How do you get someone to go beyond using loops?

[Quasar]

I've never heard of either Emo or the Eels, but I thought the verse was pretty good. Not Bob Dylan/Dylan Thomas good, but it reads like an honest expression of angst that many people feel but don't easily talk about around the water cooler.

I don't believe in equating craft with art, nor do I think that genre should be confused with quality. I happen to like romantic era Italian opera much more than I like hip-hop, but one may be anything from total hack ro raging genius in appoaching either style.

Probably most everyone who hangs around forums like this has heard comments such as: "I don't mind "classical" music. It relaxes me and helps me sleep." What this tells you, of course, is that such people are utterly incapable of experiencing the true power of great orchestral music, and there's absolutely no way to explain it to them. Similarly, many Mahler enthusiasts cast negative and false generalizations about pop-rock, country, or urban gangzta stuff too . In short, if it's not yours, if it doesn't reflect your world or your cultural niche in it, it "sounds all the same." But it's not all the same. Perhaps the next generation's Beethoven or Miles is playing around with an Acid Loops program right now, and will transform it into something else. Something that we can't even imagine.

Regards,
Michael

[TheLastCrusader]

this thread is restoring my faith in this forum, seriously.

[PaulR]

What this tells you, of course, is that such people are utterly incapable of experiencing the true power of great orchestral music, and there's absolutely no way to explain it to them.
Regards,
Michael

Are you sure? Perhaps non musicians listening to this type of stuff get more out of it than we do without the necessary academic articulation that seems accompany the aftermath of a so -called high brow concert, for example. Remembering of course, that a lot, but not all, of the classical writers weren't exactly imbued with an over supply of academia themselves.

This is one the traps that musical comparisons of different musical genres often throws up. Particularly with film/tv score writers. You have to forget that you're competing with Beethoven, or trying to impress the next writer down the line. The 'audience' does not have any interest in that sort of thing - they either like or they don't - it either works in a media based production or it doesn't. They don't care if it's sampled orchestras or loops - there's generally no musical autopsy with your average audience.

[Hermitage59]

I agree with Paul.
By assuming that audiences have the foresight to distinguish between loops and unlooped samples, beethoven and gangsta rap, country and rock, is to try and place them in musical pidgeonholes. Some listeners may have an idea, but the bulk, as Paul rightly says, either like it or they don't. We're the ones who, because we understand at least some of the mechanics of musical construction, are are making distinctions, because we know. That doesn't even make us right, it only means we have knowledge others may not have. And even having that knowledge is a veritable sword of damocles. The average listener can enjoy (or not enjoy) the experience ignorant of the history, comparisons, and musical requirements. We are, by neccessity of the craft we practise, aware of all these things, and can, unless we're experienced and openminded, be bound to a certain extent by the perceived 'rules' of musical creation, and the history or genre of that creation.
If the fellow who uses loops turns out good music, and he's happy with that process, i say good luck to him. Many a composer, again as Paul writes, wasn't exactly academically gifted, indeed many were not always competent in notation, or orchestration. It's the idea and the end result that matters to the average listener, not the journey.

Regards,

Alex.

[Journeyman]

Don't loop based and "conventionally created" music have two very different sets of compositional criteria? I've always been under the impression that loop based music is almost never about note selection or performance; it's about production techniques; timed echos, sliced audio, wierd sounds, filtered this and that, etc.

I think comparing loop based and "conventionally created" music is like comparing apples and oranges.

Good luck getting someone to leave "immediate-gratification-land"...

[Glenn]

I agree with Paul.
By assuming that audiences have the foresight to distinguish between loops and unlooped samples, beethoven and gangsta rap, country and rock, is to try and place them in musical pidgeonholes. Some listeners may have an idea, but the bulk, as Paul rightly says, either like it or they don't. We're the ones who, because we understand at least some of the mechanics of musical construction, are are making distinctions, because we know.

Alex,

That is a good insight. If you study and understand something at a deep level, then you forever "see" it differently from the person who is viewing it in a more casual manner.

If the value of music is the emotion generated within the LISTENER, then HOW the music achieves that just doesn't matter much, does it?

--- Glenn

[Bruce A. Richardson]

I don't understand why this is even an issue for anyone except the most insecure composers who feel threatened because their buddy who only knows how to use loops is actually coming up with cooler stuff than they are.

BINGO!!!

Good luck getting someone to leave "immediate-gratification-land"...

When someone tries to describe their use of looping as "composition", I mostly let it go. If asked or challenged on it, I politely remind them that I can play in their sandbox, but they can't play in mine.

Still, something in me wants great music to be "special", hard to duplicate, and rare.

And not simply holding down a key on my Korg Wavestation EX for 3 minutes!

Or dragging and dropping some loops on the computer screen.

I would challenge these assumptions.

All three are based upon an idea that looped composition cannot be as artistically complex as any other genre, and that is an incorrect assumption. There are hacks in all genres. There are also geniuses in all genres, and the rules of what makes loop based composition valid and relevant are no different than any other genre, or artform. Is there an artistic process? Is ground broken? Does it confound expectations? Amaze in some way?

What all three quotes up here describe is a hack job, one way or another. There is music of this genre that is decidedly masterful and delightful, too.

Looping done badly is certainly instant gratification. Absolutely granted. But, a well-crafted looped piece requires exactly the same investment as any other piece if it is going to reflect true artistic effort. The high practice of the genre is not concerned with stringing together "parts" from loop kits, essentially substituting loops for live tracks. That is the low, low end of looping practice--most often practiced by media composers who need to knock something out in a hurry that sounds as if they didn't, rather than someone who is truly approaching looping as an artistic form of expression. The two end-goals are so different as to be mutually exclusive.

And I really doubt that any "composer" who thinks that he can just immediately play in a hardcore, brilliant "looper's" sandbox could actually do it. In order to have relevance in the genre, there is a lot more than just "looping." The guys who are brilliant at this are truly the next generation of musique concrete explorers. ANY true artist must invest himself. Tinkering doesn't count.

Recording one's own loops is irrelevant. That misses the point of the genre's "artform," which is the transformation of the found and assembled. It's the musical version of mixed media or collage. Or when done badly, more of a pastiche. But still, the recording of one's own loops is more of an idea that "composers" have, who will then go forward and use those loops in a horrifically mundane way, versus someone who is actually engaged in the genre, and whose inventiveness is not judged by what is looped, but rather how.

Prejudice is a very seductive trap.

[Journeyman]

What all three quotes up here describe is a hack job, one way or another.

Absolutely correct; at least with regards to the one statement of mine that you quoted, regarding "immediate-gratification-land". The topic as it was presented was about some musical newbie who had no clue as to what he was doing. Of course talented folk can create masterpieces. But that's not how this was presented at all.

[Bruce A. Richardson]

Absolutely correct; at least with regards to the one statement of mine that you quoted, regarding "immediate-gratification-land". The topic as it was presented was about some musical newbie who had no clue as to what he was doing. Of course talented folk can create masterpieces. But that's not how this was presented at all.

Yes, I know. Just borrowed your line to illustrate the point.

In the situation of the first post, if I were trying to help the "newbie" progress, I would probably not take the tack of getting him to move beyond loops. I would find some absolutely mind-blowing stuff, and try to let him know that just stringing simplistic loops into a song isn't really looping--that, in fact, his "cred" is already nonexistent, becuase he's just stringing loops and not creating anything astounding.

[Journeyman]

The mention of "street-cred" brings up a whole 'nother issue: It belies that the newbie in question is not just fooling around for fun on his home computer for his own enjoyment. Evidentally, he's also involved in a whole culture of "newbie loop musicians" that lay their egos and self-worth on the line as so-called "producers". If he's surrounding himself with and hoping to garner respect from like minded people, he won't be interested in doing it the right way.