Art and Culture, Art and Technology

Introduction

There is much talk these days within the "New Age" musical community of "positive" (or "healing") versus "negative" music, referring to the subjective vibratory level of consciousness or state of being that is induced in the listener (who, let it be said, is generally "high" on some drug, yoga or other contemplative activity such as hot tubbing or talking) by a given sound and light environment.

The music most often singled out to produce "negative" vibrations is, beyond question, dissonant 20th Century classical music (from Schoenberg onward), while the best selling "healing" music of the past is played by Pachelbel, Albinoni, Vivaldi.... that is the very ornate, regular and predictable Pattern music of the so-called "Baroque" era.

This trend was emphasized (if not created from the start) by the Hollywood industry in its use of dissonant and unsettling tone combinations to accompany thrillers and horror movies while continuously and deliberately expanding on the "Baroque formula" in their easy listening, ready made shopping mall muzak. It is therefore logical to see this dual concern most clearly defined at present in California.

Beyond our own personal taste, it seems important at this point to examine objectively this particular development. Since the composers themselves (Pachelbel or Wagner...) were utterly foreign to this out of context extension of their work and that great music always best summarizes its own particular cultural origin, we can speak here of "positive" versus "negative" cultures as felt by a present social group in these times of quasi-infinite personal choice on the entertainment market - we shall see later in detail why we assume that all music is now a mere commodity, a mere entertainment program.

This highly middle class social group, however, following unconsciously the political shift to the extreme right, takes its own personal choice (relaxing music) as "Divine Law" and -completely dissociates music from its cultural roots: another example of the purely entertaining use made of music. Calling with overtly dogmatic overtones their safely consonant, background music "healing", they go so far as labeling any adventurous, complex, daring harmony as evil and detrimental to good health ! Obviously, people with such a low resistance to the flow of different cultural seasons must be sick somewhat as a donkey, who having been conditioned on eating exclusively organic carrots would collapse on eating thistles, a choice food for wordly donkeys.

Let us now be more specific: I was talking recently with one of these "New Age" music adepts and he was saying that the vibration of Penderecki's St Luke 's Passion was so upsetting, so negative, that he thought the composer had obviously intended to make his listeners morbidly sick.

Let it be said for the record, I am not myself a great fan of Penderecki's music, but I decided at this point that it was time for me to try to make sense verbally in this Jungle of subjective and dogmatic misconceptions on the deeper and immortal meaning of music and Art in general. This is how this writing came about.

Mingled with the aforementioned prejudices, we also find a lurking suspicion, a guilty attraction and uneasiness in regard to the new Technology and its ever growing influence in modern music. We shall therefore, in a second chapter deal extensively with the relationship of this new technology within the Arts.