For the last post, i must answer three questions.
1. What is something you learned about another culture this term that surprised or intrigued you?
-something I learned in this term about another culture is how much different cultures borrow from one another, and turn what they've borrowed into something new and wonderful and unique in itself.
2. What is something that you realized about your own culture through our discussions?
-most of what we listen to isn't from our own culture....
3. What is something that this course has inspired you to learn more about?
-I really want to know more about the other instruments of different cultures. I loved seeing how each instrument evolved into the instruments we have today, knowing the ones we use now will continue to be changed and "improved" to the end of time.
Sorry this post is a little shorter, it is direct and to the point I must admit. I want to say thank you Dr. Vaneman for everything you taught us this semester and I look forward to the next three and a half years at Converse, particularly in the music building.
Also, thank you to whatever members of the class decide to read this, I sincerely enjoyed every class period learning by ya'll's sides. Have a wonderful break and maybe I'll see all of you soon!
The best, God bless,
Lydia
Friday, January 31, 2014
Friday, January 24, 2014
Cool Stuff!!
I decided to look up why deities are portrayed with multiple limbs. Here's something I found about it!
 | Deities are often portrayed with multiple arms, especially when they are battling cosmic forces. The multiplicity of arms emphasizes the deity's immense power and ability to perform several acts at the same time. The portrayal of a deity in human form but with multiple arms is the artist's attempt to express the deity's superhuman power. Demons are frequently depicted with multiple heads to convey their superhuman power as well. Occasionally a deity is shown with more than one head in an attempt to describe various aspects of the character of that deity. For example, when the god Shiva is portrayed with a triple head, the central face indicates his essential character and the flanking faces depict his fierce and blissful natures. (left) Contemporary Indian poster of the goddess Durga | ||||||||||||
And here is a clip of two Americans dancing a bollywood dance, you get to see a little bit of how hard it really is to get all of those hand movements right. It's really cool :-)
This last one is composed by one of my favorite modern composers, he's 25 and does purely instrumental music. This one is called Hual Hadi, and resembles the music of the Middle East and of India in my ears. I hope you enjoy!
Lastly, this will pull in something from my Music and Family video, which I don't think real counts for this but I have to include it for my family's sake haha.
Wednesday, January 22, 2014
Friday, January 17, 2014
Nifty Stuff Right There
Well then. This week we have covered the blues, Latin America, and Australia. Pretty cool! That's a lot for one week. Hopefully I can show ya'll some pretty cool stuff that ties in some of this music!
So starting with the blues, I have first some personal experience that may not really be that neat but I feel it could be cool to include this: I used to live in/near Augusta, GA, where the James Brown Arena is today. Now, the arena is used for MUCH more than music, from hockey to rodeos, the arena is used for so much. My musical experience there has itself been varied. In one instance I played the national anthem for a hockey game on my violin, in another, I sang it for a football game. While I don't have a recording of those events, here are some of the other things that happen in the arena named after good old James Brown today:
I am also a huge Elvis fan, so I can't help but post an Elvis song…
So starting with the blues, I have first some personal experience that may not really be that neat but I feel it could be cool to include this: I used to live in/near Augusta, GA, where the James Brown Arena is today. Now, the arena is used for MUCH more than music, from hockey to rodeos, the arena is used for so much. My musical experience there has itself been varied. In one instance I played the national anthem for a hockey game on my violin, in another, I sang it for a football game. While I don't have a recording of those events, here are some of the other things that happen in the arena named after good old James Brown today:
I am also a huge Elvis fan, so I can't help but post an Elvis song…
Okay, I won't post anything more about Elvis….I think….
In this next clip you get to see all three aspects of Australian music that we talked about today. The dancing, the singing, AND the didgereedu. Enjoy :-)
And just one more picture to sum up this post. I know it's an awful picture, but it's my little bragging moment so just bear with me.
The first one is ELVIS'S GOLD PIANO (which we sadly couldn't play)
The second one is the piano Elvis played in Studio B when recording his songs, me and my sister got to play it in Nashville :-)
Wednesday, January 15, 2014
Gender-Specificity
This week's post is about the effect gender has in our personal musical worlds. In my world, I have found that music is often not gender specific. Let me explain…
Probably my earliest exposure to mixed-gender musical experiences was in my home school band when I was 13. I played intermediate clarinet and there were only two boys among the eight or ten of us. James went on to play clarinet at Clemson and even got to play in the last Olympics. I have continued playing clarinet into college, and who knows where I'll end up in a few years. In the band, all genders were treated equally as talented players, as long as you continued to work hard for your position in the band.
My next exposure to mixed-gender music was in orchestra. I played violin in orchestra for three years and loved it. Here, I will say it was definitely dominantly female. There were maybe six males in the entire youth orchestra. BUT they were all very talented, and they worked very hard. Whereas the females generally were the type that didn't practice much and were much too social for their own good as far as music came (there were exceptions of course). The gender-specificity was more obvious in only this way. The music we played was non-gender-specific (like most music), and there was no bias from any of the players or from the director (who was female) toward either gender.
The most prominent aspect of music in my life has been through church. This is the place where gender has been more distinctly separated. I have had mostly female choir directors, and there are generally more females IN the choir. However, music directors in the only big church I have been in have been male, and the female choir director I had there was not comfortable standing in front of the church in any sort of leadership position. Most of the instrumentalists have been female, from pianos and organs to guitars and violins when we have them. I don't know that this is intentional, it just seems to happen this way.
Probably my earliest exposure to mixed-gender musical experiences was in my home school band when I was 13. I played intermediate clarinet and there were only two boys among the eight or ten of us. James went on to play clarinet at Clemson and even got to play in the last Olympics. I have continued playing clarinet into college, and who knows where I'll end up in a few years. In the band, all genders were treated equally as talented players, as long as you continued to work hard for your position in the band.
My next exposure to mixed-gender music was in orchestra. I played violin in orchestra for three years and loved it. Here, I will say it was definitely dominantly female. There were maybe six males in the entire youth orchestra. BUT they were all very talented, and they worked very hard. Whereas the females generally were the type that didn't practice much and were much too social for their own good as far as music came (there were exceptions of course). The gender-specificity was more obvious in only this way. The music we played was non-gender-specific (like most music), and there was no bias from any of the players or from the director (who was female) toward either gender.
The most prominent aspect of music in my life has been through church. This is the place where gender has been more distinctly separated. I have had mostly female choir directors, and there are generally more females IN the choir. However, music directors in the only big church I have been in have been male, and the female choir director I had there was not comfortable standing in front of the church in any sort of leadership position. Most of the instrumentalists have been female, from pianos and organs to guitars and violins when we have them. I don't know that this is intentional, it just seems to happen this way.
Thursday, January 9, 2014
Whoa, really??
So, I'm really excited about this post. I have found some pretty cool stuff relating to the topics we discussed this week, especially Africa.
The first one I'd like to share with you is a Christian singer, Nicole C. Mullen, who sang a song about the African people being freed in America. What's really interesting about this, and I didn't notice this until I listened to it today, you can hear the call and response, repetition and simple melodies, and even the complex drum sounds that we heard in the purely African music. Here is "Freedom" by Nicole C. Mullen:
The first one I'd like to share with you is a Christian singer, Nicole C. Mullen, who sang a song about the African people being freed in America. What's really interesting about this, and I didn't notice this until I listened to it today, you can hear the call and response, repetition and simple melodies, and even the complex drum sounds that we heard in the purely African music. Here is "Freedom" by Nicole C. Mullen:
The next video I am going to show you I discovered today while looking for images for my sidebar. I was looking at pictures of Mbiras and Koras and found performances centered around those instruments that I thought were really cool. This particular video has a man providing commentary, giving some information about the instruments and some of the culture.
The last video I would like to share with you is very different from both of the videos I have already shared. This group of musicians has found a way to combine Native American techniques with a European Christmas carol (although I doubt they realize it). The Piano Guys use only one instrument to create many sounds, using it as a drum, a string instrument, a keyboard, and other percussive instruments as well. It reminded me of the Native American music at first because they were able to use one instrument (instead of using several) to create many sounds.
I hope you enjoyed these songs :-) The first one is my personal favorite haha. Have a wonderful weekend!
Tuesday, January 7, 2014
Musical Reverence
Okay…I am going to go ahead and apologize. The topic of music as it relates to religion is one of my soap-box topics. I tend to go off on rants about what the purpose of music in church and religion is, and how it gets misconstrued.
MUSIC IS NOT AN EMOTIONAL ADDITION TO A CHURCH SERVICE.
Shocking. I know. Okay let me give you some background. I grew up with a very conservative, reformed background. I was only in one church for two years at a time because of the military. In every church, though, I was raised with a reformed idea of music and its place in worship. This is often a very big problem, because people are picky about music. I know that may not seem so big when you are surrounded by musicians every day who are open to listening to all kinds of music, but in the church, people have made music a huge issue.
Music's USE in the church service. It is to praise and worship GOD, to give HIM the glory. It isn't to complain about how much pain we're in, it is not to show Him how much we are doing for Him. It isn't to talk about US at all. Music should always reflect back to God in worship, it was given to us by Him after all. We try so hard these days to make music in worship reflect that of the world to bring in those of the world, to attract the world. No. That's wrong. We are not supposed to be attractive to the world, that means we're doing something wrong. We're supposed to stand out in the world. We are SUPPOSED to stick out like a sore thumb, we're different and that's a GOOD thing.
Contemporary Christian music is not a bad thing. I personally love Casting Crowns and Hillsong, both very popular Christian bands last year and the year before that, and Colton Dixon is one of my favorite singers. However, I feel that music of this genre should be enjoyed outside of the church service simply for the tone of the music. When you hear a hymn, you automatically think of church, God (or some sort of religious event), and maybe even reverence. How many contemporary Christian songs make you want to be in church worshipping God? Exactly. In a church service, there is a certain atmosphere that must be upheld. Generations have made this next to impossible to maintain because they bring up arguments such as "this music will bring in the younger generation", or "it's all praising God". But, as I mentioned earlier, praising God is not the primary purpose of music in worship, reflecting His glory is.
Does this make you feel like you just gave God glory?
Yet this is the kind of thing we try to imitate to "bring in the younger generation"....I don't think it's working.
Okay, if that made no sense and just made you mad, I hope this will fix whatever damage I did.
Music's purpose in worship is to give God glory, to reflect His absolute majesty and power, to show Him that we appreciate His grace and mercy, and to praise Him. It is to plea and to pray, and then to show our thanks. Music is the expression of the people from God, to God.
The aesthetics of music in worship. How is it pleasing? Well…it's music from God….people complain about the hymns because they're "old-fashioned" or "boring"…the hymns and Psalms are written from or about Scripture. We are singing God's own words to Him. What isn't beautiful about that? The music in the church, in worship, is focused on the lyrics, yes. The melodies just reflect those lyrics, and if they reflect them correctly then that is what creates aesthetically pleasing sound.
I hope I haven't made any enemies in this post, please forgive me if I offended you or your religion. Please understand these are the beliefs I have been taught since I was a child, and have come to truly believe in young adulthood. I do not wish to anger anyone, this is just a very delicate topic in my heart and in my mind because it has cost my family dearly in recent months.
Thank you, and goodnight.
MUSIC IS NOT AN EMOTIONAL ADDITION TO A CHURCH SERVICE.
Shocking. I know. Okay let me give you some background. I grew up with a very conservative, reformed background. I was only in one church for two years at a time because of the military. In every church, though, I was raised with a reformed idea of music and its place in worship. This is often a very big problem, because people are picky about music. I know that may not seem so big when you are surrounded by musicians every day who are open to listening to all kinds of music, but in the church, people have made music a huge issue.
Music's USE in the church service. It is to praise and worship GOD, to give HIM the glory. It isn't to complain about how much pain we're in, it is not to show Him how much we are doing for Him. It isn't to talk about US at all. Music should always reflect back to God in worship, it was given to us by Him after all. We try so hard these days to make music in worship reflect that of the world to bring in those of the world, to attract the world. No. That's wrong. We are not supposed to be attractive to the world, that means we're doing something wrong. We're supposed to stand out in the world. We are SUPPOSED to stick out like a sore thumb, we're different and that's a GOOD thing.
Contemporary Christian music is not a bad thing. I personally love Casting Crowns and Hillsong, both very popular Christian bands last year and the year before that, and Colton Dixon is one of my favorite singers. However, I feel that music of this genre should be enjoyed outside of the church service simply for the tone of the music. When you hear a hymn, you automatically think of church, God (or some sort of religious event), and maybe even reverence. How many contemporary Christian songs make you want to be in church worshipping God? Exactly. In a church service, there is a certain atmosphere that must be upheld. Generations have made this next to impossible to maintain because they bring up arguments such as "this music will bring in the younger generation", or "it's all praising God". But, as I mentioned earlier, praising God is not the primary purpose of music in worship, reflecting His glory is.
Does this make you feel like you just gave God glory?
Yet this is the kind of thing we try to imitate to "bring in the younger generation"....I don't think it's working.
Okay, if that made no sense and just made you mad, I hope this will fix whatever damage I did.
Music's purpose in worship is to give God glory, to reflect His absolute majesty and power, to show Him that we appreciate His grace and mercy, and to praise Him. It is to plea and to pray, and then to show our thanks. Music is the expression of the people from God, to God.
The aesthetics of music in worship. How is it pleasing? Well…it's music from God….people complain about the hymns because they're "old-fashioned" or "boring"…the hymns and Psalms are written from or about Scripture. We are singing God's own words to Him. What isn't beautiful about that? The music in the church, in worship, is focused on the lyrics, yes. The melodies just reflect those lyrics, and if they reflect them correctly then that is what creates aesthetically pleasing sound.
I hope I haven't made any enemies in this post, please forgive me if I offended you or your religion. Please understand these are the beliefs I have been taught since I was a child, and have come to truly believe in young adulthood. I do not wish to anger anyone, this is just a very delicate topic in my heart and in my mind because it has cost my family dearly in recent months.
Thank you, and goodnight.
Where Did It All Come From?
Well, Hello there fellow musicians. How nice it is that we are to become acquainted with one another. Shall we begin with some background into where my own musical influence came from? You have no choice, neither did I. Let us begin.
I am a pastor's daughter. This most likely will automatically fill your mind with all these assumptions as to my musical background. Most of which are correct. Yes, I was raised on Psalms and Hymns. Yes, I was raised listening to organ music and pianos and choirs. No, I don't find this weird. No, I didn't actually hate it. In fact, I find the history of the hymns and the singing of the psalms quite interesting. Most of the hymns we have today were written in Europe, which makes sense since that is where the heart of the Reformation took place. Martin Luther, John Calvin and all of the other major reformation leaders also wrote hymns. These hymns are either taken straight from Scripture, or based on the words of God written there. Many of them are nearly word-for-word perfect when compared to the scripture which they came from, which I absolutely love.
The Psalms are also very fascinating to me because they date back even farther than all of the hymns I sing. The Psalms were sung by biblical characters such as King David, who wrote a majority of them, and his son Solomon. This means that the Psalms we sing in church today are the very same psalms (although to different melodies) that kings sang almost 6000 years ago! How cool is that?
Okay, so no I'm not completely a pastor's daughter. I am also an Army brat, and a country girl when I can afford it (being country isn't cheap). So, I listen to country music, and I LOVE music with a good beat (the Grass Dance we listened to in class was my favorite if that tells you anything). Country music, if you follow it back far enough, goes back to the revolutionary war, when they were singing "old" folk songs and mountain music, most of which originated in England. Apparently I have a very European-based musical taste.
PK, Army brat….oh yes, musician. At Converse, I play the Clarinet. This is majorly because I play that better than any other instrument, but my real passion in music is for the violin. I am not very good at it, but I absolutely love to play my violin. This instrument ties in all of my musical taste, from church music to old folk music, even to heavier music with a beat. This video below shows one of my absolute favorite violinists, who has taken the instrument from fiddle and orchestra to a whole new level of entertainment.
I hope you enjoyed that. She is very good and I'm kind of obsessed.
Well here ends my story. I look forward to reading through some of y'all's blogs and finding out about some of the people I'm in class with. Good night!
I am a pastor's daughter. This most likely will automatically fill your mind with all these assumptions as to my musical background. Most of which are correct. Yes, I was raised on Psalms and Hymns. Yes, I was raised listening to organ music and pianos and choirs. No, I don't find this weird. No, I didn't actually hate it. In fact, I find the history of the hymns and the singing of the psalms quite interesting. Most of the hymns we have today were written in Europe, which makes sense since that is where the heart of the Reformation took place. Martin Luther, John Calvin and all of the other major reformation leaders also wrote hymns. These hymns are either taken straight from Scripture, or based on the words of God written there. Many of them are nearly word-for-word perfect when compared to the scripture which they came from, which I absolutely love.
The Psalms are also very fascinating to me because they date back even farther than all of the hymns I sing. The Psalms were sung by biblical characters such as King David, who wrote a majority of them, and his son Solomon. This means that the Psalms we sing in church today are the very same psalms (although to different melodies) that kings sang almost 6000 years ago! How cool is that?
Okay, so no I'm not completely a pastor's daughter. I am also an Army brat, and a country girl when I can afford it (being country isn't cheap). So, I listen to country music, and I LOVE music with a good beat (the Grass Dance we listened to in class was my favorite if that tells you anything). Country music, if you follow it back far enough, goes back to the revolutionary war, when they were singing "old" folk songs and mountain music, most of which originated in England. Apparently I have a very European-based musical taste.
PK, Army brat….oh yes, musician. At Converse, I play the Clarinet. This is majorly because I play that better than any other instrument, but my real passion in music is for the violin. I am not very good at it, but I absolutely love to play my violin. This instrument ties in all of my musical taste, from church music to old folk music, even to heavier music with a beat. This video below shows one of my absolute favorite violinists, who has taken the instrument from fiddle and orchestra to a whole new level of entertainment.
I hope you enjoyed that. She is very good and I'm kind of obsessed.
Well here ends my story. I look forward to reading through some of y'all's blogs and finding out about some of the people I'm in class with. Good night!
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