Peter: > So, if that's right, stereo is predicated on quite a specialized musical presentation.
Correct! This is the "presentation" that comes along with "perspective" in Renaissance painting and the "linearity" of printed books, etc. It is a product, if you will, of the Gutenberg Galaxy -- which, in turn, started to unravel in the 19th century, yielding "electric" music and ending the "classical" period in composition. This is, perhaps, why the Bell Labs experiments that yielded the 3-channel stereo (which they determined was the "minimum" needed to actually produce a "solid" musical image, especially for an audience) was discussed in the 1934 "Symposium on Auditory Perspective." _http://www.aes.org/aeshc/docs/bell.labs/auditoryperspective.pdf_ (http://www.aes.org/aeshc/docs/bell.labs/auditoryperspective.pdf) So, on this account, you might expect that some music that "preceded" the imposition of this EYE-based conformity would exhibit more respect for the "surround," just as you would expect that some music that "followed" the relaxing of this *environmental* constraint might also begin to explicitly investigate the *spherical* nature of sound. That is, of course, exactly what seems to have happened! None of which, however, changes the fact that in the electric era -- the first and only media environment which created MASS audiences -- music continued to be largely an expression of the "unconscious" orientation for "perspective" (i.e. linear, eye-based, frontal performances), which then became a very "conscious" part of the commercialization of "performances" -- in our own living-rooms. It would have to wait for the further shift from *electric* to *digital* media environment for all of this -- both the linearity of Gutenberg and the "chaos" of "modernity" -- to begin to appear as arbitrary and merely historical "accidents." Now, we are ready for Ambisonics (but not as a mass-market phenomenon) . . . as we all become MEDIEVAL (or, if you prefer, post-modern) once again!! Mark Stahlman Brooklyn NY In a message dated 4/3/2012 10:44:35 A.M. Eastern Daylight Time, p.len...@derby.ac.uk writes: I've always assumed that frontal, proscenium arch -type presentations came out of the logistics of clocking large numbers of musicians together - generally using a visual cue in the form of a conductor (also, individual musicians might feel a bit lonely if they can't hang out with their mates) - and this in turn helped reify the distinction between the music makers and the music listeners. In other musical forms (music to have your dinner by, Telemann, lounge music, ambient, scallywags employed to amuse the medieval court , up there in the minstrels gallery, modern club music, wedding party celebration music, religious music [various cultures] etc etc) 'front' would have less, if any, relevance. So, if that's right, stereo is predicated on quite a specialised musical presentation. So, then, saying 'stereo is all you need' is a bit like saying 'you don't need 4 wheel drive' - true, but in circumscribed circumstances. Dr Peter Lennox School of Technology University of Derby, UK tel: 01332 593155 e: p.len...@derby.ac.uk -----Original Message----- From: sursound-boun...@music.vt.edu [mailto:sursound-boun...@music.vt.edu] On Behalf Of Dave Malham Sent: 03 April 2012 09:49 To: Surround Sound discussion group Subject: Re: [Sursound] OT: Spatial music Hi Robert, Umm - I was making exactly the opposite point - invented in the 16th century makes it, as far as music is concerned, a very new concept. On the other hand,when talking about "acoustic _concert_ music", it's almost tautologous that they are frontally presented, because the whole concept of a musical concert was invented at the same time, probably as a way of making money (I haven't researched that, it's just a guess) - it's much more difficult to make money from an audience who can just walk away without embarrassing themselves - and if you don't believe that (the fear of) embarrassment is not a strong driver, just watch an inexperienced western audience at the end of a Gamelan concert trying to get up the courage to actually leave the concert _during_ the ending piece :-) . Actually, talking about Gamelan, that's a case in point - in the West (and probably increasingly in it's home countries) Gamelan is usually presented frontally (even we usually do that) but this is _not_ correct traditionally. Dave On 2 April 2012 16:34, Robert Greene <gre...@math.ucla.edu> wrote: > > It may be old but it is still all but universal > in acoustic concert music. > I think it is disingenuous to say that it is not. > How many symphony concerts have you been to > recently where the orchestra surrounded the audience. > The other way around, sure. > But I think this is just not true, that music > with the musicians around the audience is common. > Not in the statistical sense of percentage of > concerts where it happens. > Robert > > On Mon, 2 Apr 2012, Dave Malham wrote: > >> Right on - as I've said before, frontal music is largely a development of >> 16th century Western civilisation and is not universal, even now. >> >> By the way, be careful about the Gabrielli's in St. Marks - there is at >> least some evidence that separate choirs singing antiphonally were _not >> _used at St Mark's (see Bryant, D. "The Cori Spezzati of St. Mark's: Myth >> and Reality" in Early Music History, Cambridge 1981, p169). >> >> Dave >> >> >> On 01/04/2012 10:20, Paul Hodges wrote: >>> >>> --On 31 March 2012 18:34 -0700 Robert Greene <gre...@math.ucla.edu> >>> wrote: >>> >>>> Of course music exists that is not in front. But the vast bulk of >>>> concert music is not like that. >>> >>> >>> Sure; but what proportion of music are we happy to be unable to reproduce >>> properly? My organ music (admittedly as much as 20% of my listening) was a >>> trivial example - and it's only in combination with other things that it >>> becomes spatially interesting, generally. You mentioned Gabrieli and >>> Berlioz in a slightly dismissive manner; I would add to them people like >>> Stockhausen and Earle Brown, a folk group moving among their audience, a >>> hall full of schoolchildren bouncing their sounds off each other from >>> different parts of the hall. Not all within the restricted form of "concert >>> music", but music in the real world where we turn our heads and enjoy our >>> whole environment. >>> >>> Paul >>> >> >> -- >> These are my own views and may or may not be shared by my employer >> /*********************************************************************/ >> /* Dave Malham http://music.york.ac.uk/staff/research/dave-malham/ */ >> /* Music Research Centre */ >> /* Department of Music "http://music.york.ac.uk/"; */ >> /* The University of York Phone 01904 322448 */ >> /* Heslington Fax 01904 322450 */ >> /* York YO10 5DD */ >> /* UK 'Ambisonics - Component Imaging for Audio' */ >> /* "http://www.york.ac.uk/inst/mustech/3d_audio/"; */ >> /*********************************************************************/ >> >> -------------- next part -------------- >> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... >> URL: >> <https://mail.music.vt.edu/mailman/private/sursound/attachments/20120402/49f083b7/attachment.html> >> _______________________________________________ >> Sursound mailing list >> Sursound@music.vt.edu >> https://mail.music.vt.edu/mailman/listinfo/sursound >> > _______________________________________________ > Sursound mailing list > Sursound@music.vt.edu > https://mail.music.vt.edu/mailman/listinfo/sursound -- These are my own views and may or may not be shared by my employer Dave Malham Music Research Centre Department of Music The University of York Heslington York YO10 5DD UK Phone 01904 322448 Fax 01904 322450 'Ambisonics - Component Imaging for Audio' _______________________________________________ Sursound mailing list Sursound@music.vt.edu https://mail.music.vt.edu/mailman/listinfo/sursound _____________________________________________________________________ The University of Derby has a published policy regarding email and reserves the right to monitor email traffic. 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