MeeMeeTheArts.Blogspot.Com

Sunday, April 15, 2012

     From the TED chronicles (Technology, Entertainment & Design) featured on Youtube.com, there is a video of particular interest to me as an unforeseen composer. http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=charles+hazlewood+trusting+the+ensemble&oq=charles+haz&aq=3&aqi=g7&aql=&gs_nf=1&gs_l=youtube.1.3.0l7.19683.24090.0.28951.11.11.0.0.0.0.114.953.10j1.11.0.
     Conductor Charles Hazelwood discusses and amptly demonstrates the utilization of trained musicians working as an ensemble with like minds creating one force of musical content. He opened a discussion about different cultures accepting improvisation as composing and use of melodic threads as building blocks. He used South African musicians as not reading music, but trusting their ears. He also discussed music as therapy and reached out to what he referred to as "para-orchestras" or orchestras for those people with disabilities.
     I googled "musicians who do not read music". I was led to 1) forums.allaboutjazz.com,
 2) boards.straightdope.com and 3) forum.deviantart.com. None of these actually addressed my situation and although the list of mythical alternative artists turned up in rock-lore, I remain discontented.
Here is my retrieved list, which is only the beginning of the phenomena of accounting this talent base:
The Beatles, Aretha Franklin, B.B. King, Chaka Khan, Jimi Hendrix, James Brown, Lionel Richie, Prince, Michael Jackson, Yanni, Buddy Rich, Jimmy Page. Then the list can branch out to include such talents as Dave Brubeck who put serious improv on the map.
     Please check out: Http://quotes.dictionary.com/Since_body_and_soul_are_radically_different_from
and you will discover an approach to analyzing musical composition from a spiritual perspective.
     Michael Jackson may not have been able to read or write music through a traditional notation method, but he was able to reinvent rock & pop music and devise new dance forms seen only in previous generations when Fred Astaire combined ballroom and tap dance.
     I cannot read or write music but I can go into a sound studio and record songs that I have memorized.
By writing down the lyrics, I have also notated the melody or vice-versa. They appear from the air, and I receive the songs, melody and verse as an implant of information. I can learn to sing in choirs or for backup talent auditory, and can follow the time structures as tempi. I can choreograph according to a score because I create the movement dictated by the beat structure.
     My experience has led me to seek other "composers" who experience this same unmethod, but I only hear about them on a late night interview program when I am too sleepy to write down their name. I will continue my inquiry, but really I think it is more important to JUST DO IT, than worry about the acceptance or rejection of the "how" that comes from traditional western cultural music, including that it is dominated by men.
     I respect Charles Hazelwood for his intuitive sense about musical ability.