Systems and Music

Photo Credit: Frank Mikley

While browsing Quora, I stumbled on and became intrigued by the following query:

"What are some systems we live with today that were designed for a world of the past?"

For me, fascinated by schema and inspired by the idea that ancient patterns influence modern lives, well of course my mind set off in a million different directions. And if you're anything like me, you've created a long list of possibilities before you stop and ask yourself, "Wait, what's a system, anyway?"

Explanations abound, and Wikipedia, of course, offers a reasonable answer, which you can read for yourself by clicking this link: SYSTEM.

But in fact different professionals relate to the word 'system' in highly individual ways. Nevertheless, I think we can distill a variety of perspectives into the following clunky definition.

A system is an interdependent group of things, rules or concepts, which taken as a set, form a pattern, a single organization or a unified interconnecting network.

This already unwieldy definition only increases in complexity when we realize that sometimes the tools we use in the implementation of systems are systems or the products of themselves. Indeed, systems are often nested one within another, as a cell to a body, or an ocean on a planet. Likewise, a particular procedure using certain equipment might itself be considered an equipment or process dependent system, if we can define process as an operation within a larger framework of interactions that compose a system. Perhaps it's a bit like quantum mechanics. Definitions may change with scale.

But what I find particularly fascinating is how the query applies to musical instruments because modern musical instruments represent not simply tools, or the products of systems, but system specific tools. In this way, a piano, for instance, is very different than a hammer, which can lend itself to a (wider) variety of systems.

And it may be that the more complex the tool, the more more system specific it is, or that tools, once assuming an arbitrary level of complexity are best thought not as tools but as machines, if we can put machines (and instruments) into another (also arbitrary) category.

Either way, I stumbled when some people answered the query by suggesting that certain systems, such as piano keyboard organization, were anachronistic systems simply because they were complicated to learn or implement.

This one really threw me because I've long thought that the piano proved an example of technology that one needn't improve upon. In fact, I've long used the piano, and by extension the keyboard, as an example of a system from a prior age that continues to serve us well today. It also strikes me as a perfect example of a system embodied in a machine, i.e. the tool is the system made physically manifest. But here was a gentleman arguing it was a jerry-rigged device with too many key signatures to learn (or rather, that each key required a different physical execution).

Well, if it suits you, you could do as Irving Berlin did and outfit your piano with a lever that permits the player to memorize but one pattern, C or F# major say, and then essentially stick shift into the more difficult fingerings. Or, if electronics suit you, you can simply press the transpose button on your electronic keyboard.

However, if there were a musical instrument that I thought might seem out of date, I might suggest the pipe organ. Not because I think pipe organs sound old fashioned (I think they sound great), but because the primary function of many 'stops' and pipes of these behemoth instruments are intended to mimic other instruments. As a result, we might, some centuries later, suggest that because the synthesizer presents us with more sound in a smaller package, the pipe organ might now be considered an anachronism when compared to a modern synthesizer. (Although, personally, I'm not yet ready to replace every pipe organ with a MIDI keyboard, no matter how stunning current sampling or modeling technology.

Yet another instrument that might tempt my vote as fabricated upon an obsolete system is the guitar. Five strings are tuned in perfect fourths while one remaining string is tuned by a major third. This system of tuning is made all the more peculiar when compared to other string instruments, which are tuned by fifths. Coming from a violin background, I imagined the original guitar makers to be simultaneously brilliant craftsmen, able to bend wood and hammer frets, and yet somehow incapable of understanding a concept as simple as an ascending Circle of Fifths.

Because it is that one string tuned by a third that always throws a wrench into the advancement of every beginning guitar student. Not to mention that the matrix-like quality of a fretboard requires those dedicated to learning the instrument to navigate a seemingly endless number of patterns for any given key.

Oh, but were learning the guitar simply a matter of memorizing the position of 12 keys. Instead, a scale, which is a perfectly linear thing on a piano (up and down), stretches out in every single direction on a guitar –up, down, left, right, diagonal this way, diagonal that. In fact, one can even ascend a scale while descending on the fretboard and vice versa, which would feel a bit to a pianist like playing the high notes in the bass register.

Start anywhere: Go anywhere. It's a recipe for both free improvisation and madness.

But see, yes, it's madness, but it's just that kind of madness that turns out to be quite fun. And once one has accustomed oneself to navigating the fret board with some ease, it becomes quite evident that your television remote notwithstanding, simplicity is not always an improvement when it comes to the arts.

Certainly, simplicity is paramount to utilitarian activities. And the simplicity provided by toy or electronic instruments might enable a layman or beginner to feel immediate enjoyment as a music maker, and that's always good thing.

However, as Music theory and the machines we call instruments collectively represent a complex system for communication, the system provides users infinite possibility, and like language, mastery necessitates environmental access from a young age, prolonged study and intense pursuit, i.e. practice, practice practice.

Fortunately, mastery (of music, language or any other thing) is not required for clear communication, professional success, spiritual enlightenment, personal fulfillment, securing a mate or the enjoyment of most common social interactions.

In this regard, one might think of the art of teaching a subject, such as music, as not so much presenting a set of rules or processes, but as a systemic flow which one must approach at just the right place in order to gain successful passage. A bit like merging onto a highway. After that, speed, complexity and fluidity of execution are eventualities (in the persistent and enthusiastic student).

It might also be noted that some systems are eliminated on the basis of taste alone, rather than issues of functionality. For instance, tuning technology has allowed steel pan makers to create instruments which sound with a more accurate pitch center than their predecessors. However, to my ears the slightly imperfect steel drums of yesteryear sound more magical. It may be that in the quest for perfection we lose a bit of magic, and I'm not convinced that's always a good thing.

Beauty and simplicity are sometimes used as synonyms, and I think this is a mistake. Presented as such, simplicity is very often an experience as related by an observer or audience member. But for the performing artist, Beauty is generally produced by the control of a complex network of nuance and patterning. And in regard to music especially, any expression within a work that presents as beautiful often appears as such within a context designed to evoke an emotional response in a listener.

So while audiences may judge musical systems as effective based on a notion that the results are beautiful and therefore simple, but whether such systems are effortless to operate is another matter altogether.

In fact, when it comes to systems in music –and as to whether some systems we live with today which were designed for a world of the past, might or might not be anachronisms– I'm inclined to believe that that it is simple systems are likely to wear quickly and fade from our lives unless they acquire a level of complexity which transforms them from 'tools' into 'instruments', which in the hands of an artist, become capable of transforming theory and momentary impulse into timeless communication.

MUSIC, LINGUISTICS AND NETWORK THEORY

Music, Linguistics and Network Theory form a magical triangle.

The combined power of the three concepts is as of yet untapped, but Network Theory will eventually develop widespread applications for audio and music, especially in the areas of advertising and commercial media.

So, where to start?

First one must realized that Music, Linguistics and Network Theory are not three distinct ideas, but areas of study themselves linked into a sort of 'small world' network.

That is, the ideas are closely connected, so much so that any distinctions between them are separated by but a few degrees.

• Music and linguistics are both forms of organized sound.
• All functional sound is organized for the purpose of conveying transactional communication via linked 'small world' networks.

One beauty of music is that it presents our ears with a perfect symbiosis of language and mathematics. It is math that performs like language, in the same way that light behaves as both particle and waves.

Musicians have long formed networks, but the sounds composers, music designers and musicians make is itself not yet connected as it can be. Once it is, we will find that we can build intelligently designed audio carriers capable of distributing communications via systems that behave in a manner not unlike other networks made up of independent, living organisms.

When this happens, audio producers will be able to produce distribution networks that can self-program performance material which may at first appear random, but actually possess a discreet intelligence.

Consider a quiet summer night suddenly enveloped by the apparent random song of locusts and apply that to transactional advertising messaging in public venue, say Times Square for instance.

If we combine artificial intelligence with network theory and draw on a portfolio of modern playback systems, such as Hypersonic Sound Technology, which can "focus sound into a tight beam for optimal sound directionality", then the result could very well be targeted communications that nobody hears, except for a limited demographic.

WORDS AND MUSIC AS DATA STREAMS

Words and music have always connected for me. Not just as in song, where lyric is attached to melody, but at a more fundamental cognitive level, where I'm sure both music and speech were born.

Within a given song, there are at least three data streams at play:

1. The social network comprised of musicians (which we are not so much concerned with)
2. Lyrical content
3. Non verbal Audio Encoded Data

No surprise then that if music can be thought of as a stream of Audio Encoded Data, that it must be capable of acting as a carrier of information, beyond the emotional response audiences may get from it.

And by Audio Encoded Data I do not mean coded or digitally compressed audio, but rather the inherent or perceived meaning conveyed by non-verbal sound. It is 'coded' because otherwise meaningless tones have to enter our brains before meaning is perceived, and not every demographic shares the same conventional ideas about sound. Like a foreign language, only those fluent in it will be able to understand it. Fortunately, others are often all too happy to provide a translation.

However I can't write about a piece of music and trust you will share my full emotional experience of it. However, after 'decoding' I will at least be able to convey to you information contained in a given work (not to mention my reaction of it).

For instance, I can say that the thunder was loud and frightening, and you may nod your head, which may suffice. But were you to have heard the thunder yourself, you may have found yourself running for the basement. So the sound of the thing and the description of it do not always produce the same reaction.

But what I find further interesting, is the potential to embed a sound with information beyond its emotive impact, and then the potential to trigger that and a multitude of other communications via some algorithm that mimics the natural ecology.

I do not mean to inspire a method that produces subliminal advertising, but rather to consider how a system might limit its broadcast to only those who want to hear a message, need to hear a message, or are predisposed to hearing it. And all eavesdroppers may as well think that they hear the sound of the ocean or something else, because for all intents and purposes, they don't have the skill set to decode a particular communication, which should therefore render it innocuous audio to all those beyond a given set.

If only via anecdotal evidence, we recognize archetypal sounds, organized sounds, and this thing we call music is extraordinarily powerful because of its capacity to convey non-verbal, meaningful transmissions.

We can take Lyrical Data at face value, regardless of metaphorical intent. For the purposes of this article let us agree that the word, whether spoken or sung, means what it means.

What is interesting is not the words, but how they are employed, especially if several independent, contrapuntal lines are sung by several tandem voices.

In an earlier post I described how as a child I wondered why people conversed as they do, often in monotones, instead of exchanged information via song. It seemed so much more efficient to me to sing, given that two or more people employing identical keys and meters, and engaging in a contrapuntal exchange, could talk to one another and overlap one another, and yet be completely understood by themselves and others.

I still like to imagine the possibility of one day walking into a crowded room and finding fifty or more intertwining inner voices engaged in simultaneous melodic small talk, the result immediately perceivable as a linguistic fugue, a musical tapestry composed of multiple communications, and yet were I to focus my hearing in any one direction, any and all communications would be perfectly legible.

The application of contrapuntal theory to distinct musical and non-musical audio communications is also a fundamental characteristic of Green Sound, whereby multiple independent transmissions carry distinct, legible information, without degradation, or introducing noise into a given environment.

But with or without the spoken or sung word, Music is still capable of signifying language, which is obviously why it is such a powerful communications tool.

SPEECH AS MUSIC

Our daily use of language –conversation– is generally non-melodic sound, and yet performed at a rate dictated by an unconscious rhythm metered out by a neuro biological clock (or metronome).

It seems that both literally and figuratively speaking, everybody is a talking drum.

Even when I read prose, depending on the density of the document, it may strike me that I am holding in my hands nothing less than a symphonic score composed of text. Not quite alive when I first begin skimming the book, eventually the writer's rhythms become apparent, until I am at last engrossed by the work. And as though performing from a score, were I to read the document aloud, the author's own breath, evident in his or her phrasing, would also become my own.

Sometimes I think what little I know about linguistics informs everything I know about music.

I'm certain that the same parts of the brain given to improvisational conversation are tapped when producing improvisational music. When musical improvisations are melodic –and therefore capable of serving as a carrier for language– they are emotive. When the melody is flat lined or removed, leaving only rhythm and harmony, the music is no less emotive, but pattern recognition replaces melody at the forefront of our consciousness and the math is allowed to dance.

I tend to group the musical works I like into three basic categories.

1. Works that induce induce a kind of meditative state such as trance. I think of such music has having a light (cognitive) gravity.
2. Works that lend themselves to providing a platform for physical activity (such as dance) or moving picture.
3. Complex works which shut down physical response, as though doing anything else beyond tapping a finger or toe requires so much effort. I think of such music as having a heavy (cognitive) gravity.

However one thinks of it, when I hear an inspirational sound, I want to describe it. It's these verbal descriptions that reinforce the way I feel about a given work. Music may convey or elicit emotion, but Language allows me to qualify what I feel and in turn, express those feelings, and play a role in allowing me to decode the music, so that others might also receive the same message (via my translation, of course).

Like a given word, a given sound may be the result of an arbitrary choice. But unlike a body of words, it is listeners that usually define the meaning of a given piece of music. Certainly an independent listener may have an immediate opinion about a work, but it is the consensus that has the last word: i.e. is it good? Bad? Cool? Cheesy? Is it the 'Best Rock Song Ever'. Is it a work of genius or the work of a hack?

A given individual might certainly hold an opinion contrary to that held by a group or cluster, but we are interested in individuals who are hubs, conduits for ideas. Our interest is not people whose minds are made up, and who use opinions to shut down discussion, but people with flexible opinions, people who can change minds, people who provide links to others in a network. What good is art of any kind, except as a psychological exercise, if it meets its end at a dead end (of an unyielding brain)?

MUSIC THEORY VS. NETWORK THEORY

A potentially significant element of audio applied or music related Network Theory comes into play when we begin to inquire how groups of people (audiences) all arrive at the same opinion and the same time. A performance ends and everybody either leaps to his or her feet and cheers, or they don't. Sometimes audience members continue an act of applause long after a performance is over. Hence, the necessity to inform fan clusters that 'Elvis has left the building'.

Equally interesting is the effect applause has when it runs back through the network to the performers, sometimes causing them to produce an impromptu performance or encore, not always pre-rehearsed, often better when it isn't. At that point we witness not a performance and an audience's reaction to it, but a loop circulating through the network from performer to audience and back again.

I often think that it is this kind of audience/performer communication loop that could be employed to good effect in a brand/consumer relationship, and that sound would play an integral role in this paradigm.

But does music convey anything but emotion? Isn't that enough? My gut reaction is to say 'No' and 'Not always', but the answer to either question, of course, relies on our definition of music.

Some define music as organized sound. It is, but quite often when we listen to the natural acoustic ecology of a given environment, the result can be music to our ears. Consider the sound of the beach (not just the surf). Consider the sound of the night. Consider what Sunday morning sounds like.

In truth, music is not always sound organized by the composer. It can also be 'found' sound, which is then organized by our brains the moment we receive it.

And it may very well be that in the future we think of music as not simply organized sound, but as audio emissions that conform to a network theory.

If we include pure rhythm and pulse as examples of music, and I think we should, then a snippet of Morse Code is every bit as valid (as music) as composer Elliott Carter's 'Eight Pieces for Four Timpani'.

In fact, Morse Code might even be considered a proximal relative to both American Indian and Haitian Vaudou drumming, because (as with Morse Code), both native drumming conventions use rhythm to communicate information beyond the passive emotional response experienced by listeners who don't understand the language of the drum.

Although most people understand 'the drum', at least when it comes to 'feeling' Morse Code, even if most aren't fluent in its language of sonic dots and dashes. We know that because there appears today not a single televised news show whose main theme isn't arranged around its urgent rhythm.

Which is to say, whether Morse Code, Indian drumming or a jingle:

What enters our ears may be first defined as music (or not), but what actually enters our brains is raw data: sometimes emotive, sometimes numerical, as often as not verbal. And if it is also designed as an information carrier, whose message is not produced as verbal communications, it is capable of being decoded by those fluent or versed in the music designer's particular brand of cryptography.

Which is not so difficult as it seems, because what I mean by 'cryptography' is cultural agreement.

And once we have an agreement of terms in place, then the Music + Linguistics + Network Theory magic triangle acts like conceptual jet fuel.

The fundamental act of listening to music is a whole brain activity. Linguistics allows for infinitely complex communications, and Network Theory provides us with a highly effective distribution model.

Thus the power of the MLN magic triangle is that though it may be a recent mutation, born from combined DNA, it is readily adaptable, composed of both modern communications intelligence and ancient archetype.