound harsher to me than major triads, I do think it is possible to create beautiful music with both of them. I also think that Messiaen's harmonies are very harsh compared to traditional tonality (which can be scientifically demonstrated by their higher proportion of partials within the critical bandwith) but I often find beauty in them.

*For more information on roughness in psychoacoustics you can check these articles:

Loading…

en.wikipedia.org

Loading…

en.wikipedia.org

The following quote from the second article is critical to this discussion and the claim that everything in music is mostly subjective:

I can find no source for the research into "roughness" in sound, despite the paragraph about it in the wiki article. Can you cite a reference please?

 

[chipia]

I can find no source for the research into "roughness" in sound, despite the paragraph about it in the wiki article. Can you cite a reference please?

Sure, here is the source of the Wikipedia article: http://www.acousticslab.org/papers/Vassilakis2005SRE.pdf

 

[Forster]

Sure, here is the source of the Wikipedia article: http://www.acousticslab.org/papers/Vassilakis2005SRE.pdf

Thanks. Now what? What is the point you wish to make about roughness?

 

[Chat Noir]

Thanks. Now what? What is the point you wish to make about roughness?

Yes, I was just about to say. The diversionary point has been stated, but what is the actual point? If we show that something is 'harsh' (it hasn't because that's a linguistic value judgement), what then?

I think we know what the actual point is supposed to be.

 

[Forster]

Yes, I was just about to say. The diversionary point has been stated, but what is the actual point? If we show that something is 'harsh' (it hasn't because that's a linguistic value judgement), what then?

I think we know what the actual point is supposed to be.

As far as I can see from the paper Chipia referenced, there is no justification for making any aesthetic judgement about "roughness" or "harshness". In fact, the paper points critically to those who wish to point to the superiority of Western music because "roughness" is less evident (see p6).

 

[chipia]

What's interesting about dissonance (or harshness) is that, depending on what you mean, it is both subjective and objective.

You are correct that there are both physical and and cultural influences on perceived dissonance. The actual magnitude of these influences depends on the specific context.

It seems that culture has mostly an influence on the perception of "moderately rough" sounds like minor sixths, wereas the perception of "very consonant" intervals (fifths) and "very rough" ones (minor seconds) seems to be more universal. The study I've just linked to goes into more detail on this topic, it's pretty interesting.

I suspect besides physical and cultural influences, there is a third one: Musical context. For example, I think that a cluster between two major chords will be perceived as more dissonant than a cluster between two other clusters.

We had an interesting thread on TC that discussed a particular experiment that tried to understand how dissonant chords were perceived. People listened to various dissonant chords (i.e. just the chord itself) and recorded their assessment of the dissonance. They were then "trained" in identifying the middle tone. After the training their assessment of dissonance was reduced. Exposure to the dissonance reduced the psychological harshness.

Yes, that's certainly true as I've experienced it myself as I began listening to modern classical music. However, I suspect exposure to intervals mostly changes their absolute perception and not their relative one. For example, today the music of Messiaen sounds much less harsh to me compared to when I first heard it. But relatively speaking, I still think it sounds much harsher than CPT, Pop, or medieval music. It would be interesting to know if the study you've read also researched this aspect.

 

[chipia]

As far as I can see from the paper Chipia referenced, there is no justification for making any aesthetic judgement about "roughness" or "harshness". In fact, the paper points critically to those who wish to point to the superiority of Western music because "roughness" is less evident (see p6).

I have never claimed that less roughness makes music superior, so I don't see what you are getting at.

My aim was to show that the perception of music isn't just subjective, but that there are in fact objectively measurable components to the listener's experience, in this case roughness.

 

[Forster]

I have never claimed that less roughness makes music superior, so I don't see what you are getting at.

So, what are you getting at with your fascination with roughness?

 

[SanAntone]

The simplest definition I know of music is "organized sound," and I don't think you can strip away half of what makes music music and decide it's all about the organization rather than what's being organized.

My point that music is differently created and perceived by different cultures, meaning that the particular sounds are less important than what is going on among them. Noise is sound and what differentiates music from noise is the organization.

Which brings up back to the OP, i.e. how can randomness create music.

Probably the most absolutely random work composed is John Cage's 4'33". IN this work Cage played no organizational role but allowed whatever sounds would emerge at a venue to constitute the "music." Many people consider 4'33" completely bogus because of Cage's premise.

In most if not all works which incorporate random procedures (they are procedures) there is some input or control by a composer. Just not as much in a work with no random qualities. Even in the Bubbles experiment, the composer took the result of his cildren at the keyboard and manipulated it using DAW software.

THe most natural form of music is made by the unaccopianed human voice or druming and unpitched percussion instruments. The intervals that emerge when we sing are slightly different than those found on a piano. And they change according to the context, what came before, where the music is going. We do this instinctively.

As technology entered western music making, e.g. the piano, it changed the intervals to something which could be standardized so that music played on a piano did not sound horribly out of tune using natural intonation. Hence the Well-Tempered Clavier.

I am highly suspicious when I see people attempting to apply acoustical science to musical attributes such as intervals, triads, scales, etc. Since I see this as off target from how music was originally made, naturally, and with little or no technology interfering.