Listeners
Through the electronization of soundwaves, we first learned how to keep and replay music at our will. We can listen to any music, anywhere, while doing anything. Things weren't like that just a century ago. For the entire history of human love for music, we couldn't do that until less than a century ago. We can walk and surround ourselves with physical sounds, instead of imaginary ones. We can play music constantly, and alter how our brains work by creating an ambiance for one of our senses. New possibilities for human brain and human entertainment.
It saved us from faulty memory and our incapacity to live it again. For the poor memory-obsessive souls from living in the crushing present where the memory lamented, 'I won't be able to remember this!', It helped them comfortably enjoy music to its fullest, by knowing that they can listen to it and study it again whenever they want to. By saving us from the oppressively bad memory, it probably made us use it less, too. We don't sit trying to soak it in and trying to force open our deepest emotions to remember it. We are just there. Maybe to just be there, instead of to dig down our emotions, is how best to enjoy music. Conscious intellectualization of music may benefit our conscious, but not necessarily our emotions and moods. But it could, too. If anything, I think we now have options. They're only hiding behind our lack of thinking to consciously lead our experiences. If you do think about how you listen to music and how music is being made even if you are the worst musical philistine like me, then you have options at hand. So many different options of who, what, why, when, how, therefore, nonetheless.
To me, the worst thing that came about later is when technology granted us even better ways to keep things as memories: video-recording capacity. Now we hold up our iPhones at the concert, not to sway our LCD screens with the vocalist, to communicate with them- but the other way, to record them as a vocalist. Bad sound and video quality, just to share some broken videos with other people, instead of expressing the emotions we felt. If abundance of music can have its unintended consequences, it would be making us lazy and ungrateful for it.
Creators
Through the electronization of soundwaves, we also learned how to mix and combine music that we have recorded. With softwares, we can stretch and squeeze and cut and paste and repeat and reverse. With synthesizers, we can orchestrate the sounds we have. One man conducting infinite amount of soundwaves, through the infinite stretch of time, as long as you just have the electronic storage space. DJs and producers create music, so it's the role of composers that has transformed a little bit.
They don't play or conduct music, so the instrument players and conductor who bring them together still remain uniquely. Speaking of such physical and real sounds-- granted, electronic sounds are different from physical sounds that are created from our physical interaction with instruments, stroking of the strings, breathing of the brass, beating of the percussions. But by capturing them for future use, we necessarily sacrifice the truthful present. We transcribe them and somethings are lost. But we are getting better at transcribing them, recreating the sounds in spaces. Electronic sound itself is becoming closer to real sounds. Only thing we'd miss is the human-to-human experience as we see a live performance.
Electronic sound is becoming so immensely different from the real sounds as well. We are creating new sounds that no one has heard before. One one or two people are enough to create sounds and produce music.
Through the electronization of soundwaves, we may have become lazy in our appreciation for music, but the creators of music have not become lazier. Perhaps different in the sense that they don't receive music theory lessons before creating music, but they can learn theories later if they want to. There are more creators of music now, because education is not necessarily a requirement to creating music. More creators mean more shitty music, but also more great music. More stimulus.
What may degrade are the music industry, the bland popular taste it instills in people, and our liberal democratic lazy answers, "everyone has different taste in music," "I respect that artist because they make music that I can't," "I don't know what I like about it but I do." Music that told stories and expressed emotions for hours at a time now do it in 2-4 minutes. Lyrics that puzzled and intrigued us with their poetic mystique now sometimes just shouts like an uneducated child, "friday, friday, friday." I wonder if we wanted simplicity to our music because we're too busy to digest something so dense. Work to go to, children to raise, money to earn, places to visit, people to meet. But do we digest anything when we are doing those things? It wouldn't hurt to digest more things.
Many underground rock and electronic music I was introduced to by my friends now have 5, 8, 10, 11, 12, 15 minute songs. Many artists (are again) creating albums that are to be listened as a whole album. Many albums now is not just a collection of separate songs, but a whole thematic exploration, complete with music, video, visuals, writings, interviews, performances, packaging- and a whole chunk of puzzles to digest, and horizons to see.
Complex music will always be there, ever self-complicating itself, all in search of a new sound, new language to describe how we feel or to influence how we feel. Music will continue to inspire, songs will be made and mixed, knowledge will be passed down, creativity will spread, archival collection will pile up. And heads will be rocked and bodies will be swaying, jumps will be jumped, tears will be shed, minds will be breathing, and love will be felt. Our ears will be listening, beseeching music to say hello to us and talk to us about everything.
Mothagesso.
