<\/p>\n
Every summer the guitars and ukuleles appear in the garage of the cabin by the lake. She calls a tune, he asks for a brush-up on the chords, a new arrival joins the circle, and we sing. Somebody makes up a new verse. Another takes a uke solo. Yet another pulls out a harmonica and draws excited exclamations. Everyone\u2019s involved; we even gave the young\u2019un an egg shaker.<\/p>\n
Down the road a teenager listens to music in his room. It makes him want to dance. It\u2019s background for homework. It lets him tune out from his problems. He\u2019s not musical; his descriptions might contain the words \u2018catchy\u2019 and \u2018beat.\u2019 He\u2019s just as likely to refer to a song as an electronic file. But he can appreciate the skill and creativity it took to compose, arrange, and perform. Listening to other musicians, appreciating their contributions to the world of art, can be valuable, right?<\/p>\n
Not entirely. When entertainment becomes a commodity it becomes oppressive. Music becomes just another consumer good, something to be bought and sold. That guy in his room is being oppressed by his own earbuds; a \u2018culture industry\u2019 is forcing sameness and passivity down his ears with every piece of entertainment it mass-produces.1<\/sup> Adorno argues that any choice we think we have in popular culture is really the choice between two similar molds; the choice between two top-40 songs is as meaningless as the choice between two different parking spaces at the mall. The German word for entertainment is Unterhaltung: \u2018holding under.\u2019 The culture industry, by providing such entertainment, can take away freedom, suspend thought, and block happiness, because there are a thousand other ways to be and we don\u2019t know what we\u2019re missing.<\/p>\n Does the guy in his room get any leeway with Adorno? One might argue that some music doesn\u2019t suspend thought and render us passive; we are actively involved, part of the music. Singer-songwriters make it easy for us to insert ourselves right into their music because they sing directly to an individual: \u201cBaby, we found love right where we are,\u201d \u201cI\u2019m yours,\u201d \u201cDon\u2019t let me be lonely tonight,\u201d \u201cYou are the only one,\u201d \u201cYou are my<\/em> only one.\u201d The list goes on. It\u2019s easy to feel like Ed Sheeran and James Taylor are singing only to you, and the intimacy of the genre makes you important, makes them vulnerable, makes you believe you\u2019re seeing the real them. We are made to feel individual, but everyone is hearing the same \u201cYou are the only one;\u201d everyone is the same individual. This is the paradox, the trick of the culture industry: they are making us feel like individuals while perpetuating uniformity. Consuming this type of music isn\u2019t actually any better than others, singer-songwriters just try to hide it.<\/p>\n If there isn\u2019t a genre that escapes the industry, then what about live performance? If passivity is to be avoided, interactive and improvisatory performances could be the alternative. They\u2019re unique, fleeting, and full of spontaneous energy. Performances can\u2019t be recreated, which someone could argue removes it from the culture industry\u2019s sameness. However, we\u2019re still passive at a live performance. The fundamental problem with performances that make them little better than recordings is the divide between\u2014the existence of\u2014the producer and the consumer. Performances sell us the illusion that we\u2019re a part of the music that\u2019s being made; we applaud every solo, we sing along, we touch hands with the singer. But really, that divide is clear as can be at a live performance. It\u2019s a show. There\u2019s an audience, a stage, spectators, applause; these things separate us from the music as consumers. We are just observing, being entertained, being held as a servant to the culture industry.<\/p>\n I am concerned with culture that cannot be industrialized; culture of which there is absolutely no way to corner it into becoming a commodity. Performances, shows, hit singles, iTunes, stages, applause\u2014only when those are absent have we reached a free and independent culture. Such a culture erodes to the point of destruction the line between the artist and the spectator, the producer and the consumer. Music is at its most valuable when it is not a commodity, and can\u2019t be made one. The way to achieve this is not by focusing on the \u2018what\u2019 of music, but the \u2018how.\u2019 Adorno1<\/sup>, and even Adorno\u2019s critics3<\/sup> concern themselves with the structure of the music itself, and seem to assume that only particular people can produce it.<\/p>\n On the contrary, more important is our interactions with the music and with each other. Yes, the singer-songwriters and jazz musicians sell us an illusion, but it\u2019s the illusions of something that we can indeed have. If the industry makes us passive, then the most thoughtful and interactive music will be the most conducive to opposing it. Of course, I mean the best music is the music we make. Music is meant to be made and shared, not consumed. Active, participatory, communicative, and interactive music is impossible to commoditize and as such is outside the culture industry\u2019s clutches. It\u2019s not just an alternative to the industry, several qualities make it the industry\u2019s opposite.<\/p>\n The culture industry suspends thought and perpetuates sameness. Folk and jazz music done right encourage thought and dialogue. When the guitars come out in the summer we listen to each other, use each other\u2019s ideas, twist them and make them our own. Our minds are alive, anticipating and responding, interacting with the music and the circle.<\/p>\n Music is language;2<\/sup> we must speak it and understand it in order to have any use for it. The best jazz music is a conversation:2<\/sup> from Kind of Blue <\/em>to Boss Tenors<\/em> it\u2019s wonderful to hear the rhythm section players communicating with each other and with the horn players. Bill Evans takes a rhythm Miles played, Jimmy Cobb latches on, they hold it for a few bars then let it go. (If someone doesn\u2019t speak the language, they can be taught. People who \u2018can\u2019t sing\u2019 usually just mean they forgot. Sing to an eighteen-month-old and they will more than likely sing back in the same key.)<\/p>\n You might think me contradictory for praising mass-produced recordings. But the purpose of listening to recordings is to observe. The tracks on Kind of Blue<\/em> are all first takes; the spontaneity and creativity are palpable right from the opening bass riff of \u201cSo What.\u201d But that\u2019s the players. For them, the music is worthwhile because they aren\u2019t under the hand of the industry. For us, it\u2019s not enough to just listen, because the tracks are set in stone, able to be repeated. For us, it becomes the same as the rest unless we learn from the masters and then do it ourselves.<\/p>\n The essence of \u2018circle music,\u2019 including folk and jazz, can\u2019t be captured and mass-produced. Sure, you can record people playing such music, but then it can become just as oppressive as any other music. That\u2019s why everyone interested in music needs to play and sing and experience it themselves. The opposite of the culture industry is the campfire. If we do it ourselves we might find thought and freedom and connection in the art that is music.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n 1<\/sup>Adorno, T. & Max Horkheimer. The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass Deception. <\/em>Dialectic of Enlightenment. 1944.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n 2<\/sup>Monson, I. Saying Something: Jazz Improvisation and Interaction<\/em>. Chicago, 2009.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n 3<\/sup>Witkin, W. W. Why Did Adorno Hate Jazz? <\/em>Sociological Theory 18:1. Washington: 2000.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Every summer the guitars and ukuleles appear in the garage of the cabin by the lake. She calls a tune, he asks for a brush-up on the chords, a new arrival joins the circle, and we sing. Somebody makes … Continue reading