5 ms·

I'm a fan of Juergen Schmidhuber's theory: http://people.idsia.ch/~juergen/creativity.html http://people.idsia.ch/~juergen/creativity.html The idea is that the

I'm a fan of Juergen Schmidhuber's theory: http://people.idsia.ch/~juergen/creativity.html http://people.idsia.ch/~juergen/creativity.html The idea is that the brain finds it pleasing to learn things. It effectively seeks novelty. Repetitive, predictable music does not sound pleasing. Pure randomness also does not sound pleasing. Somewhere in between is novelty. Patterns that are definitely real, but new. That somehow violate your brains expectations.

tonyhb 10y ago
Anecdotal but I feels as if that goes against standard chord progression, keys, and almost all EDM. Blues has a fairly strict formula in which most songs follow. Most songs are in 4/4, and most modern music sounds fairly similar yet people are really into it.
- cynicalkane 10y ago
  There's far more to musical creativity than chord sequences and time signatures. Blues is made interesting by the musical ability of the performers.
  - arthur_pryor 10y ago
    it's almost mystifying to me at this point that not everyone's on board with this idea. most of what i care about musically is captured poorly by the traditional notation of western classical music.
    - yolesaber 10y ago
      Only people who have never made music think in that way.
      - meowface 10y ago
        Many electronic music producers (including myself) share a similar sentiment. There's a lot to a carefully produced song that can't be fully encompassed by sheet music.
      - coldtea 10y ago
        Well, I have made music, and I think in that way. The mere score of a blue piece is just as good as useless for conveying the power of a particular blues performance for example.
    - maroonblazer 10y ago
      The notation is just a model, an imperfect one (as all models are). That's been the case since Bach, if not earlier.
- tdkl 10y ago
  .
  - meowface 10y ago
    It is, but that's not really contributing anything here, unless you're saying that diatonic scales and popular chord progressions are also shit.
- tzmudzin 10y ago
  Aren't those patterns and structures just there to avoid the cognitive overload, while we're entertained by lesser variations? (BTW, I believe we're overly simplifying by speaking of music as a single entity. All of the elements you mentioned are a foundation in more popular music, but good luck finding them in more modern or experimental genres.) The cognitive effort to digest Schoenberg is different from that for a pop song. Still, you can progressively familiarize yourself with a genre, and relax on pieces that seemed hard and inaccessible earlier.
  - thirdsun 10y ago
    > Still, you can progressively familiarize yourself with a genre, and relax on pieces that seemed hard and inaccessible earlier. Yes, as a passionate music collector and someone that can get lost in weird, obscure and very leftfield music, this is something I notice all the time. You start with something accessible only to find yourself enjoying obscure 70s synth funk recorded on tape in someone's bedroom months/years later. Or similar. It's why we recommend "Kind of blue" whenever someone wants to get into Jazz, which is difficult if you just randomly start...anywhere.
- zhemao 10y ago
  > Somewhere in between is novelty Most 12-bar blues use a similar chord progression but have different melodies. Even the same song performed by two different musicians will sound different enough to be perceived as "novel".
kazinator 10y ago
Even lovers of serious music have certain favorite recordings that they listen to repeatedly, even though those pieces have been recorded by dozens of others. Pop music is repetitive and predictable, yet, ... well, enough said there.
- zhemao 10y ago
  The difference is the space of time between experiences. I'm a "lover of serious music" and I do have some favorite albums that I come back to every now and then. But I don't listen to the same song in a constant loop on repeat. That would be dreadfully boring. Similarly, most people would not enjoy a song consisting solely of a single measure repeated verbatim over and over again. Even the most repetitive music has some variation.
  - dspig 10y ago
    Not a single measure, but this one must be at the limit of how repetitive music can be while still being interesting (at least for a few minutes, for me): https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=RY26KNRhbOA https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=RY26KNRhbOA
    - dspig 10y ago
      Which makes me think - maybe algorithmic composition would work better the other way around - start with one or two short phrases and repeat them, adding more variation, and different types of variation over longer timescales.
      - lloeki 10y ago
        Reminds me of The Antikythera Mechanism by BT (This Binary Universe) [0]. Each "loop" sample isn't because it's subtly different from the previous one, and when a phrase loops back again, the context changed, creating progression all along the song. I seem to recall I read somewhere that (part of?) the album was painstakingly made using Supercollider [1], but can't find a proper reference. [0]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dKcAfkkipKU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dKcAfkkipKU [1]: http://supercollider.github.io/ http://supercollider.github.io/
FeepingCreature 10y ago
This does not explain why there is a semi-universal experience that certain chords sound "happy" and other sound "sad".
- arthur_pryor 10y ago
  actually, here's some recent research suggesting that the experience is less universal than is often assumed (or at least, much more dependent on culture, and less so on basic universal human biology, which is what i assume people are talking about when they say universal here): http://arstechnica.com/science/2016/07/the-jaws-theme-might-not-be-scary-for-tsimane-people/ http://arstechnica.com/science/2016/07/the-jaws-theme-might-... http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nature18635.html http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/natu... ("Indifference to dissonance in native Amazonians reveals cultural variation in music perception")
visarga 10y ago
I think these musical patterns discovered by the brain are multi-dimensional. The music is just a serialization of this multi-dimensional object, possessing various kinds of symmetries at different levels. It's as if a complex model was presented piece by piece, allowing the receiver to reassemble it. When the multi-dimensional structure was recovered, there is a feeling of "musical" pleasure. Every note is integrated with the other notes, has it's place in this structure its significance to us emerges by its relation to the whole structure. The ability to enjoy music is related to how good the high-dimensional reconstruction is. A listener who has no experience with a genre might not perceive subtle symmetries and higher order patterns, thus, it's just some kind of noise. The more she listens, the more her musical "vocabulary" and ability to perceive these symmetries increase. Developing taste for it is developing ability to represent it fully as it is, a form of integrated information.
- jasonm23 10y ago
  This is one of the better descriptions I've read regarding the appreciation of music. Thank you.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- lprubin 10y ago
  "The more she listens" part is likely why we can listen to an album once and dislike it and then on a second, third and fourth listen develop an increasing appreciation for it until it potentially becomes a favorite album. I always found that phenomenon strange, but your comment is an interesting theory for why that happens.
Scarblac 10y ago
But that clearly isn't all -- I've listened to _No More Shall We Part_ probably a thousand times and it's still good.
- smhost 10y ago
  And white noise makes me feel calm.
- anoonmoose 10y ago
  This is literally the closest I've ever come to encountering another Nick Cave fan "in the wild".
- GrinningFool 10y ago
  I've been looking for new music to enjoy and this fits the bill - thanks for posting. Israel Kamakawiwo'ole has similar vocal attributes, also very enjoyable.
pizza 10y ago
I can't help but think "reduction of entropy is information is good" is the Shannon version of Feynman's "energy makes it go"

tonyhb 10y ago

Anecdotal but I feels as if that goes against standard chord progression, keys, and almost all EDM. Blues has a fairly strict formula in which most songs follow. Most songs are in 4/4, and most modern music sounds fairly similar yet people are really into it.

cynicalkane 10y ago
There's far more to musical creativity than chord sequences and time signatures. Blues is made interesting by the musical ability of the performers.
- arthur_pryor 10y ago
  it's almost mystifying to me at this point that not everyone's on board with this idea. most of what i care about musically is captured poorly by the traditional notation of western classical music.
  - yolesaber 10y ago
    Only people who have never made music think in that way.
    - meowface 10y ago
      Many electronic music producers (including myself) share a similar sentiment. There's a lot to a carefully produced song that can't be fully encompassed by sheet music.
    - coldtea 10y ago
      Well, I have made music, and I think in that way. The mere score of a blue piece is just as good as useless for conveying the power of a particular blues performance for example.
  - maroonblazer 10y ago
    The notation is just a model, an imperfect one (as all models are). That's been the case since Bach, if not earlier.
tdkl 10y ago
.
- meowface 10y ago
  It is, but that's not really contributing anything here, unless you're saying that diatonic scales and popular chord progressions are also shit.
tzmudzin 10y ago
Aren't those patterns and structures just there to avoid the cognitive overload, while we're entertained by lesser variations? (BTW, I believe we're overly simplifying by speaking of music as a single entity. All of the elements you mentioned are a foundation in more popular music, but good luck finding them in more modern or experimental genres.) The cognitive effort to digest Schoenberg is different from that for a pop song. Still, you can progressively familiarize yourself with a genre, and relax on pieces that seemed hard and inaccessible earlier.
- thirdsun 10y ago
  > Still, you can progressively familiarize yourself with a genre, and relax on pieces that seemed hard and inaccessible earlier. Yes, as a passionate music collector and someone that can get lost in weird, obscure and very leftfield music, this is something I notice all the time. You start with something accessible only to find yourself enjoying obscure 70s synth funk recorded on tape in someone's bedroom months/years later. Or similar. It's why we recommend "Kind of blue" whenever someone wants to get into Jazz, which is difficult if you just randomly start...anywhere.
zhemao 10y ago
> Somewhere in between is novelty Most 12-bar blues use a similar chord progression but have different melodies. Even the same song performed by two different musicians will sound different enough to be perceived as "novel".

kazinator 10y ago

Even lovers of serious music have certain favorite recordings that they listen to repeatedly, even though those pieces have been recorded by dozens of others. Pop music is repetitive and predictable, yet, ... well, enough said there.

zhemao 10y ago
The difference is the space of time between experiences. I'm a "lover of serious music" and I do have some favorite albums that I come back to every now and then. But I don't listen to the same song in a constant loop on repeat. That would be dreadfully boring. Similarly, most people would not enjoy a song consisting solely of a single measure repeated verbatim over and over again. Even the most repetitive music has some variation.
- dspig 10y ago
  Not a single measure, but this one must be at the limit of how repetitive music can be while still being interesting (at least for a few minutes, for me): https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=RY26KNRhbOA https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=RY26KNRhbOA
  - dspig 10y ago
    Which makes me think - maybe algorithmic composition would work better the other way around - start with one or two short phrases and repeat them, adding more variation, and different types of variation over longer timescales.
    - lloeki 10y ago
      Reminds me of The Antikythera Mechanism by BT (This Binary Universe) [0]. Each "loop" sample isn't because it's subtly different from the previous one, and when a phrase loops back again, the context changed, creating progression all along the song. I seem to recall I read somewhere that (part of?) the album was painstakingly made using Supercollider [1], but can't find a proper reference. [0]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dKcAfkkipKU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dKcAfkkipKU [1]: http://supercollider.github.io/ http://supercollider.github.io/

FeepingCreature 10y ago

This does not explain why there is a semi-universal experience that certain chords sound "happy" and other sound "sad".

arthur_pryor 10y ago
actually, here's some recent research suggesting that the experience is less universal than is often assumed (or at least, much more dependent on culture, and less so on basic universal human biology, which is what i assume people are talking about when they say universal here): http://arstechnica.com/science/2016/07/the-jaws-theme-might-not-be-scary-for-tsimane-people/ http://arstechnica.com/science/2016/07/the-jaws-theme-might-... http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nature18635.html http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/natu... ("Indifference to dissonance in native Amazonians reveals cultural variation in music perception")

visarga 10y ago

I think these musical patterns discovered by the brain are multi-dimensional. The music is just a serialization of this multi-dimensional object, possessing various kinds of symmetries at different levels. It's as if a complex model was presented piece by piece, allowing the receiver to reassemble it. When the multi-dimensional structure was recovered, there is a feeling of "musical" pleasure. Every note is integrated with the other notes, has it's place in this structure its significance to us emerges by its relation to the whole structure. The ability to enjoy music is related to how good the high-dimensional reconstruction is. A listener who has no experience with a genre might not perceive subtle symmetries and higher order patterns, thus, it's just some kind of noise. The more she listens, the more her musical "vocabulary" and ability to perceive these symmetries increase. Developing taste for it is developing ability to represent it fully as it is, a form of integrated information.

jasonm23 10y ago
This is one of the better descriptions I've read regarding the appreciation of music. Thank you.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
lprubin 10y ago
"The more she listens" part is likely why we can listen to an album once and dislike it and then on a second, third and fourth listen develop an increasing appreciation for it until it potentially becomes a favorite album. I always found that phenomenon strange, but your comment is an interesting theory for why that happens.

Scarblac 10y ago

But that clearly isn't all -- I've listened to _No More Shall We Part_ probably a thousand times and it's still good.

smhost 10y ago
And white noise makes me feel calm.
anoonmoose 10y ago
This is literally the closest I've ever come to encountering another Nick Cave fan "in the wild".
GrinningFool 10y ago
I've been looking for new music to enjoy and this fits the bill - thanks for posting. Israel Kamakawiwo'ole has similar vocal attributes, also very enjoyable.

pizza 10y ago

I can't help but think "reduction of entropy is information is good" is the Shannon version of Feynman's "energy makes it go"