From The Archives 3: Musical Genres & Performance

Another essay from Music & the Environment, another step leading me towards writing a thesis about musical genres. Honestly though, if you go to New College of Florida, you should take a class with Maribeth Clark. It's worth it! She's the best!

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November 2015

             Sound and space are intrinsically connected- sound cannot exist in a vacuum. But music and the background setting are very connected as well. Musical performances of all kinds are a common pastime, yet performances of different types of music are not the same. One wouldn’t dress the same when going to a concert hall versus a rock concert, so it is easy to understand that the way that performances are carried out and the stage presence that the performers have would be different for different types of music. Performers in different genres of music choose to convey themselves according to and because of their genre.

            Of all musical genres, classical music is the most outwardly strict on their guidelines defining a professional performance. However, some of their arguments and rules pertain to other genres as well. For example, Hagberg declares that stage presence is vital to being a musician, and that it connects the musicians to the audience in a way that makes a more meaningful experience for everyone involved.[1] A musician with good stage presence can interest someone in a genre that they may not usually like, but even if the audience does enjoy the genre, musicians with bad stage presence can sometimes ruin the experience, and even the music for them. Many people tend to connect sentimentally to music, so a bland or negative experience of a performance of that music can be a letdown and add connotations of disappointment to the memory of that music. 

Some of the rules for classical are not so easily generalized, though. The idea that a musician should never turn their back on the audience or directly look at them during the performance is unique to the genre.[2] Other rules, like the formal wear that is mandatory with classical could be used in different genres, but they usually set an exception that helps to brand the musicians as unique. When starting out, The Beatles were known for wearing suits to their shows. None of the other bands were doing that, so it set them apart. It’s not necessarily the independent rules to stage presence and performance that determine a genre’s style, but the overall conglomerate of performance qualities that identify it. 

One specialized form of classical music is opera. The particular thing about opera is that the music is being separated into two places: the musicians are in the orchestra pit, and the singers are on the stage. The musicians still follow the same performance qualities, but are even more physically invisible. For classical music, the visual performance is created to be as subtle and unnoticeable as possible, to not inhibit the focus on the music itself. When the classical music is used in genre, it’s even subtler, because the focus is being brought to the singers who are performing the show. It is the combination of the theatrical and musical elements that are of true importance in an opera. In La Bohème, the main characters Rodolfo and Mimì are the main focus, along with the other singers on the stage, but before each of the four acts, the audience takes the time to clap for the musicians after they tune before each act. The audience recognizes the musicians as a significant piece of the performance, but in order to enjoy the performance, their stage presence must be nearly unnoticeable compared to the singers. 

Electronic music can be divided into many subgenres, but Emmerson spend time talking about it as a whole and points out that the genres, like electronica or IDM, tend to follow a “strong ‘live performance’ tradition.”[3][4] He agrees that a genre’s music cannot be considered independent of performance style and that the best performers in electronic not only connect to their audience, but feed off of them and their energy. The same thing can be done with classical, but in a more formal manner. Whereas a classical musician may use the applause they receive by putting more emotion into their next piece, an electronic performer responds to the energy of their audience as the performance happens, and can add more body movement to their performance as it happens. For those performing from a laptop or other various technological equipment, full-on dancing usually isn’t feasible, but movement similar to dancing can prove that the performer is connecting to their music and their audience. 

For the ambient-techno electronic musician Pantha Du Prince (PDP), the show is everything.[5] People don’t come solely for the music; they come for the experience and the atmosphere that he creates as well. Because en electronic musician can be limited spatially to being near their mixing desk on stage, it allows them to create a visual experience using lights and whatever else they can think of. In the case of PDP, he has created a whole persona for himself. His real name is actually Hendrik Weber. And he’s not the only one. Many electronic musicians and DJs create stage names and personas to match their music and create a memorable connection for their fans. It is an all-encompassing musical identity that mixes both their visual person and their auditory music.

Although most musicians follow a planned set list, it is more common to find improvisation, or to change their music between original recording and performance in electronic musicians than in classical musicians. Some electronic musicians are even known to perform unique sets that they have not recorded, nor put on any of their albums. PDP will create music during his performance by taking live samples from the audience, truly creating a different experience attuned to every venue and performance that he is at. For him, the stage and the sound become one.[6] On the other hand, classical musicians have music composed, usually not by themselves, to be played as-is; and their performance doesn’t often stray too far from versions that are produced to be heard outside of the live context. 

As far as performance qualities go, rock is much more similar to electronic than to classical. In an interview with the music industry executive Daniel Glass, he replies that the most important part of stage presence is to entertain the audience.[7] He also mentions paying attention to the audience and responding to their energy and everything that’s happening in order to have a quality performance. For electronic music, the music often becomes more of a backdrop for people’s experience of dancing and enjoying themselves, but in rock, there is a lot more interaction. Banter between the band and the crowd is a key element of a rock performance.[8] Along with banter, rock bands will bring people on stage, go out into the crowd, ask if people had a certain request, and eye contact definitely is included sometimes. The in-between for songs in classical music is filled with applause, electronic music usually connects their songs to have no in-between, and rock fills them with audience interactions. Rock bands bring their audience into the music and get them involved. The key to what to do on stage is to “let the moment dictate what’s next” and so incorporate the atmosphere and everything that’s happening in the music and the show in a very kinesthetic way.[9]

The auditory-visual connection is inseparable. The five senses: hearing, seeing, feeling, smelling, and tasting, are labeled as separate senses. But in many ways, they shouldn’t be seen as different “dimensions.”[10] The senses can be thought of separately, and watching a show, one could focus on just hearing it, or just watching it, but it wouldn’t be a full experience without using both together. Listening to music alone, on a stereo or headphones, without being at a performance provides a purely auditory experience. The appeal of concerts is having the creator of the music there, seeing how they develop the experience, and the possibility of getting something from the performance that could never be gotten when listening alone. When alone, the listener can create their own performance, and make up their own ideas and theatrics relating to the world around them without their characters knowing that they have been cast.[11] Although musicians create music allowing for their audience to find their own meaning in it, fans like to know what the musicians feel like their music means. With the physical and visual experience, again, the fans can always form their own ideas and thoughts, but seeing how the performers themselves choose to present their music is special and meaningful in an additional way. Having all these evolving depths and experiences with the music and performance in musicians is what makes music important and meaningful.

When it comes down to it, many elements of musical performances carry through different genres. Often, those elements are incorporated in slightly different or majorly different ways. However, within genres those elements, from body movement to verbal interactions, remain largely the same through a variety of musicians. Experience is divided into the five senses, music is divided into numerous genres, and while each genre and sense is distinct, they are invariably connected. In music performance, it is not just the auditory experience that is important. Each genre has its overall way of being in their performance, and it is their show as well as their music that helps define them as that genre. It is only by excelling at both that a truly great musical performance can come about.

    

Bibliography

Adkins, Peter. “Building On The Ruins of Pop,” Mixmag, 2013, 74-75.

Bull, Michael. 2008. Sound Moves: iPod Culture and Urban Experience. London: Routledge. 39-49. 

Emmerson, Simon. 2007. Living Electronic Music. Aldershot, England: Ashgate.

“Get Good Stage Presence,” Modern Drummer, 2011, 35, 54-56.

Hagberg, Karen A. 2003. Stage Presence from Head to Toe: a Manual for Musicians. Lanham, Md: Scarecrow Press.

Ihde, Don. 1974. The Auditory Dimension.In Listening and Voice: A Phenomenology of Sound. Athens: Ohio University Press. 49-55.

McGaw, Kaitlin. "Size Up Your Show." Electronic Musician, 2011, 09, 98-100. 

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[1]Karen Hagberg, Stage Presence from Head to Toe(Lanham, Md: Scarecrow Press, 2003), 1-5.

[2]Hagberg, Stage Presence from Head to Toe,17, 20.

[3]Simon Emmerson, Living Electronic Music(Aldershot, England: Ashgate, 2007), 32.

[4]Emmerson alsomentions the use of genre “labels.” While names like “electronica” can be given to what seems like a certain type of music, the genre labels used overall are fairly subjective. Not all pop music is popular, indie pop is a complete oxymoron, and many musicians create music that is more of a combination of genres than any one particular genre. It is important to note that despite this, a lot of music is grouped into larger categories in order to provide a form of distinction. Because of this subjectivity, this discussion is based more on general genres labels and doesn’t delve into subgenre specifics. The label “electronic” will be used to specify the broad category of music that is primarily created from music technology and instruments and, for example, could be performed from a computer rather than musical instruments like a guitar or trumpet.

[5]Peter Adkins, “Building On The Ruins of Pop,” Mixmag, 74-75.

[6]Adkins, “Building on the Ruins of Pop,” 74.

[7]“Get Good Stage Presence,” Modern Drummer, 54. 

[8]Kaitlin McGaw, “Size Up Your Show,” Electronic Musician,98.

[9]“Get Good Stage Presence,” 54.

[10]Don Idhe, “The Auditory Dimension” (Athens: Ohio University Press), 49.

[11]Michael Bull, Sound Moves: iPod Culture and Urban Experience.(London: Routledge, 2008), 39-49.