In this podcast, the hosts delve into the occult practice of music writing, analyzing how notation falls short when interpreting ambient tracks like Brian Eno's. They explore the power of good writing to reveal new facets of the ineffable world. Topics range from music analysis in popular culture to the limitations of music notation and the evolution of musical analysis techniques.
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insights INSIGHT
Notation Reveals and Conceals
Music notation abstracts concrete musical experiences but also reveals structural insights impossible to grasp otherwise.
Notation both loses and generates meaning, enabling analysis of motifs that shape entire pieces.
question_answer ANECDOTE
Rejecting Notation for Expression
JF Martel and his brother played complex rock music without reading notation, fearing that learning notation would corrupt their expression.
They admired Paul McCartney, who composed without reading music, embodying a folk tradition distinct from classical music’s notation roots.
insights INSIGHT
Meaning vs. Presence Cultures
Meaning culture separates experience from its abstractions, like music notation separates sound from feeling.
This distinction leads to confusing maps for territories, losing the immediacy of presence in favor of abstract meaning.
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Music writing has always been something of an occult practice, trying by some weird alchemy to use concepts to describe stuff that defies the basic categories of intellect. So long as we stick to classical music, we can pretend that nothing too odd is happening, since the classical tradition has been steeped in notation for centuries. But when a musicologist attempts to analyze, say, an ambient track by Brian Eno, things aren't so simple. Suddenly notation won't do, and there comes the need to make use of every tool in the poet's shed. This episode focuses on a recently published article by Phil on this question. In due course, the discussion turns to the power of good writing: its capacity not just to convey an author's subjective impressions, but to disclose new facets of the ineffable, baroque objective world.