Playing with emotion

[Randy Stein]

Phrasing is so fundamental that I am surprised that anyone should forget about it - although sometimes when I hear the Hohner wall of sound* in a Morris session all I hear is the driving beat with no phrasing at all.

 

Playing solo, or playing "nicely" in a session (rather than the vulgar gallop of a box and fiddle race) the phrase is the basic unit. Think in terms of individual bars and the music becomes jerky and disconnected. Ignore the phrases and it becomes a monotonous meaningless musical mush.

 

Much of the music I play is either dance music or closely connected to dance music, and the surge and flow of the dancers is reflected in the surge and flow of the phrases. I think of my hands dancing on the concertina.

 

 

*These days, it is often the Castagnari wall of sound - it sounds exactly the same, but it's more expensive.

 

I was taught to play the English Concertina through violin étude studies that also stressed bow technique and phrasing. I developed a style of playing using bellows, like a bow on a violin, to effect and in some cases define the phrasing and arrangement of a piece. When I work a tune out or playing I am always aware of the phrasing and bellow direction and placement in relation to the bars of music or musical phrase being played. I play English so whether the bellows are moving in or out does not determine the notes but the breathe and nuances of the piece being played. For me the breathing, hearing the notes and sounds of the instrument, the feel of the touch of the buttons, the movement of the bellows, even the smell of my case when I open it all have an emotional impact and define how and what I play.

Once you have organized and committed to the notes on the page, the nuanced responses develop the sound coming from the soul of your instrument.

rss

 

 

[Anglo-Irishman]

'Phrases' eh? Good name. I wonder if it'll catch on?

 

Since you might not be joking, I'll point out that the name has, in fact, caught on.

 

John? Look at this. Some sod's stolen your idea...

 

Dirge,

Yes, he must be a mind reader! The referenced Wiki entry really says it all. Including the fact that the word "phrase" is taken from spoken language, and that "What counts is the sense of completeness we hear in the pitches not the notation on the page."

 

How essential phrasing can be comes out in the old school joke: The teacher gets Wee Willie to read the next sentence. He reads: "There is a warm dough-nut. Step on it." the teacher says, "No Willie, the sentence reads: 'There is a worm. Do not step on it.'"

 

The interesting point is that what really screwed up the meaning of the sentence was not Willie's mispronounced vowels, but his misplacement of the full stop separating the phrases. If someone said, "There is a warm. Dough-nut step on it," it would sound rather odd, but after a moment's thought, we'd realise what was meant.

By analogy, it's the phrasing that makes "sense" of a tune.

 

Cheers,

John

[catty]

Phrasing is so fundamental that I am surprised that anyone should forget about it - the phrase is the basic unit.

 

Much of the music I play is either dance music or closely connected to dance music, and the surge and flow of the dancers is reflected in the surge and flow of the phrases. I think of my hands dancing on the concertina.

+1

 

 

 

 

For me the breathing, hearing the notes and sounds of the instrument, the feel of the touch of the buttons, the movement of the bellows, even the smell of my case when I open it all have an emotional impact and define how and what I play.

Once you have organized and committed to the notes on the page, the nuanced responses develop the sound coming from the soul of your instrument.

Nicely put. For me, spontaneity is one of the more stimulating aspects of playing. The organization of the "notes" provides the platform from which the player can propel into a gestalt or suspension of nuanced expression. Once the foundation has been laid--through memorization and rehearsing of the notes--my ambition is to leave all of that behind...all the rote learning, bricks and mortar, thoughts and associations with the building...and launch into another realm altogether. Often, there is a feeling of being "released" completely from notes, scores, mechanical instruments, and cognition...sometimes soaring into a realm of hypersensitivity, awareness, and even pure "emotion"; a meditation where thoughts are left behind and experience of great subtlety is rendered. For me, the experience of essence and beauty capable of being expressed through abstract art is a type well beyond words and other conventions. If I'm playing particularly effectively, I'm more apt to forget what preconceived notions I may have formulated around the music, and maybe the meaning of words altogether, in lieu of musical acuity.

 

For me, the above statements much better conceptualize the experience of musical dynamism than equation with "verbal" processes or other cognitive interpretive means.

Edited May 9, 2010 by catty

[Rod]

Phrasing is so fundamental that I am surprised that anyone should forget about it - the phrase is the basic unit.

 

Much of the music I play is either dance music or closely connected to dance music, and the surge and flow of the dancers is reflected in the surge and flow of the phrases. I think of my hands dancing on the concertina.

+1

 

 

 

 

For me the breathing, hearing the notes and sounds of the instrument, the feel of the touch of the buttons, the movement of the bellows, even the smell of my case when I open it all have an emotional impact and define how and what I play.

Once you have organized and committed to the notes on the page, the nuanced responses develop the sound coming from the soul of your instrument.

Nicely put. For me, spontaneity is one of the more stimulating aspects of playing. The organization of the "notes" provides the platform from which the player can propel into a gestalt or suspension of nuanced expression. Once the foundation has been laid--through memorization and rehearsing of the notes--my ambition is to leave all of that behind...all the rote learning, bricks and mortar, thoughts and associations with the building...and launch into another realm altogether. Often, there is a feeling of being "released" completely from notes, scores, mechanical instruments, and cognition...sometimes soaring into a realm of hypersensitivity, awareness, and even pure "emotion"; a meditation where thoughts are left behind and experience of great subtlety is rendered. For me, the experience of essence and beauty capable of being expressed through abstract art is a type well beyond words and other conventions. If I'm playing particularly effectively, I'm more apt to forget what preconceived notions I may have formulated around the music, and maybe the meaning of words altogether, in lieu of musical acuity.

 

For me, the above statements much better conceptualize the experience of musical dynamism than equation with "verbal" processes or other cognitive interpretive means.

 

Music without at least some input of emotion of some sort is probably neither worth playing nor worth listening to ?

[Anglo-Irishman]

 

For me, spontaneity is one of the more stimulating aspects of playing. The organization of the "notes" provides the platform from which the player can propel into a gestalt or suspension of nuanced expression. Once the foundation has been laid--through memorization and rehearsing of the notes--my ambition is to leave all of that behind...all the rote learning, bricks and mortar, thoughts and associations with the building...and launch into another realm altogether.

 

Yes, this is the point at which my bass-man says "We've got the notes, now let's learn the piece." It's only when you've heard the notes, and felt them under your fingers, that you can ascertain what's in them, and what you are capable of drawing out of them. I prefer to "draw out" the emotion rather than to "put it in". That thing about music and musician being in tune with one another, neither forcing the other into anything, but rather amplifying each other.

 

Often, there is a feeling of being "released" completely from notes, scores, mechanical instruments, and cognition...sometimes soaring into a realm of hypersensitivity, awareness, and even pure "emotion"; a meditation where thoughts are left behind and experience of great subtlety is rendered.

 

What are you talking about here? Is it performance, or is it noodling alone at home? If someone is listening, you're going to need notes!

 

For me, the experience of essence and beauty capable of being expressed through abstract art is a type well beyond words and other conventions.

 

"Abstract art" as opposed to what? Concrete art? Naturalistic art? Painting can be abstract as opposed to naturalistic. But music can only be abstract. For me, a planxty by Carolan and an atonal string quartet by Webern are equally abstract. Even the programmatic tone poems of the Romantic composers are abstract. The associations awakened by them are the listeners' - or the performers'. There are no concrete words or images to channel the associations.

On the other hand, even an abstract painting is concrete - it consists in physical paint and canvas, and could not exist without them. Similarly, music consists in physical vibrations in the physical air, and could not exist without these.

So "abstract" is very relative, and must always be defined in terms of "as opposed to what?"

 

We really do need a "Philosophy of Music" sub-forum!

 

Cheers,

John

[catty]

What are you talking about here? Is it performance, or is it noodling alone at home? If someone is listening, you're going to need notes!

 

 

I'm talking about intuitive versus cognitive experience of music.

 

Regarding your last paragraph, of course everything is "relative"; an "abstraction" must be abstracted from something. I think we can agree that a "thing" that "exists" (whether, light frequencies from paint on a canvas, or sonic vibrations from music) can be called "concrete." But I think this obfuscates the discussion here.

 

Because we are generally oriented to visual sensory experience, we conventionally organize and interpret visual stimuli in agreeably linear terms (i.e., a picture of a house represents a house). Much of music does not make this kind of "sense" unless we impose such symbolism (i.e., the melody "Twinkle, Twinkle" represents a house). Therefore, music is "inherently" more abstract than visual or "plastic" representational stimuli because we have not, for the most part, attached symbolic meaning with it. But if we were as aurally oriented as we are visually oriented, we would likely have made those symbolic associations (indeed, some have advanced this process) and music would not be "inherently" abstract as it is.

 

Connecting symbolic associations with sound (vis-a-vis, the methods you described previously) is more akin to that cognitive visual "language" (symbolism), and a free association to sound is a more "abstract" interpretive experience. Therefore, I disagree that "music can only be abstract": (not because sonic vibrations upon the anatomy of the ear are any more or less physically sensate than frequencies of light along the retina, but because there can be more or less symbolic association with it; it is abstract only insofar as it is not associated with symbolic meaning). As you have stated previously, there are an infinite number of varied responses to music--some more representational than others.

 

Pertaining to the thread topic, I'm interested in analyzing musical abstraction versus representation, or symbolism, and its relation to playing music with "emotion." Therefore, I'm interested qualitatively in HOW musical stimuli evokes emotion, not THAT it evokes emotion--(on that I think we can all agree). With this in mind then, I am reasoning why it is that, for me, music experienced "abstractly" (with minimal conventional cognitive symbolism) tends to evoke greater or more profound emotional response than music predicated on certain formal conventions (nostalgia, romanticism, etc.), and why it is that programmatic music (or representationalism in visual art, etc.) often relies upon cliche to evoke emotional response, which for me is less evocative.

Edited May 11, 2010 by catty

[Jody Kruskal]

As a performer, I walk a fine line between my own emotions and those of my audience. If I get personally emotional then my playing and especially singing suffers in performance. A singer who is sobbing is a pitiful spectacle but a sobbing audience is a moved audience and a singers delight.

 

As I record my music, I keep telling myself... just sing the notes, words, rhythms, pitches... tell the story and leave the emotion to the listener. When I become the listener and evaluate my playing and singing in the editing process I like my performances best when I am not interjecting any extra added emotion and I’m just delivering the song in the most straightforward manner possible. Over and over again, those are the takes that that get used in my recordings.

 

As for the concertina, my most emotional playing emulates my singing and follows the same KISS principal. Keeping it simple and playing the same way I sing, brings out the best and the most emotional playing.

 

This idea might seem like a contradiction perhaps, less is more, but connecting with my emotions as a performer is not a matter of adding a bit of emotion on top of technique, but rather being an honest human being, in the moment, with the song or with my instrument.

 

As for how this is done on the concertina... well for me, it all comes down to a very fine examination of details in the practice stage... rhythm, dynamics, phrasing, note choices and relative note duration's for every button I push. Then in performance, I throw it all away and just play and let my fingers do the walking.

[Alan Day]

Emotion really is about relating music to a happy or sad experience in your life. It is what makes dancers skip around with joy,of freedom, of sharing happiness with others and exploring the dance. Sadness with music relates to remembrance, relations, people in your life, music you remember from childhood, your Mother or Fathers favourite tune. A lovely walk, scenery, wild life etc.

A tune I wrote for my late Aunt, who looked after me as a child, is something I get very emotional about. When other players join in to make a rich full sound it brings her back into my mind,which is why I wrote it. Those other players cannot share my thoughts, but are sharing the emotion of the music I am playing.

Timing is of course an essential part of playing with emotion.

Al

[catty]

As for how this is done on the concertina... well for me, it all comes down to a very fine examination of details in the practice stage... rhythm, dynamics, phrasing, note choices and relative note duration's for every button I push. Then in performance, I throw it all away and just play and let my fingers do the walking.

There ya go

[Anglo-Irishman]

Sadness with music relates to remembrance, relations, people in your life, music you remember from childhood, your Mother or Fathers favourite tune. A lovely walk, scenery, wild life etc.

A tune I wrote for my late Aunt, who looked after me as a child, is something I get very emotional about.

 

Al,

 

That's a nice point. There are two kinds of emotion that music can arouse.

 

Perhaps, analogous to the value of old objects which can have an intrinsic value and/or a sentimental value, you could call them "intrinsic emotions" and "sentimental emotions". When a piece of music makes most people melancoly, then melancholy is an intrinsic emotion. What you're talking about here is "sentimental emotion". I'm not trying to belittle it. There are even pieces of music that have a sentimentally emotional value for a whole generation, like "All you need is Love" for my generation. It's something that becomes relevant when you're deciding what to play for what audience.

 

There's one piece of music that will always have a dual - intrinsic and sentimental - sadness for me: the Finale - Adagio Lamentoso of Tchaikovsky's Pathétitique Symphony. It's a gut-wrenching movement anyway, but it was also the last piece of music that my horn-playing son-in-law rehearsed the evening before he died. The performance of it was dedicated to his memory, and you may imagine how emotional it was for us bereaved, so soon after his death. An emotional musical experience that it is almost impossible to describe. One that I hope all of you will be spared ...

 

Cheers,

John

[catty]

 

 

 

 

 

That's a nice point. There are two kinds of emotion that music can arouse.

 

This is like saying that there are two kinds of responses to music. I would say that there are an infinite variety of emotional responses to music.

Edited May 11, 2010 by catty

[Anglo-Irishman]

That's a nice point. There are two kinds of emotion that music can arouse.

 

This is like saying that there are two kinds of responses to music. I would say that there are an infinite variety of emotional responses to music.

 

Yepp! Any number of points on the continuum between completely intrinsic and completely sentimental emotion.

 

My feelings about the Pathétique are a case in which the intinsic and sentimental emotions reinforce each other. On the other hand, there is intrinsically pompous music that some people find ridiculous because they associate it with some lidicrous episode in their life. With a piece of music that I've never heard before, I only have access to the intinsic emotions. Other pieces of music would not convey anything to me, were it not for the happy childhood memories they are associated with. I hope I've made the point clear now.

 

Cheers,

John

[Robert Booth]

And then there some tunes that are so melancholy all by themselves that they just take me along with them; surely the intent of the composer. One that does me in is "Buttermilk Hill" So sad and lonesome that I get all misty when I've done it well; it leaves me sitting in a moment of drained silence when I'm done. On the blues side, Black Night is Falling (James Cotton's version, especially) Where I get to switch from chromatic to diatonic, is a favorite.

In both cases, the tune dictates the emotional response; I'm just the medium.

RB

[m3838]

Looks like there are two meanings of "playing with emotion.

One meaning is to express emotion through the music.

The other is to get emotional while playing.

Can we clarify the meaning of the thread's prompt?

However the meaning of Art is not only to express emotion through it, but to correspond emotion to the spectator.

In which case one may not express emotion and not even experience it, but be able to professionally correspond emotion. Like a professional violinist, playing above mentioned Tchaykovski's work, may not be in the mood, having played it for weeks at performances. But none the less successfully transports Tchaykovsky's intent on to the public.

Then of course there is the level of the public. Some are easier to persuade than others.

To some I'm a wonderful musician, to others I'm a laughable loser.

As one literary character put it, "to some a Mare is a Broom".

Important question whether a musician thinks he is expressing emotion, on the level that is satisfactory for musician himself. It's quite enough for people who don't perform. Performing is entirely different case.

Regarding myself I am NOT satisfied with my level of expressiveness, and performing only makes me happy when it's over.

Corresponding emotion is not even in the plans.

[catty]

An excellent point, and one I wished to begin discussing when I brought up playing with others, group empathy, and group interaction...but deleted it for sake of trying to stay on point. I would term what you're referring to more as evocativeness, "empathic playing," or playing with empathy, but I'm sure there are many ways to describe such.

Edited May 12, 2010 by catty

[ocd]

Looks like there are two meanings of "playing with emotion.

One meaning is to express emotion through the music.

The other is to get emotional while playing.

 

There is at least one more meaning: elicit emotion in the audience. One does not necessarily need to feel the emotion to bring it out in the listener. A parallel would be the difference between "method acting" and "craft acting"

 

ocd

[Kautilya]

Looks like there are two meanings of "playing with emotion.

One meaning is to express emotion through the music.

The other is to get emotional while playing.

 

There is at least one more meaning: elicit emotion in the audience. One does not necessarily need to feel the emotion to bring it out in the listener. A parallel would be the difference between "method acting" and "craft acting"

 

ocd

"elicit emotion in the audience" - and get recalled by the landlord as your gig increases drink sales among the listeners.... Some relevant stuff coming up but embargoed till May 26 - watch this film track space!

[Mikefule]

All this technical discussion about emotion. I'm reminded of the (apocryphal?) story of the jazzman asked by a middle aged white lady to ask what "swing" means. He replied, "Lady, you gotta ask, you don't got it."

 

It is apparently important that jazzmen in stories speak with appalling grammar, in much the same way as pirates only speak in the present tense.