Do Words Belong in Music?

(dance music etc.)

is track 1 of 'a love supreme' a song, because of the vocals? and the rest are not?

it's more chanting than singing

i dont know i would probably just call it a "track" or a "piece" or a "joint" or something

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ab-Ne52cwKo&feature=player_embedded

(Notice how when they actually sing the "song" they are singing about IT DOESN'T HAVE ANY WORDS)

i mean the thing is this is about usefulness--i get that apparently nick has never needed to make a distinction between "music with singing" and "music without singing" but many of us have in the past and may need to do so in the future, so what is the problem with having words to specify those qualities? especially when there are a million other words we can use that dont make the distinction for difficult-to-say cases like a love supreme or whatever!

truly i dont have a problem with "song" being used to describe "music without singing" except that then the word loses its value as a specific description

max knows the time. we are trying to simplify things and y'all are trying to muddle it up. simplify, man. om.

the thing is that language is complicated

good point

i.e. we're not fucking things up by using "song" to describe music without vocals because it's apparently common enough that we need to have a big discussion about it, and there's not much you can do about that. i mean you can try and institute some kind of linguistic purity policy where people only use "song" for pieces with vocals but you're not going to get too far with that, so you might as well embrace the ambiguity.

Be careful never to accidentally refer to your apartment as your "house" and not your "home" around max.

let me just do this one more time:

anyway just to reiterate:

i mean "song" can mean whatever you want i guess but you know it implies "singing" which implies you know like "vocals" and shit and therefore not "instrumental"

― max, Tuesday, December 29, 2009 12:13 PM (57 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

― max, Tuesday, December 29, 2009 2:39 PM (22 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

b/c i'm not trying to be obtuse, i sincerely think of things more in terms of structure than whether or not it has vocals. if a piece of music with no vocals has melody and moves through sections similar to folk/pop/etc. forms, it feels like a song to me. if another one has vocals but doesn't feel like it's connected to that tradition, then maybe i'll say "track" or "tune" or "beat" or whatever.

xp

In the past I've referred to a a piece of music without words or singing as a "song" just because it was easy to and it was effective for that particular conversation and conversee, but surely the usefullness of "song" in opposition to "instrumental" can be seen? You know, like exactly how it was used upthread?

I don't think I've ever heard anyone use "song' to just refer to music w/ singing in my life. but, you know, I'm sure that's how people used the word in 1734.

So you guys were just totally thrown for a loop huh? Had NO IDEA what I really meant by "song" and "instrumental", did ya?

i'm still trying to wrap my head around the fact that a Grandmother is posting on the Internet

"instrumental" seems so antiquated, like a surf rock novelty single from the '50s. i seriously never hear it anymore unless it's the b-side on a rap single or something.

and there really is a shitload of music that doesn't easily fall into your binary.

max is otm.

who says "jazz song" about a... not-song? or, as said, "rap song". "number", "track", "tune" even.

this is not "my" binary or "our" binary it is just "a" binary that many people recognize and many do not--i am making an argument for its syntactical usefulness & its "correctness" in that sense but im just a dude

there's a far bigger shitload that falls within the binary tho is the thing

who says "jazz song" about a... not-song? or, as said, "rap song". "number", "track", "tune" even.

are you sassing me?

im feeling pretty sassed over here.

http://unrealitymag.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/12/spicoli.jpg
this is not "my" binary or "our" binary it is just "a" binary

someone should put this thread to music imo

who says "jazz song" about a... not-song?

what makes it a not-song though? i mean, jazz standards are either the definition of a song (like, tin pan alley songs that were once huge popular hits) or written by jazz musicians to expand on those forms.

semantics aside, a few months ago i was collaborating on songs with a poet and it was an interesting experiment. i sort of assumed he'd be able to write good lyrics because he's a good poet and he really loves & pays attention to lyrics in music, but it was super hard for him to do the things that he consciously avoids in poetry (rhymes, and writing blunt things that would look dumb on the page but have power when sung).

The fact that since 1734 the definition of "song" has loosened to such a degree merely means that the ratio needs to return to its 1734 status, post haste.

Jordan, you should read one of the gazillion books by Philip Furia about the lyricists of the Great American Songbook like Yip Harburg and Ira Gershwin, where he contends that the appropriate background for such lyricists was not poetry but "light verse."

I stopped referring to instrumental pieces as "songs" when the band teacher that Granny Dainger and I had in middle school told us that "songs" implied singing. Probably pedantic, but whatever.

I did some jazz D-bag fieldwork last night on this issue. First I went to the first half of the early set at The 55 Bar, where there was a lot of "that composition," "this next piece," "this tribute,blah blah blah and the title is called" etc. Then I went a over a few blocks to Smalls and where octojazzarian pianist John Bunch called every single thing he played a "song." "This song by Jerome Kern," "This Johnny Mandel song," "this Benny Goodman song," "Bucky wrote this song but he was nice enough to give me a credit on it. I've gotten a total of 17 dollars in royalties on it, he could have had that all to himself." Not once did Bucky Pizzarelli lean over to correct him and say, "ah but John that tune has never had lyrics therefore you are in error to call it a song." If you can't believe the Fred Astaire of piano, who you gonna believe?

Of course after they finished up, the next act came on and went back to "this composition," "this piece." Maybe this distinction is taught at Berklee or something.

He's in his 80s. He probably refers to his toothbrush, his great-grandkids, his Muesilix, all as "songs".

Maybe, but even in his 80s the guy could still kick your butt, "Granny." Show some respect.

Fuck words

should just be numbers imo