[Adam Neely] What is the slowest music humanly possible? - General

Dunno if you guys are familiar with Adam Neely, but he runs a music theory based YouTube channel and has a shit ton of really unique content relating to all kinds of musical concepts, as well as some pretty good bass lessons. [video=youtube;afhSDK5DJqA]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=afhSDK5DJqA[/video]

This is a really great video which made me excited about life. I expected a standard "science channel" breakdown of a question, but was given something actually quite poetic and inspiring in its complexity and potential significance.

"high effort shitpost" :v:

Man, I don't often think I actually learned something after watching a video off YouTube but that was neat.

Anyone that was or is in a high school band could tell you it's Pomp and Circumstance :v:

I feel that the video slightly dodged the question because the as slow as possible thing is kind of difficult to label as music, but at the same time it didn't given the orchestral example at the end. Still an awesome video, it would be nice to get some examples of modern stuff that attempts extraordinarily slow pieces. Sun 0 would definitely be one of the examples, i'm sure that it could be possible to find something even slower in drone/doom metal.

[QUOTE=genkaz92;53073997]I feel that the video slightly dodged the question because the as slow as possible thing is kind of difficult to label as music, but at the same time it didn't given the orchestral example at the end. Still an awesome video, it would be nice to get some examples of modern stuff that attempts extraordinarily slow pieces. Sun 0 would definitely be one of the examples, i'm sure that it could be possible to find something even slower in drone/doom metal.[/QUOTE] john cage had a neat idea that every sound you ever hear is music, which he demonstrated using his popular piece 4'33" - 4 minutes and 33 seconds of silence, where the sounds of the space it's performed in becomes the music. so for as slow as possible, even the rest periods would be music under his definition. i use the same definition myself.

[QUOTE=NightmareX91;53074039]john cage had a neat idea that every sound you ever hear is music, which he demonstrated using his popular piece 4'33" - 4 minutes and 33 seconds of silence, where the sounds of the space it's performed in becomes the music. so for as slow as possible, even the rest periods would be music under his definition. i use the same definition myself.[/QUOTE] IMO, that definition makes the idea of music meaningless. If everything is music, then nothing is music.

[QUOTE=sgman91;53074042]IMO, that definition makes the idea of music meaningless. If everything is music, then nothing is music.[/QUOTE] the way i see it, music is art, and by making everything music, you can perceive everything as a work of art

[QUOTE=NightmareX91;53074049]the way i see it, music is art, and by making everything music, you can perceive everything as a work of art[/QUOTE] Which would make nothing art.

I think it's more like anything you actively listen into and seek meaning in is music, and everything is art if you look for it. At least that makes more sense to me.

[QUOTE=Hilton;53074059]I think it's more like anything you actively listen into and seek meaning in is music, and everything is art if you look for it. At least that makes more sense to me.[/QUOTE] Again, I disagree, finding meaning where there is none isn't meaningful. It's just you convincing or fooling yourself. In my opinion, art and music gain their meaning from the value put into it from their author. It's the act of expressing something in the form of melodic sound, for music, anyway.

In my perspective art and music require a certain quantity of content in it before it can be more widely accepted as music, it could be argued that the as slow as possible composition is not really music because it is far too diluted.

my favorite song is ΩΣPx0(2^18×5^18)p*k*k*k by Bull of Heaven, going to be listening to it for the next 3.343 quindecillion years

I'd form a Funderal Doom Metal band and I'd call it Deadbeat.

[QUOTE=Peon Greenjoy;53074176]I'd form a Funderal Doom Metal band and I'd call it Deadbeat.[/QUOTE] Funeral doom is unironically a favorite of mine. One of the slowest funeral doom songs I know of is Ahab's "The Pacific". [media]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8X1aD7zvFgQ[/media] As the name suggests, the band (and album) are inspired by Moby Dick, which is always an added bonus.

Ah, doom. The music genre that heals me. As soon as I saw the thread title I thought it would be a doom shitpost, but I'm glad we managed to get to doom anyway, especially funeral doom. Crank that shit up.

let's slow it even further down from funeral doom and go to drone metal [media]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yn8e9DuJs7g[/media]

[QUOTE=sgman91;53074074]Again, I disagree, finding meaning where there is none isn't meaningful. It's just you convincing or fooling yourself. In my opinion, art and music gain their meaning from the value put into it from their author. It's the act of expressing something in the form of melodic sound, for music, anyway.[/QUOTE] If finding meaning in places where others don't is "fooling yourself" then life must be very boring for you

[QUOTE=153x;53075094]If finding meaning in places where others don't is "fooling yourself" then life must be very boring for you[/QUOTE] Why did you change my words in the attempt at a zinger? I didn't say, "finding meaning where others don't." I said, "finding meaning where there is none." Me saying, "Wow, this piece of shit on my shoe is really meaningful," doesn't actually mean the piece of shit has any meaning. It's me making up the meaning from my own mind, and imputing it onto the piece of shit. You've convinced, or fooled, yourself into thinking there's meaning where there is none. On the other hand, art has inherent meaning, whether you see it or not. It's very creation was based on the intention of a mind.

[QUOTE=sgman91;53075392]Why did you change my words in the attempt at a zinger? I didn't say, "finding meaning where others don't." I said, "finding meaning where there is none." Me saying, "Wow, this piece of shit on my shoe is really meaningful," doesn't actually mean the piece of shit has any meaning. It's me making up the meaning from my own mind, and imputing it onto the piece of shit. You've convinced, or fooled, yourself into thinking there's meaning where there is none. [B]On the other hand, art has inherent meaning, whether you see it or not. It's very creation was based on the intention of a mind.[/B][/QUOTE] This is wrong. The creator's intention means jack shit. There is no such thing as inherent, objective meaning, just subjective ones. Anything can have meaning, whether or not it was created with it in mind or not. Think of it this way, a claw hammer is made for the purpose of hammering nails and removing them from wood. But if you were to drop a hammer into the Amazon rainforest and a local tribesman stumbles upon it, I guarantee you he will not use it to hammer nails. The concept of woodworking likely either flat out doesn't exist, or is very different in his mind, and in the culture he comes from. Maybe it would be junk, maybe he'd use it as a weapon or maybe they would turn it into some kind of musical instrument. Either way, the creator's intention doesn't matter. Similarly, if I were to read a novel written by some 18th century Hungarian man (let's pretend I'm either reading a flawless translation or understand the language 100%) the feelings I would feel and messages I would get by reading the novel would be completely different from someone from Hungary at the time of the books publication. My morals, beliefs, education level, experience which inform my viewpoints are all [I]completely[/I] different from that man, as well as from just about every other human that exists or ever did exist. Thus it's really short-sighted to say that art of any kind has "inherent" meaning. No two people are going to have the same opinion on one piece of art.

the creator's original intention does matter to some degree though, however from my experience it more often than not makes things worse by placing the created object into some kind of a rigid limited context, it is for the same reason why lyrics in songs in foreign languages can completely ruin the experience of the song once you know what they actually mean. The song riders on the storm by the doors have a cosmically incredible composition which gets kind of ruined by the lyrics accompanying it, which is why I enjoyed it a lot more back when I did not speak English.

[QUOTE=NightmareX91;53074049]the way i see it, music is art, and by making everything music, you can perceive everything as a work of art[/QUOTE] when you stretch a definition limitlessness then language and concepts becomes worthless and you end up stating nothing at all the way I see it, the world is food, and by making everything food, you can perceive everything as a thing that's food by attempting to apply some sort of higher spiritual meaning to food I've basically stating nothing meaningful at all. It's all a bunch of words applied in a logical sentence but its all non-sense. There's no value in an art when you just aimlessly apply it to everything in existence. It's a perspective that's so personal that it can only have value to people who came to that conclusion on a personal level, otherwise they're just emulating the ideas of someone that understood music differently.

[QUOTE=J!NX;53075645]when you stretch a definition limitlessness then language and concepts becomes worthless and you end up stating nothing at all the way I see it, the world is food, and by making everything food, you can perceive everything as a thing that's food by attempting to apply some sort of higher spiritual meaning to food I've basically stating nothing meaningful at all. There's no value in the word when you just aimlessly apply it to everything in existance.[/QUOTE] There is no meaning in something if everything is meaningful, in order to have meaning it is necessary to have something that is meaningless. In order to have something that is special it is necessary to have something that is not special. Part of the reason why I highly dislike the phrase of "everything happening for a reason" because if everything happens for a reason then there is ultimately no reason in anything, it is necessary to have meaningless chaos in order to have something that has reason, otherwise everything becomes meaningless and boring, and quite frankly an existential nightmare.

This video might be in my top 10 ever. That was great and really touching. I'm going to watch The Unanswered Question now

[QUOTE=Wealth + Taste;53075564]This is wrong. The creator's intention means jack shit. There is no such thing as inherent, objective meaning, just subjective ones. Anything can have meaning, whether or not it was created with it in mind or not. Think of it this way, a claw hammer is made for the purpose of hammering nails and removing them from wood. But if you were to drop a hammer into the Amazon rainforest and a local tribesman stumbles upon it, I guarantee you he will not use it to hammer nails. The concept of woodworking likely either flat out doesn't exist, or is very different in his mind, and in the culture he comes from. Maybe it would be junk, maybe he'd use it as a weapon or maybe they would turn it into some kind of musical instrument. Either way, the creator's intention doesn't matter. Similarly, if I were to read a novel written by some 18th century Hungarian man (let's pretend I'm either reading a flawless translation or understand the language 100%) the feelings I would feel and messages I would get by reading the novel would be completely different from someone from Hungary at the time of the books publication. My morals, beliefs, education level, experience which inform my viewpoints are all [I]completely[/I] different from that man, as well as from just about every other human that exists or ever did exist. Thus it's really short-sighted to say that art of any kind has "inherent" meaning. No two people are going to have the same opinion on one piece of art.[/QUOTE] Your argument seems to be that because two people can see/hear/experience the same object and get different meanings out of it, then there can't be such a thing as an objective meaning. I don't follow the logic. It may very well be that one, or both, of those people are wrong. To use your hammer example: Let's say I were to pick up a sheet of paper and claim that it has the purpose of hitting nails into wood. Is that claim equally legitimate to every other claim about the sheet of paper's purpose? No, I don't think any rational person would think so. The ability of a person to make claims about meaning aren't the same thing as those claims being legitimate. The creator's intention is relevant because a creation is only a success if the thing is good at what it is intended to do, and whatever-is-being-made's optimal use is it's given purpose. A longsword might work as a dinner knife, but it doesn't work nearly as well as a knife made for that job. In the same way, a dinner knife might work as a weapon, but it won't work nearly as well as a longsword. Hell, a dinner knife might even work as a hammer if you swing hard enough, but it will break quickly, won't work great, and would probably be pretty dangerous. So, sure, you can use it for something it wasn't intended to be used for, but it will be suboptimal at that job. In the same way, art has intention behind it. Some art tries to express a variety of emotions, some art attempts to be beautiful, some art expresses a political position, some art tries to embody a feeling, etc. I'm not sure why we would treat art differently than we treat everything else that people create.

[QUOTE=sgman91;53075392]Why did you change my words in the attempt at a zinger? I didn't say, "finding meaning where others don't." I said, "finding meaning where there is none." Me saying, "Wow, this piece of shit on my shoe is really meaningful," doesn't actually mean the piece of shit has any meaning. It's me making up the meaning from my own mind, and imputing it onto the piece of shit. You've convinced, or fooled, yourself into thinking there's meaning where there is none. On the other hand, art has inherent meaning, whether you see it or not. It's very creation was based on the intention of a mind.[/QUOTE] Sorry but I don't see how I misconstrued what you said. "Finding meaning where there is none" is not an objective statement. Just because [i]you[/i] say something is meaningless doesn't mean it is to anyone else. To use your own example of the shit shoe, maybe someone else might laugh at the absurdity of it, or think it karmic retribution, or a sign, or even just an awful coincidence. That's not finding meaning where there is none, that's finding meaning where others don't. You're welcome to your own opinion on what is or isn't meaningful but you can't possibly dictate what objectively matters. [QUOTE=J!NX;53075645]when you stretch a definition limitlessness then language and concepts becomes worthless and you end up stating nothing at all the way I see it, the world is food, and by making everything food, you can perceive everything as a thing that's food by attempting to apply some sort of higher spiritual meaning to food I've basically stating nothing meaningful at all. It's all a bunch of words applied in a logical sentence but its all non-sense. There's no value in an art when you just aimlessly apply it to everything in existence. It's a perspective that's so personal that it can only have value to people who came to that conclusion on a personal level, otherwise they're just emulating the ideas of someone that understood music differently.[/QUOTE] I see where you're coming from, but [quote]the way I see it, the world is [b]art[/b], and by making everything [b]art[/b], you can perceive everything as a thing that's [b]art[/b][/quote] I mean I can't really disagree with that. In my personal opinion appreciating everything as though it was art does the exact opposite, and actually makes everything more meaningful [editline].[/editline] Not to mention, art has an extremely broad and vague definition to begin with, so it's not the same as saying everything is food because food is strictly defined as things I can eat

[QUOTE=153x;53076074]Sorry but I don't see how I misconstrued what you said. "Finding meaning where there is none" is not an objective statement. Just because [i]you[/i] say something is meaningless doesn't mean it is to anyone else. To use your own example of the shit shoe, maybe [B]someone else might laugh at the absurdity of it, or think it karmic retribution, or a sign, or even just an awful coincidence. [/B] That's not finding meaning where there is none, that's finding meaning where others don't. You're welcome to your own opinion on what is or isn't meaningful but you can't possibly dictate what objectively matters.[/QUOTE] We seem to be talking around each other. I wouldn't call thinking that something is funny or that it is a coincidence constitutes any sort of meaning. If anything, something being a coincidence means that it doesn't really have any meaning. I would call your other two example objective meaning claims. Something is either a sign or it isn't and it is either karmic retribution or it isn't. So I don't quite understand your position based on these examples.

[QUOTE=sgman91;53076123]We seem to be talking around each other. I wouldn't call thinking that something is funny or that it is a coincidence constitutes any sort of meaning. If anything, something being a coincidence means that it doesn't really have any meaning. I would call your other two example objective meaning claims. Something is either a sign or it isn't and it is either karmic retribution or it isn't. So I don't quite understand your position based on these examples.[/QUOTE] Fair enough, I think we're getting away from the point here so let's go back to the beginning [QUOTE=Hilton;53074059]I think it's more like anything you actively listen into and seek meaning in is music, and everything is art if you look for it. At least that makes more sense to me.[/QUOTE] I think there was a misunderstanding here. It's not necessarily about defining every sound as being music, but about appreciating every sound as if it were music. More broadly I think it's valuable to appreciate [i]most[/i] things as though they were art, and not just in a superficial way like saying "this tree is a literal work of art". It's not about redefining the word, it's about applying your framework for appreciating music to other things you wouldn't normally call music.

[QUOTE=sgman91;53075898][B]Your argument seems to be that because two people can see/hear/experience the same object and get different meanings out of it, then there can't be such a thing as an objective meaning. I don't follow the logic. It may very well be that one, or both, of those people are wrong.[/B] [/QUOTE] I meant to illustrate the fact that since there is no "one true" interpretation for any work of art, and the possible interpretations are infinite, attempting to say there is "objective" meaning of any kind whatsoever is vain. From an objective standpoint anything you say about art is false. From a subjective standpoint, anything you say about art is true. So long as you really believe it.