Music and Emotion

[Clay Anderson Johnson]

Can you reach people on an emotional level other than the simple, easy happy, sad, or angry?

 

Can you be emotionally complex while remaining musically assessable to your audience?

 

As an experiment listen to people who were Master Musicians and you may increase your impact tremendously.

 

Beethoven is regarded as a genius and his work still reverberates today.

Obviously his technical prowess is remarkable and he was groundbreaking in his presentation. The undying factor is his emotional command and the ability to tell a story with or without words.

 

Most often considered his greatest Symphony #9, The Choral Symphony, known for the Ode To Joy segment not only introduced the combination of vocal soloists to symphonic music but also it celebrated liberation from both repressive governments and the tyranny of the Roman Catholic Church with his use of pagan imagery.

 

My personal favorite is Symphony #3, The Eroica (The Hero). It tells the story of the French Revolution without using any words. It progresses through the discontent of the people, the frivolity of the court, the plotting against the throne, the uprising, the reign of terror, the rise of Napoleon putting down the mob, and ends with Napoleon being crowned Emperor.

All without a single word.

 

Although on a much smaller scale Carlos Santana has done the same. Soul Sacrifice is an Aztec sacrificial ritual told strictly through music. It moves from the anticipation of the crowd, the offering walking up the steps of the temple, the gathering of the priests, and climaxes with the stabbing heard in the three organ bursts before ending with the ensuing celebration.

 

Miles Davis does similar thing in his albums Sketches of Spain and Bitches Brew.

 

Jimi Hendrix often did much the same thing in his three studio albums where the introductions set the emotional mood for the song before he sings a word.

 

None of these may be in your personal catalog but all are excellent lessons in how to reach an audience on an emotional level using music. Listening to great music that is not in your preferred genre is an excellent tool for growth.

 

Edited October 31, 2021 by Clay Anderson Johnson

[john]

Beethoven has long been my favourite, though there are a few brilliant composers. For me, I am a sucker for his piano sonatas. I regularly play the moonlight sonata as an exercise in memory and mood. It still takes me on a journey every time I play it. Not only do I express the mood I think Beethoven intended, but overlaid is my own mood, affecting every performance. Sure I can do it with or without my mood affecting it, but to meet it’s a vital expression.

 

Chopin is another, slightly later composer I love. Some pretty big hand stretches required for Chopin. The biggest are just a little too much for me.

 

Another composer who I greatly admire is Rachmaninov. Oh boy, the passion he can summon. So far I haven’t learned any, it’s on my list.

 

Out of interest, going back to an earlier topic, the journey from Bach (harpsichord - loads of “inventions” of constantly played notes because the plucked note had low sustain and all the same volume, more or less), through Mozart (piano - improved sustain, so more held notes, and more variety in note volumes, better control, more complexity, more emotional depth) to Beethoven (pianoforte - the modern piano, loads of sustain and nuance of note volume, a load more control) was enabled entirely by the evolution from plucked strings of the harpsichord to the hammered notes on the pianoforte. That evolution allowed composers a growing depth of expression in a technology journey that lasted a century.

 

The emotion of the composer, the emotion of the performer, both are vital components. They allow a full range of expression, limited only by feeling and imagination. Playing scales and chords is just the start of playing. Mastering expression is what sets you apart as both a composer and a player. Truth be told, feeling, expression and communication are vital for musicians, composers and lyricists.

 

There’s an expression I love:

• Amateurs practice until they get it right
• Professionals practice until they can’t get it wrong

In honesty, that is just talking about the core notes and chords, the base timing. The journey of a piece goes way passed that. Mastering the nuance of weight of note and timing of note is a journey that has barely begun when the performer has already reached the point of no mistakes.

 

As a writer our compositions require such devotion too. Not in a slavish sense of devotion. It is a devotion of love, a dedication to the honest expression of a full range of emotions. It is about a level of control that allows you to express exactly what you feel and the depth and complexity with which you feel it.

 

Performance is a beautiful addiction. Songwriting is no less. It deserves our best. After all, if we do not believe in our music enough to build the capacity for such emotion in to our works, why on earth would someone else do it for you?

 

Exploring, learning, they are all about expanding our capacity to express. So that we can commune with our audience, at their convenience, long after our performance. That takes depth and range.
 

Never under estimate the beauty and power that mastery of expression will infuse your music with.

 

[MikeRobinson]

It's very easy to overlook the fact that the technology of music was changing right under the "classical composers'" feet.  (The first "piano" produced by Bartolomeo Cristofori – a harpischord maker – sounded a whole lot like a harpsichord.  The "serpent" is no longer played.  The "saxophone" hadn't been invented.  Flutes didn't have valves yet.  And, so on.)

 

And yet, there they were, "driving the envelope."  Writing music for the instruments of their day.

 

One of the most interesting sort of projects that you can now readily find on the Internet are various efforts to re-cast classical works as their composers and their audiences would have heard them.  Some projects seek to re-create (or, re-use) the actual instruments, while others resort to modern synth patches while striving for authenticity.  It is all extremely interesting.

 

Many folks also do not realize that "the sequencer" is actually not new.  Once the "player piano" had been invented, composers began, so to speak, to bring out their razor-blades.  They invented tools which allowed them to cut patterns into piano rolls.  And so, for the very first time, audiences could hear more than ten notes being played simultaneously. 

 

Meanwhile, other musicians pushed the limits of other musical technologies, such as the "orchestrion."  In fact, one of the most memorable performances that I ever attended was Pat Metheney's "Orchestrion Project," in which he was standing there on the stage, surrounded by dozens of sometimes-very-old instruments, looking for all the world like a kid in a toy store as he put all of these instruments to work ... sometimes using modern digital technology.  You just had to be there, in Nashville – "Music City" if ever there was one (other than Austin).  And, I was there. 😀  Lucky me.

Edited November 17, 2021 by MikeRobinson

[MikeRobinson]

There are various videos out there ...

[jacobsen]

To respond to your introducing question: I think that one essetial point of music is that it evokes music (or art) specific emotions and not just the basic emotions, which you mentioned.

As I am part of a research team, which looks into those emotions, we work with a model that proposes 9 different emotional dimensions: wonder, transcendence, tenderness, peacefulness, nostalgia, joyfull activation, energy, sadness & tension.

I'd like (even though I came a little late to this discussion) to hear your opinion about these emotions.

 

I further would be very greatfull, if you would participate in one of our studies, where we test a short-version of our scale, with which we try to assess this model. You'll find the details in the study description.

 

In any case, thanks!

 

https://webapp.uibk.ac.at/psychologie/psyuibk/index.php/621927?lang=en