Notes from the Other Underground…
A quick addendum to my recent “click pick” visit to the Eastern Front:
My good and long-time i-friend Rudy Carrera pointed me in the direction of the young Russian composer Dmitry Subochev (b.1981), who’s posted a couple frenetically fun (and challenging) Moscow performances on video at YouTube. Cheglakov and His Shadow was made in collaboration with Subochev’s fellow composer and cellist Dmitry Cheglakov:
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As well, Subochev teams up with Tatiana Mikheeva to terrorize the inside of a piano in Pandora’s Box:
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Whether as something integral or as optional accompaniment, my very really grand prediction is that video will become ever-more essential to both performers and composers, and not just in the “big” places. Bone up now or chew the dust at the back of the pack…
I’m no expert, but I’m guessing that the definition of history is going through an even more radical revision than anything that is going on in the arts these days. A thousand years ago, groupings of people were almost completely defined by location; today, location means less than it ever has, and shared interests mean more. I can’t imagine how that will impact what is seen as historically significant.
Hey, culturally speaking we were all swept to the dustbin quite a while ago! 😉 A dustbin stuffed with treasure, but dustbin nonetheless. Still, a few folks like to go dumpster-diving for what we offer, and life goes on.
Yes, that’s pretty much the only point I was making, that most every composer or performer who makes recordings of their work will eventually have to consider some visual/filmic component as an essential part of the package. (Not that I think the work necessarily needs it; it’s just that to that future public anything less will become awfully quaint.)
Okay, I think I’ve got it now. If I can put it this way: the performance experience is an essential part of music. Twentieth-century recording technology divorced music from performance, losing a critical part of the equation while gaining vaster, more personalized dissemination and greater expressive refinement. Generations of listeners have come to prefer the advantages of recorded sound. Combining recorded music with video reconnects us to the original performance experience we still crave, without sacrificing the advantages of recording.
Is that the evolution you see happening?
If I’ve got it now, it’s definitely a valid point, and I don’t disagree. It’s not at all what I thought you were saying at first. Either way, though, I always react badly to pronouncements that consign segments of the population to the dustbin of history, which was how you came across, intentionally or not.
No, Lawrence, of course there’ll always be live concerts (though what happens at them might change a bit from the current conception). Nothing replaces anything. But in the wider world recordings already easily dominate live performance, and music video will eventually dominate the whole spectrum of recorded music, “classical” included. Again, it’s not so much some new concept as it is a recovery. Until the birth of sound recording “decoupled” it, music performance always had a visual aspect. And so it will again (though film taught us that it doesn’t always have to be simply documentary).
Now I’m more confused. You say you are only talking about the recorded medium, but it sounds like you are talking about the end of live concerts. Are you saying that music videos will replace pure music recordings, or they will replace live performance? Or both? I thought I understood what you are predicting, but now I’m not so sure.
No, not “snuff out” at all! I’m only talking about the recorded medium. That’s where the change will occur, while all else conitinues on its merry way (to greater or lesser interest). Yet while it’s only one aspect of the whole range of musical experience, it’s become one of the most dominant forms. And as hugely pervasive as it is already, it still isn’t finished growing. For at least 80-some-percent of the active listening population, the “pure” concert experience is already an minor or rare adjunct to their daily music experience. Lament, rail or retreat, it’s not coming back.
I don’t think it’s like vinyl or 78rpm or silent films — I think it’s like people singing together around a campfire or alone in the shower, or cleaning their apartments, or driving to work, or practicing the clarinet. If you are saying that people in the future won’t use music unless there is an image attached, do you really mean that all those other activities will happen in silence? It’s nice to have one art form that doesn’t require the eyes, so we can combine it with whatever our eyes are engaged with.
I have no doubt that the music video concept, which as you say has been around for quite some time, will continue to be popular. But snuff out all other forms of music making? There are just too many options, not just the marginal and esoteric ones, and billions of people need more than one option.
Sure, just like there are vinyl and even still 78rpm junkies. I’m completely from the sound-recording generation(s); I don’t have any problem with it, yet like it or not know that kind of thing will become marginal and estoteric. When sound was finnaly able to be reuinited with image around 1930, there was really no going back. I think that this is simply the other side of the coin.
Oh, now I see what you are saying – I thought you were referring to the Subochev performances. Well, chew-the-dust is a bit over the top, but your point is understandable. Still, I don’t agree that the time will come when something has to be there, simply because people will always find many different ways to enjoy music – some will always prefer to focus on the sound itself, while others will prefer to use it as a soundtrack underpinning their own experiences, as opposed to someone else’s vision.
Of course, if you are just referring to the majority of people, then you may be right, and those of us who want majorities would do well to heed your words
I was thinking more along the lines of recording as opposed to live audition. There’s an ever-increasing expectation building, of having something to watch as well as listen to. From the start sound recording was always a compromised medium, able to only capture half of any performance. Even when it became possible to do both with film, there wasn’t really an easy, cheap and portable way for a consumer to have it at home. In the meantime, recording went on to develop some approaches unique to itself.
But the last 30 years have brought the visual into the home and individual in the same way that records, tape and CDs did for sound. With that, I think this has already begun to reinstate the expectation for both sound and image; people will often no longer just want to listen. The visual aspect may simply be a record of the actual performance, or it may drift into more filmic territory, but there’ll come a time where something will have to be there.
“Bone up now or chew the dust at the back of the pack…”
So if everyone starts doing x, I’m gonna do x too just so I don’t feel left out? Great prediction…
The first video is a bit gimmicky.
As a grand prediction, here’s my entry: I think this is more about the present than the future. Steve is right: everyone is doing it, in small and large venues. It’s cheap, it’s easy, it’s a no-brainer. I’ve done it several times, and I don’t think anyone would consider me to be in the vanguard.
Very soon this will become so ubiquitous, and there will be so many examples of really atrocious work using video technology, that it will look old and hackneyed to those who are most interested in being on the cutting edge. At that point, it will be time to assess which works have some lasting value, while those who worry about chewing dust will move on to the next bandwagon.
I agree, full video integration into live performance is the next big thing. It’s showing up everywhere and something we as performers/composers are no longer going to be able to aviod.
Mike
http://www.multimediasaxophone.com
I’m humbled, flattered and honored for the mention!