media music - art or craft?

[pete whitfield]

This came out of a forum discussion a while back where Chris Alpiar talked about the artistic merit of media music (film music in particular) compared to (oh I'm going to struggle for a term here!) art or concert or classical music.

Many of the composers in this community write media music; do you consider your work to be art or craft? Or perhaps how do you see the balance between the 2, as the cliche '1% inspiration, 99% perspiration' may ring true for many!

Is the natural home of contemporary music with images (music to picture)? I suggest that no other arena allows a composer to draw together so many influences and cross so many musical borders than music to picture. There are parallels here with opera I feel, where historically composers have found the marriage of drama, visual imagery and music is the ultimate home for their work. (At least with film you don't have to listen to that dreadful warbling - sorry, just had to get that off my chest!)

Referring back to the original discussion, Chris felt that media music might not throw up the next great 'art' composer. But with movies providing some powerful emotional experiences, is film the best contemporary home for music, and part of the art form that is film?

Update - 25th October 2008. If you are coming to this discussion hoping to get involved in the original topic, I would try starting a new forum discussion, as somewhere along the line it evolved (disintegrated? was hijacked?) into something equally interesting - (the future of music as a commercial industry, and in particular the effect of new technologies.

[Composer Peng Meng]

No melody and no rythem, of coruse it's not music. But exactely it's art, we can call it sound art. More and more soundtrack composers become sound designer, but it's not mean that they can not compose.

[Matt Gates]

It exists. It's called the composer collective. check it out.

[Matt Gates]

I like the comment about how nondistracting argument is used as an excuse. As a film composer I use that argument on myself under dialogue a lot... Shame on me.

[Matt Gates]

Yeah don't forget the true ART of film music is how the music works with the picture. Rarely does the music stand on it's own even with the best of us.

[Aaron]

As an opera composer myself, I feel that there is definitely merit to preserving the art of live music-and-stage events. Also, In general, I feel that movies actually end up going past true art in their pursuit of it. The medium surpasses art because the audience has no perspective on reality while viewing it.

I believe that, in order for something to be pure art, the lines between itself and reality must be clearly seen. This is so that the viewer is allowed the ability to contrast reality with the piece of art being viewed. Thus, he or she has a valid, knowable experience of the art itself, as opposed to art mixed with circumstantial intrusions from reality itself. Call me a purest if you wish; this is just off the top of my head.

[Ray Kemp]

Hi Matt,
I've got to say your statement here is just plain nonsense. There are hundreds of pieces, cues whatever you would like to call them which stand very well on their own.
Go buy a "Music at the Movies" multiple CD and be reminded of the fact.

[Heather Fenoughty]

Is it not possible to become lost in the experience of an art form, such as a beautiful painting, an exquisite piece of literature, and in the same vein be lost in the sonic world of music without being aware of reality, in the same way one can be consumed in the experience of watching a well-crafted piece of film? The boundaries between the art and reality still exist on recollection. But then how does one define reality? Where do the boundaries exist? Who decides and how subjective is that decision?

[Patrik Ohlsson]

Don't kill me now but I think there are alot of orchestral film music out there I would consider craft and not so much art.
In some scenarios film composers almost write in realtime! No not really, but as he's on a very tight schedual, he hasn't got alot of time to edit, withdraw notes, add notes, deepen harmonies etc. etc. And he's also bound by routine, and is expected to sound and compose in a certain way.
The less creative the work is, the less arty and more crafty it is according to me. You don't write down those notes because you have to, according to a certain timeplan or an angry director, screaming at you. And you're not writing those notes ONLY because you get paid to do it (it's nice with a treat though;) You do it because you love it, then you're creative and inspired, right?

[Patrik Ohlsson]

I think it's valid for art to be amplified by another form of art, since this broadens perspective and possibilities.
Reading your comment I find it a little contradictionary that you're an opera composer, being that you write music from a libretto, which definitely doesn't have to be attached to any 'solid-reality grounds', I mean, just look at Wagner. If it's true what you say then, you can't appreciate opera music aswell, because the cast and play is putting it in a bad perspective, seperated from reality. In most movies I see the music and film intimately linked, even though they are two seperate arts they get brought together, as they represent the same emotion, mood, ambience.

Just my thoughts

[Adrian Allan]

"the market serves us well".

Unfortunately the market can no longer be seen as the the arbiter of good taste.

Why ? ...because the general public have a poor musical "education" (in the widest sense of the word) and therefore a limited judgement of what is quality music.

Only a minority of people in this society play instruments to any standard, and to many, "music" is an MP3, not years of time and patience invested in an instrument; and the heightened sense of musical awareness that comes with such study.

However, sixty years ago, when most homes had a piano (a fact), the general public were (I believe) far more musically appreciative.

They were the "overseeing committee" - and I would have trusted their judgement above that of the general public of today. Music today is more and more at the mercy of shallow marketing techniques, advertising, reality TV appearance, sex appeal, etc, than ever before.

And yes, Elvis did have sex appeal, but he really could sing.

[Ray Kemp]

Adrian I'm sure you're really a nice fellow but give the world a break.
How condescending can you and others be. You're not the first or I'm sure the last to spout this rubbish about how knowledgeable one must be to fully appreciate a piece of music. It pains me think music in any form cannot be listened to and enjoyed with no need for dissection.
What you are saying is, sorry general listening public but this piece of music I've just written is in a seriously pure artyfarty kind of form of which you won't understand but, don't worry because there are half a dozen university graduates in music theory who will no doubt think it wonderful.
The discussion on this thread keeps reverting to intellectual gobbledygook. Is that a real word? :-)
The listener with the poor musical "education" should and will ultimately decide.

[Adrian Allan]

Ray

I think you have misunderstood. I am as much an anti-snob as you are.

I think that there are only two types of music, good and bad, no matter what genre or style. That is why I finished my post by quoting Elvis, not some obscure composer as you seem to be suggesting where my tastes lie.

60 years ago, most homes had a piano, even poor homes. When you play an instrument yourself, classically or in a pop style, you develop a much deeper "feel" for music, even if this is not on an intellectual level at all.

How about you, Ray: could you appreciate music as well as you do now, having never played an instrument yourself ?

And by extension of that argument, have our musical skills as a society gone down the pan in those years since music making has died and DJs now reign supreme - or do you think that people are just as musically receptive today as they have ever been.

My old music teacher told me that when he was young there were 12 music shops on just one street in Manchester, and nearly every club had its resident group of musicians. Music making in the 1930s, his era, was thriving at every level.

And now, the DJ reigns - do you seriously think that society's ability to appreciate music has not suffered since then ?