Teaching in 21 Minutes 2 years per minute Philip Tagg Visiting Professor Universities of Huddersfield and Salford UK wwwtaggorg httptaggorgClipsNantes130531mp4 or httpyoutubeGbDG8ApNhRs ID: 216866
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Slide1
42 Years of Popular Music AnalysisTeaching in 21 Minutes [2 years per minute]
Philip TaggVisiting Professor, Universities of Huddersfield and Salford (UK)www.tagg.org
http://tagg.org/Clips/Nantes130531.mp4 or http://youtu.be/GbDG8ApNhRs must be accessible
A short audit of a few problems in the denotation ofmusical structure, with suggestions for improvement
Presentation at Popular Music Analysis Conference,University of Liverpool, 4 July, 2013
Previous versions ‘The Trouble with Tonal Terminology', ‘Too Important to Fail', etc. presented in Rome, Glasgow,
Århus
,
Göteborg
, Durham, Liverpool (2011); Newcastle, Lancaster, Nottingham, Berlin, Granada, London (City), Manchester, Granada,
Cáceres
,
Huddersfield
(2012), Cambridge (Anglia), Naples, Trento, Nantes (2013).Slide2
Overviewpresentation overview as intended in Liverpool, 4 July 2013
‘Time’ ‘Totality' or ‘form’
Que faire? Background and aim
‘Tonality’Slide3
BACKGROUNDSlide4
Background [potted CV 1]1957-62 Organ, composition,
trad. jazz1962-65 BA in Music (Cambridge); Scottish country dancing, soul/R&B1963 -66 Cert. Ed. (Manchester); mainstream blues/jazz, pop demos
1966-71 Various gigging combos (Sweden)1971 Full time employment as music teacher‘unusually eclectic’Slide5
Background [potted CV 2]1968-72 Choir (sing & arr.)
1971-76 Agitrock band1971-78 Keyboard harmony, etc.1971- History and analysis (incl. euroclass
., pop, jazz, ‘world’, etc.)1993- Music & Moving Image courses1998-2001 EPMOW articles2009 Everyday Tonality2012 Music’s Meanings: a musicology
for non-musosSlide6
Visited 2012-05-03Slide7
Sets and subsets (1)
Rain
HailSnow
‘MUSIC’‘popular’‘ethno’
‘world’‘dance’‘contemporary’
‘medieval
’
‘jazz’
etc.
‘avant-garde
’
‘early’
‘rock’
etc.Slide8
TONALITYSlide9
Sets and subsets (2)
Rain
HailSnow
Euroclassicalc. 1730 – 1910― ‘functional’ (!?)―—‘tonal’ (!?)—
‘modal’
‘
pretonal
’ (!)
‘
posttonal
’ (!?)
‘contemporary’
‘medieval
’
‘jazz’
etc.
‘atonal
’ (!?)
‘primitive’
etc.Slide10
Tonal TerminologyAspects of musical structure compatible with Western notation:i.e. a system of graphic representation developed to encode mainly monometric
music whose pitches conform to the twelve notes of our chromatically divided octave.(a v. small % of all music at any time anywhere)Slide11
Basic definitionsTONE : note with audible fundamental pitch
TONAL : consisting or characteristic of tonesTONALITY : system of tonal configurationTONIC : central reference tone in relation to which other tones in a piece or extract of music are audibly related
One problem :Tonalité/tonalidad/tonalità
, etc. = key/Tonart—idiome tonal
for ‘tonality’/‘Tonalität’— ?
PLEASE DISTINGUISH
between
TONE
and
TONICSlide12
‘ATONAL’ !?Slide13
Linguistic derivative pattern 1— -al -
alityNoun Adjective Abstract noun
root derivative derivative brute brutal brutalitycrime criminal criminality form formal formalitymode modal modalityTONE TONAL TONALITYSlide14
Linguistic derivative pattern 2
-ic -ical (-icality
/-icism)Noun Adjective Noun Adjectivecleric clerical clinic clinicalcomic comical critic critical
ethic[s] ethical lyric[s] lyricalmagic magical music musicalmystic mystical physic[s] physical
sceptic sceptical
rhetoric rhetorical
t
actic[s] tactical topic topical
tropic[s] tropical
Abstr
. n.
musicality, physicality, topicality
OR
criticism, mysticism,
scepticism
HENCE
TONICALITY
OR
TONICISM
e
rgo:
ATONICAL
or
NON-TONICAL
,
ATONICALITY
,
etc.
TONIC TONICALSlide15
Tonality v. Modality
ionian (heptatonic/diatonic)phrygian (heptatonic
/diatonic)Nawa Athar (heptatonic)
نوى أثرdoh
-pentatonic (anhemitonic)
ré
-pentatonic
(
anhemitonic
)
hirajoshi
(pos. 4:
hemitonic
, pentatonic)
Which of these modes are tonal and which are modal?Slide16
Chordal mystery categoryQUARTAL
‘triadic’? ‘functional’ ? ‘diatonic’?
TERTIALPLEASE DISTINGUISH
TETRAD
FOURTH
TRIAD
THIRDSlide17
Tonal terminology conclusions Don’t confuse TONE with TONIC. Tonal music without
a tonic is ATONICAL, not ‘atonal’. Don’t confuse TRIADs with THIRDS. If harmony based on stacked fourths is quartal, harmony based on stacked
thirds is TERTIAL. Don’t propagate false contradictions like ‘TONAL v. MODAL’. Please conceptualise all modes, including the ionian, as
modes. Please also consider all modes as tonal. Don’t use TONAL and TONALITY in a musically, culturally and intellectually restrictive manner. Please
consider the MULTIPLICITY of TONALITIES (tonal systems). Slide18
TIME
SORRY. NO TIME FOR TIME THIS TIMEexcept to mention just a few termsSlide19
Time: a few problem terms —under construction—
syncopation polyrhythmpolymetricitycross-rhythmextended
present— only possible in monometric
music with unequivocal downbeats— arises when >1 rhythmic pattern is heard at the same time
— more accurate designation of rhythmic
traits in many
Subsaharan
musics
— term used by
Subsaharan
music scholars and practitioners to cover ‘
polymetricity
’ (a
eurocentric
term)
—
neuroscientifically
established concept essential to understanding how batches of ‘now sound’ (
syncrisis
, groove, etc.) work Slide20
FORM
“a shape; an arrangement of parts” (
Concise Oxford Dictionary, 1995) Slide21
Visual “form” (‘composition’, ‘shape’, etc.)
Musical “form” (‘composition’?)
Exposition | Exposition | Development | Recapitulation
Chorus | Chorus |Middle 8/Bridge
| Chorus
A | A | B | A
diachronic,
extensional form
synchronic,
intensional
form
vessel
formed
as a
coffee pot
bush
formed
as a
mushroomSlide22
Play video http://tagg.org/Clips/Nantes130531.mp4
orhttp://youtu.be/GbDG8ApNhRsSlide23
QUE FAIRE?Slide24
What to do? (1)
Ostrich strategy. ‘Nothing is wrong’. Carry on as usual.
‘We may be in the minority but we’re always right.’ Defeatist (‘realist’) strategy. T
ake note but no action: ‘interesting; some valid points but we have to deal with
music theory “as is”. You can’t change >100 years of
dubiously ethnocentric
labelling
. Get used to it!’
Tokenist
strategy.
‘We’re broad-minded and modern.
We have ethnomusicology and/or popular music
studies and/or music technology on the curriculum but
we see no need to change the basics of music theory.
Laissez-faire (‘anti-authoritarian’) strategy
. New terms
are as bad as old ones. You’re forcing everyone to
think like you. Let things develop organically, man!Slide25
What to do (2)? Risk
alienation from conservative musicology (both ancient and modern) by making life easier for the popular majority of students through: - simple reform of a few basic terms; - recognition of vernacular musical competence; - reintegration of music as a specific form of symbolic production on a par with others.Slide26
What to do (3)Establish a forum of interested parties in music education, media education, etc.
Get together to decide on priorities for a reform of music theory terminology.Involve experts from as many musical territories as possible so as to minimise risks of producing new ethnocentric concepts.Collaborate across cultural, disciplinary and professional boundaries to produce a music theory primer (max. 100 pp.) to take us into the 21st
-century and the age of globalisation. Slide27
Further edificationMusic’s Meanings: a modern musicology for non-musos
(2013) tagg.org/mmmsp/publications.htmll [710 pp.]
Everyday Tonality (2009) tagg.org/mmmsp/publications.html [334 pp.]
Dominants and Dominance
Musical Learning & Epistemic Diffraction
Scotch Snaps: the big picture
Troubles with Tonal Terminology
(2011-13)
—tagg.org/articles/
xpdfs
/Aharonian2011.pdf [32 pp.]
‘Not the sort of thing you could photocopy’
(2013)
A short idea history of notation with suggestions for reform in music education and research [21 pp.]
—tagg.org/articles/
xpdfs
/Frith1301.pdfSlide28
THE ENDPhilip
Tagg — tagg.org — MMXIII