Contemplations - nature, music & us

Life, music, technology ..

The un-ease we often feel now in contemporary (music) life, is probably an (inevitable?) result of being ‘swamped' ..
Swamped by businesses, rushing, consuming, traffic, noise .. and by technologies; technologies that, through cultural constructs, promise all kinds of substitutes for thought, work, ethics and awarenesses ..

Looking back at ‘old’ indigenous/folk/traditional musics - where ‘music’ had cultural functionality and was not separated off into ‘art’ or ‘personality pop’ - makes for an interesting comparison with our current rush to try and keep up (with schedules, tours, technologies, media, marketing)

Our unease now is probably much more to do with our western cultural unconsciousness - rather than anything changing much within the actual processes of performance or instrument making and development

Instruments used to be what-ever were at hand - sticks, skins, branches, body

The ‘sublime’ always transcends any technical ‘limitation’; it comes back to people in place and time, of being 'in the moment'

It’s ‘how we are’ that matters

Perhaps we can:
Re-view life - as approached through music/art/living - as a process, in which we all play a significant if ‘small’ role

Realize that everything may be done ‘well'; nothing is too small nor insignificant

That ‘art’ is a construct, it has no intrinsic meaning

And to try listening, non listening, being quiet, celebrate a moment, experiment with musics, no music, time of day .. tune ourselves up

Look, listen to and with, nature for inspiration
see music through ‘landscape eyes’ (ears?); complexity developing from relatively ‘simple’ ideas and forms

Maybe even move out of the noise ..

Good luck

Visit to Arnhemland (Indigenous area, northern Australia) 1993

I recognized the sky, the colours, the trees, some of the calls of the birds - but I knew straight away that I did not understand
And I never had

Understand?

Feeling alienated from the earth on which I was standing, from the flora and fauna around me, from the sounds I could hear

My language was not adequate; it could not adequately describe how I was, who I was or even where I was - in relation to place

The languages I could hear though, were

They seemed to be couched in nature, in earth, inside the story and song of this place, of being here
In trees and birds and community and people

Everything appeared to exist in relationship to everything else - except that there was no 'else'; all was/is included
As music, essential music, music of the earth, of place, of all and everything within

Culture, language ..

The meaning of (Indigenous) song story is imbued by, and exists within, its language
Indigenous language is imbued with the 'spirit of place'

Probably needs the thousands of years of living in and with - and being totally dependent upon - one's own environment to develop such an intimate (local) language with which to describe and 'name'

English language seems concerned with a linear cause & effect process
Ind languages are more to do with relationship (bet pple earth & pple and spirit)

There is a richness of culture (the relationships of people with people and people with earth and cosmos) approachable only through Indigenous language - that seems beyond the ability of English to comprehend; perhaps much translation really does 'lose the essence', 'lack the splendor of the experience'

Buckets of crabs, thongs and winning

(Response to a newspaper article equating a’ bucket of crabs’ with Australian aboriginal social systems)

‘There’s no need for a lid, these are aboriginal crabs; if one tries to climb out, the others will pull it back down’)

Our egos love these individuation stories; tales of the personality overcoming perceived obstacles and habitat; presenting social ‘limitation’ in succinct visual ‘grabs’ (a crab grab?)

No doubt there are elements of a greater truth contained within the portrayed struggle; but it is a struggle, a struggle always to find the balance between head and heart ..

Nathaniel from central arnhemland lived with me (a white fella) near Melbourne for 6 months some years ago; he was about 7 years old at the time
It was his first time ‘outside’ his community ..
He was not much of a (study) student and, perhaps surprisingly, even less of a sports student, hopeless at ‘competitions’

The ultimate sports event for the school year was the inter-school races and Nathaniel - who was the fastest runner by miles when he had to - charged out to lead the whole group again and again, only to always slow down until all the other runners caught up

Finally a somewhat exasperated teacher called out, ‘Nathaniel, what are you doing .. why don’t you run and win?’

The reply .. ‘If I slow down, everyone catch up, we all go over the line together - and we all win’

Watching our reactions to this story - and the bucket of ‘black fella’ crabs story - is the interesting bit isn’t it ?

Both stories appeal, each to different parts of ourselves; both are 'valid'
One is ‘group’ oriented (family, community, doing ‘good’ works) the other is ‘individual’ (realizing potential, freedom, self expression)

Is there a problem ?
Yes .. simplification of (complex) life into the 'crab grab' and then presuming that either an 'individual' or a 'group' is somehow more important that the other

We are both ‘group’ and both ‘individual’ at the same time - each needing the opposite - the balance - for the ‘other’ to even make sense of itself

And thongs?

An old apocryphal story:
The white fella spies Jimmy, the black fella, walking down the street wearing only one thong ..
‘Hey Jimmy, you’ve lost a thong’ he yells out

‘Nah mate’, comes the reply, ‘found one’

Meditation, life, noise .. and seeking sounds and music

The best way of finding new (sounds and musics) is to go out into the world - and find them

This is a 'meditational' activity: it needs to be approached whilst expecting nothing, being in the moment; 'visualizing' where to be in order to hear or imagine or record what - and with no fixed idea of what might happen

Recording (nature) sounds - and hearing generally - are becoming increasingly difficult .. due to noise
Traffic noise, planes, machines, alarms, sirens .. so much intruding mechanical noise being generated in the modern world

'Noise' is here defined as that sound that is sublimating ('swamping'!) the detail and meaning of quieter sounds

Loud (city type) noise is a real problem for us all; exposure to continual noise of sufficient volume has the effect of turning our hearing 'down' - in order to protect itself - then failing to 'turn back on' as the noise just continues unabated

Creating space
- in story, music and life !

Space for the participant, the listener, to place him or herself in .. a place/space to explore from

The major shortcoming with contemporary media is that there is no space left; no room left for participation; all space is removed; space is viewed as a ‘marketing opportunity’ .. or maybe we have become just afraid of it

Thoughts:
no past .. no future .. just now !

Two views:
Galaxy and creek; different scales perhaps, but both 'measured' in epochs - to be as they are ..

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