The musicians are almost extinct

[teethofgold]

Originally Posted by meisenhower

Sorry, but if you don't PLAY (programming a sequence at 25% of the tempo doesn't count as playing) a musical instrument (synths DO count as musical instruments), don't create your tracks (by your own hand) from your instrument and cannot play what you write (without technical assistance), or can't perform your music without sequencing, DAWs, arpeggiators or loops.

You're not a musician.

Producer? Perhaps. DJ? Perhaps.

Musician? Not on your life.

Flame away! I'll be keeping warm at the Grand Piano

expecting people to play electronic music live is like expecting someone to create 3D animation with a pencil and paper.

[Khazul]

(Gets abestos pants on...)

I probably count as an instrumentalist - I play all keyboard parts (and sometimes sax, guitar and bass and drum and percussion parts) for all music I produce - (theres some stuff of mine on this forum's radio that whats I can play, but it was edited afterwards to make it tight - Late Night Messin is probably a good example, or Sunset and Escape on my soundcloud page).

However there is no way in hell I can consistently play to the level of tight precision needed for most modern dance music so I end up tweaking and quantizing most stuff I record. I can probably manage keys for the loosness of the average guitar band.

I think 'musician' is regarded very broadly these days - a musician makes music - period. Whether by programming everything, playing instruments, or even just writing and getting someone else to play it (human programming?), or hashing together loops etc...

In this sense - most of us here are musicians - the ones who aint are those who cant actually string a musical peice together, nor play anything that is involved in music, or are strictly DJs, or are strictly sound engineers etc.

A DJ isnt a musician - a turtablist is (IMHO) - Turntablists are usualy also DJs, very few DJs can count themselves as turntablists.

The grey area to my mind is someone who create music pieces by stringing together and mixing pre-made samples and loops - ie where they are not actually writing any melodies or chord progressions, or writing rhythms etc, just mixing it all up - they aint musicians by any definition I can think of.

[annikk.exe]

Originally Posted by teethofgold

expecting people to play electronic music live is like expecting someone to create 3D animation with a pencil and paper.

And writing about music is like dancing about architecture :>


It's weird thinking about why people make posts that they acknowledge they will be flamed for. What is the objective? To be flamed? Surely everyone knows nobody participating in a debate will leave with a different opinion from the one they started with.

I can play most of the stuff in my songs, but there are some things like glitch that are very very difficult for humans to play unassisted. I spend my time writing music though, not worrying about whether I am really a musician or not. :>


-Annikk

[Monobeat]

I think that root of this arguement is out of jealosy somehow. I am not a good keyboard player, and would never claim to be. I am a drummer foremost, which lead me into rhythm programming, and paved the way into composition...

I think someone is jealous of my synthesizers and wants them for his own collection.

You'll have to pry them out of my cold dead hands.

[maelstrom808]

Music is music. It does not matter if the the person who created it spent more time in front of a piano roll window than they did with hands on the keys. It does not matter if they put more hours in cutting and editing audio than they did with an instrument in hand.

The lines between producer, musician, DJ, engineer, etc. blur more and more everyday. Expression is not limited to those who fill the traditional role of a musician. Technology opens up new avenues of creativity. You end up with more hacks, but you also end up more options for the truely talented as well as inviting new artists in, and that is well worth the trade off.

If you are primarily concerned with the previously mentioned hack's commercial success, my advice is don't be. The same situation exists in every proffession, and it has always existed and will always continue to exists.

Creativity and inspiration will come through in the end product if it was there to begin with. It doesn't matter what tools were used to create it. A good song is a good song regardless of how it was made.

[Khazul]

Originally Posted by Monobeat

You'll have to pry them out of my cold dead hands.

This can be arranged

[Monobeat]

I've decided to move deeper underground. As suspected by myself and several others that should remain anonymous, the Infekted posse has scouts/ sniper all over the country listening with their highly sophisticated techno detection/ synthesizer decernment gear, and are waiting to move in and "off" those people suspected of not being good keyboard players.

I suggest...

1) Relocating
2) Switching to polka.
3) "Donating" at least 1 piece of gear to me for long term inspection.

[IamEvil]

Originally Posted by Monobeat

I've decided to move deeper underground. As suspected by myself and several others that should remain anonymous, the Infekted posse has scouts/ sniper all over the country listening with their highly sophisticated techno detection/ synthesizer decernment gear, and are waiting to move in and "off" those people suspected of not being good keyboard players.

I suggest...

1) Relocating
2) Switching to polka.
3) "Donating" at least 1 piece of gear to me for long term inspection.

Noo!

You can't play live 16th notes on 210bpm speedcore/gabber... you arent a musician , you should only use casio !

[suzzymackenzie]

Hmmm ... reminded of Leonard Cohen's 'Jazz Police'

I'm much less sniffy than I once was about what constitutes a musician - for instance, shifted my stance about turntablists. Still think there is special status for the ability to perform your work live to an audience, because music is inter alia a communication medium and nothing enhances that more than actually being there. A couple of days ago I went with my daughter to her first 'open mic' session at a local music pub. She's an avid consumer of mainstream production-heavy pop and used to that level of sonic quality. But as we listened to an amateur guitar/perc/accordeon trio delivering a [snobbishness] technically flawed [/snobbishness] but fun tune she turned to me grinning and said 'Aren't they GOOD?!'

[meisenhower]

Let's just say on this subject, some of us simply disagree about what constitutes a "musician", but do it without being disagreeable.

To those of us who have taken the "long" view about learning our craft, we are naturally going to be sensitive about broad comments like "practicing scales for 8 hours a day is a waste of time, when one could be learning how to make commercially successful music". It's like being dismissive of Thelonious Monk, because he didn't sell one platinum album in his lifetime.

As it was pointed out, some electronic music would be physically impossible for ANYONE to play at certain tempos, however that is the nature of that particular beast. No argument here on that point. I won't discuss the relative "musical" merits of a 210bpm song, but to each his own.

If you're a knob twiddler, loop slicer or beat maker, and you're making music and it makes you happy. All the better.

If you simply pick up your guitar, strum to your hearts content and enjoy doing it. Great.

If you're a practice wonk and live for scales and theory and want to master as much of your chosen instrument as possible, have at it.

The music world is certainly big enough for all of us.