Re: Guitar-o-centrism

["Scott Bullerwell" <tanelorn@dimensional.com>]

John Price writes:

> I'm bothered by the statement that rock is the dominant form of music
prevalent today.

If we use what's on the radio and on television and in the stores and
glossy magazines as a gauge, I'm afraid it is--along with rap and country. 
I'm not thrilled with the prospect myself.  And it's pervasive.  Go to
Ougadougou and turn on the radio.  Might as well be in Moline.  In fact, go
anywhere that the government doesn't dictate what shall and shall not be
played on the radio and you'll hear Western pop-culture.

> I think it is more of a Western and overly Euro-American perspective that
thinks Rock moves in ways nothing else > does or can.

Very experiential, I think.  My parents get all teary-eyed over music I
consider rather banal.  They, in turn, aren't particularly impressed with
the live version of "Cat Scratch Fever" I played incessantly in grade
school.  The country fan who gets all teary-eyed over Bocephus may very
well think I'm crazy for getting all misty over Djam Karet.  And there's
plenty of classical music afficionadoes who find nothing compelling
whatsoever in either Elvis or Javanese court Gamelan.  (Or Bartok, for that
matter.)  With dilligence and an open mind, one can acquire a taste for
anything, and that may be the saving grace of experimental musicians--they
don't respect any notion of a "cultural patent on knowledge" (to borrow a
phrase from Dinesh D'souza.)

> I think if there is one instrument that actually dominates anything in
any particular music's origins it is the > Piano (IMHO) - not a synth, not
a sampler or even a violin,  just a plain old piano.

A Chinese musician might make the very same statement about the yang ch'in.
 But before that there were drums and voice, and they pervade music all
over the world.  Long before there were pianos and Stratocasters and Da
Plex there was rhythm, melody, and harmony, and there were even rules for
same.  And it moved people on some visceral level.

Funny ole thing, music.

Scott Bullerwell
tanelorn@dimensional.com
Boulder, Colorado, USA