We're All Postmodern...
...when it comes to music these days. The most common answer I hear when I query others as to their favorite music is this: "You know, whatever. I like alot of stuff." Yes, my friends (all six of you reading this), it's true: your musical predisposition is postmodern. You have unconsciously committed to the viability of most types of music. Though you may subscribe to some ethical standard or presuppositional worldview, you are nothing other than a chameleon when it comes to rhythm and melody.
It's hilarious just how varied our tastes are. For example, in any given day, I might listen to the haunting English piano of Coldplay, the Southern bluegrass of Allison Krauss,
the ghetto strains of Jay-Z, and the rustic tunes of Christian hymnody. That's pretty crazy. Just imagine our ancestors a few centuries ago, whose musical selection was largely limited, I suppose, to that which they heard in church. Can you imagine them speaking to one another in the midst of their agrarian routine: "Hey, Adolphus, can you hum that fresh tune the immigrants from Iceland have been singing?" "No, Gerhardus, I'm stuck on that ballad the Swedish maiden taught us by the Maypole last week."
Things done changed.
Have you noticed this? From the constellation of musical choices before us, we essentially make our own soundtrack by which we live, work, and play. Those crazy kids with their ipods only make it easier to "dj one's life," essentially. As for me, I got no funds, so my soundtrack has yet to be crafted.
It's hilarious just how varied our tastes are. For example, in any given day, I might listen to the haunting English piano of Coldplay, the Southern bluegrass of Allison Krauss,
the ghetto strains of Jay-Z, and the rustic tunes of Christian hymnody. That's pretty crazy. Just imagine our ancestors a few centuries ago, whose musical selection was largely limited, I suppose, to that which they heard in church. Can you imagine them speaking to one another in the midst of their agrarian routine: "Hey, Adolphus, can you hum that fresh tune the immigrants from Iceland have been singing?" "No, Gerhardus, I'm stuck on that ballad the Swedish maiden taught us by the Maypole last week."Things done changed.
Have you noticed this? From the constellation of musical choices before us, we essentially make our own soundtrack by which we live, work, and play. Those crazy kids with their ipods only make it easier to "dj one's life," essentially. As for me, I got no funds, so my soundtrack has yet to be crafted.
posted by Owen at 12:36 PM
4 Comments:
I only listen to mimes.
Does that make me postmodern?
I've discovered premodernism- the only music I hear I make using the simplest of instruments- Ah, the sounds of my armpit, a sick goat and a hammer against my neighbor's car.
Of course the other source of musical inspiration for our ancestors was folk music and pub songs, many of which we are treated to on a weekly basis from the Baptist hymnal. Can't you just see some drunken Irishman swinging his elbow cheerfully, splashing beer on his pals to the tune of "Make me Blessing"?
Thanks for giving Alison Kraus props. Now if we can just get our friend from Maine to listen to artists such as Jimmy Martin, Bill Monroe, Del McCoury, and Rhonda Vincent, he will turn from his postmodern ways and go bluegrass. Jimmy Martin just died a little over a month ago. The world is poorer without him.
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