Not Enough To Hurt

[cbullard@HiWAAY.net (Len Bullard)]

This isn't a flame.  This is a rebuttal.  The old canard,
"Can you read music?  Not enough to hurt."  is one
of the contributors to the mediocrity that permeates
modern pop music.   Ask Quincy Jones or Take 6.

[Bryan Dongray]

>Anyway I understand many artists have not had lessons either. 
>I understand from a few interviews that if they had, they would have 
>followed the "rules", and not produced excellent modern pieces which 
>often break the rules, but sound so right. Such as the above B/E which
>is technically dischordant, and would not be "normally" allowed
>(if I understand some rules I have read about writing music "properly"
> - stupid book).

Discord is just as much a part of "technically correct" music
composition as concord.  Any book that teaches otherwise
is incorrect both historically and musically.  Someone schooled
in composition is taught this and only somone unschooled
believes otherwise.  The result of a solid musical education
is to enhance one's own understanding of the possibilities
as well as the best way to execute them.  

The finest pop and jazz musicians I have known were technically educated,
then tempered with years of performing experience.  Most
of the "naturally talented without a lick of training" players I 
know have serious defects in their technical execution 
(e.g., three fingered scales for diatonic passages that force 
them to change positions without cause, thus losing fluidity).  
While their natural skill can still enable them to do marvelous work, there
are some compositions which are forever denied them.
Most of these players lament their lack of formal training;
they don't exult in it.   The only result of such poverty is
to have to work twice as hard, remember half as long,
and be denied some gigs because they do not have
the necessary skills.  There are plenty of "one trick
pony's" in the business.  The musician who works the
most is also the most rounded.

The use of a dissonance in the bass is a regular part
of all music.  It's application is mainly determined by
intonation (hard to achieve without proper technique),
duration, harmonic neighbors, and orchestration.
A music education is rooted in music *theory*
and the practice of works which contribute to skill.
All said, it is the ear of the composer that is the final
authority for the piece, the skill of the player for the
rendering, and the taste of the listener for the pleasure.

I hated atonal music, but if one has to do a thunderstorm
or a psychotic killer, it is pretty evocative of the mood.
It is emotion that good musicians are after.  That
is hard enough to do and the less one has to think
about it, the better it works.  The better one is trained,
the less one has to think during the execution of the
work.   This takes knowledge which once absorbed,
one can put it away and let music happen. Don't make a
solid education a carpet for your own insecure 
steps in composition.  Don't let a theory get in
the way of expressing your intent.

BTW:  There is a local congressman in my state who
is trying to pass a federal law outlawing the use of
tritones in commercial music.   Now that is stupid.

len bullard