Love-Hounds-request@EDDIE.MIT.EDU.UUCP (12/25/86)
Really-From: Jeff Dalton <jeff%aiva.edinburgh.ac.uk@Cs.Ucl.AC.UK> In my view, |>oug and IED's attempted refutations of Kyle almost entirely miss the point. Here's |>oug, for example: >> From: kyle@CS.UCLA.EDU >> OK, I have a question for you, which is a more versatile instrument? >> a) a guitar >> b) a drum >> The answer in my opinion is very dependent on what one values in an >> instrument and one's personal cultural experiences. And |>oug replies: > No, it isn't. A guitar is capable of making a wider range of sounds > than a drum is. That depends, though, on what types of sounds you want to make. If what you value is percussive sounds a guitar will be seriously deficient. A guitar does not make a wider range of percussive sounds, and the endless variety of other noises it makes may be irrelevant. It may still seem that a guitar is capable of greater total range than a drum, but think for a minute about what it would take to show this. Neither instrument's sounds are a subset of the other's. How many different sounds can a guitar make, anyway? The types of differences that we will be willing to call significant is certainly culturally influenced. But even if we could develop an objective measure, what would it really show? Perhaps the range we are most interested in expressing can be better expressed by a drum. (Remember the guitar vs synth debate, and synthesisers can sound a lot like guitars.) Even if something (e.g., "range of sounds") is objective it may be irrelevant. IED also tries his hand at instrumental superiority: > Now, it is possible to imagine a fairly faithful imitation > of the banjo's sound played by a talented violinist on a Strad; but > the banjo, even when put in the hands of a master banjoist, > is utterly incapable of sounding like a violin. Do you really think a violin can imitate a banjo? The sounds made when the strings are plucked are noticeably different, and even a good violinist might have trouble with fast finger picking. Neither is a banjo "utterly incapable" of sounding like a violin. It may not sound much like a good violin, but have you ever played a banjo with a bow? But to IED, this sort of reasoning is anathema: > Apparently it is your opinion, Mr. Slime, that all forms of judging > quality are invalid. If, as you propose, there is no intrinsic, > provable difference in quality between the range of expression > obtainable from a Stradivarius and that which a banjo offers, then > it must follow that there is no intrinsic difference between a > good banjo and a bad banjo -- or between a Stradivarius violin and a > Sears model, or between any two instruments. There are a number of replies that might be made to these charges. First, it is certainly not the case that it "must follow" that there is no difference between a good and bad banjo. Saying, for example, that there's no intrinsic, provable difference in quality between the taste of apples and oranges does not at all imply that there's no difference between good apples and bad. Someone might indeed feel that all absolute quality judgements about fruit taste were impossible, and that no apples were truly good or bad, but that would be a different and stronger claim. Second, I don't think anyone claimed there were no "provable differences" in range of expression. There are certainly a number of provable, differences, presumably even "intrinsic" ones. That leaves the word "quality". Judging quality is often difficult. In some cases, there are some fairly clear, testable criteria. For example, one tool might be better than another because it's stronger, longer lasting, etc. But this assumes that we are using the tools for certain purposes. Perhaps for a slightly different purpose the formerly inferior tool would be better. Suppose, for example, we live in a culture that does certain things that require very strong tools and that, within limits, we're willing to use heavier tools if they're stronger. A different culture might have the same sorts of tools, and do pretty much the same things with them, but in a different context in which weight is more significant (perhaps they fly where we sail). For them, the best tools might be lighter, even though this would mean they were weaker. Heavy, excessively strong tools might be a sign of manufacturing flaws. Even this simple case, then, involves difficulties. And I don't have to be any kind of relativist to see them. Musical "range of expression" sounds like it might be a more or less objective measure, like the strength of a tool. But it's more like a measure of what the tool can be used for; i.e., "greater range" is analogous to "better tool". Note that IED compares a generic banjo with a Strad, implicitly putting the whole weight of our classical tradition behind the superiority of the latter. I suspect that IED has little notion of what makes the best banjos better than merely good ones, nor even of what accounts for their continued existence at all. Those with access to banjos typically also have access to fiddles (and guitars), and they have not decided to throw the banjos out. Remember how this argument started. IED was trying to show Kate's vocal superiority to Elvis Costello by reducing it to her greater vocal purity and versatility. I am arguing that we would be quite right to say that versatility, in the sense that a Strad might be more versatile than a generic banjo, or a guitar than a drum, does not say which of two singers is the better in an absolute or total sense. Indeed, "better" means very little without some notion of purpose -- "better for what?", we should ask. In terms of a particular musical tradition that values a particular kind of purity and versatility, Kate may well be a better signer; in fact I think she is. But even within that tradition, it doesn't mean she's better than Elvis in every way. There may well be some things that Elvis can express more effectively than can Kate, and that was all the original message was claiming. That's right, a completely reasonable point that happened to be slightly critical of Kate has resulted in all these flames about musical range, cultural relativism, and the relative advantages of guitars and drums, Strads and banjos. -- Jeff