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Music has often had a visual component. From opera to musicals, psychedelic patterns and disco lights to rock drama in concerts, rock artist movies and TV shows to music videos, music has been given an element we can watch. For example, we could discuss how Beatles movies and the TV show "The Monkees" evolved into music videos. (Michael Nesmith of the Monkees predicted the rise of MTV.) Music videos themselves have changed, or at least in the MTV sense that we knew them when they first began. Music videos of the 80's were dripping with art. First came the whitescreen vids that mmade the band members look washed out. Then there were the videos that were bright with color, almost trite in their use of common images (the white horse, the broken mirror, the falling snow, etc.), almost manic in their pace and filled with androgynous-looking musicians. Are videos like a condensed form of opera? Or am I making a stretch? I guess this would be an argument of how much technology replaces human labor. Even comparing the stage to TV is difficult. And then after the music video came the CD + Graphics, and then the enhanced CD. I'm not sure how extensive the CD + Graphics was (I have only an Information Society CD that has this). You needed a special adapter, which would show the graphics on your TV. (Perhps this is an RF modulator, but I'm not sure-- anyone know about CD Graphics Adapters, where I can find them, if I need a special CD player with an adapter port, and where I can find them-- help!!) Of course, I'm sure more people know what an enhanced CD is. It's a digital audio CD with additional PC CD-ROM info on it. You install a main program just like you would any CD-ROM program on your PC, and then you run the program from the disc. The only one I've seen is the Romeo + Juliet movie soundtrack CD, so I don't know the extent and variety of enhanced CD graphics.
42 responses total.
Besides the obvious problem that it's going to really piss off opera fans to have their art form equated with music videos I think the comparison is deficient in several other respects.. Music videos often lack the sort of narrative that's found in virtually all operas and unlike operas there are some music videos don't end with everyone either dead or getting married..
Nope, videos are just eye candy for a brain previously only occupied with the ears. With or without the videos, you don't just want MTV, you do something else with it. I never sit around listening to music without doing something else too. It doesn't occupy my brain enough.
Never? There have been several evenings when I've just sat on myu bed, staring offinto space, listening to a new tape or cd. Occationally I knit, too, but not always. I think you're missing out, senna.
Well, rarely. Occasionally I do, but my brain usually isn't on full tilt. I almost never only do one thing at once, unless I"m at school where I have no choice. Right now, for instance, I'm running two connections and playing a game of solitaire simultaenously (and holding three conversations.) My mind tends to need a lot to keep it occupied.
My point was that TV didn't exist in the two centuries previous to ours, so opera was one medium composers could set their music to (or perhaps the only one). I was hoping for a discussion on the visual mediums music artists use for their music. another example is the laser light show Pink Floyd used for _The Wall_ concert. yet another is the fantastic pyrotechnics metal bands use in their concerts.
Some do. U2's current concert tour is a visual extravaganza.
Anyone seen which CDs out on the market are using the enhanced CD technology? besides the one I mentioned, I heard the last Barenaked Ladies CD had it.
The new Sarah McLachlan does, as well as here Rairities CD. I think the Fiona Apple CD does. I've heard of several more, but I can't think of them at the moment. For the most part, I'm not particularly impressed with the enhanced CDs. The CDROM part is rather pathetic, usually just a video of one of the songs. I'd like things like discussions with the song writer about the meanings of the songs, lyrics (you'd be amazed. I've never seen one with lyrics on it...) things like that. If I want the video, I'll watch VH1 or rent it.
Yeah, I was very disappointed iwth the Sarah MaLaughlan one. Not that I knew it was enhanced when I bought it -- I was expecting a normal CD. And then I opened it and found out about the America Online access program on it. Ugh. And no lyrics. Anywhere. I *hate* that. I wasn't terribly impressed with it in my CDROM drive.
As for the question of whether music videos are a "condensed form of opera",
I think not. I'm not exactly what you would call an opera buff, but only
because I'm too new to it. :) Becoming an opera buff takes years, because
you have to listen to the darn things, and there are so bloody many of them.
I think that opera differs from music videos in three important respects.
1. Opera is dramatic.
Opera tells a story. Usually, it's pretty obvious what the story is.
If nothing else about it appeals to you, you can consider it to be a
play where all the lines happen to be sung. (This would be pretty
obnoxious, though. Most of the lines are sung multiple times, and
it's all too common for operas to have really stupid lyrics.) Also
included in this reason is the fact that opera is live, generally
speaking (yes, there is movieized opera out there, but not a lot of it,
and what's there is pretty pathetic, usually.). You just can't have
the psychedelic, surreal effects of the music video on the operatic
stage.
2. Opera is epic in scope.
A music video runs about the length of the song that spawned it, about
five minutes or so. The songs are usually more or less monothematic,
and the music videos reflect this, if they have any relation to the song
at all. An opera runs anywhere from an hour and a half to four hours,
and the music can have extreme variance. They are rarely thematically
simple, either in terms of dramatic or musical themes. A typical opera
will contain 10-25 "songs", with assorted filler. These songs interact
with each other, quoting a previous song or foreshadowing a later song
or helping to emphasize character development via music. I have only
observed this kind of progressive interaction between music and image
in a "music video" once, in Pink Floyd's _The Wall_. However, even
this example, which is the closest I can think of that music video
comes to opera, does not fulfill my third and most important argument.
3. Opera is written from the drama to the music, not the other way around.
When you write an opera, you don't sit down at the piano, write 20 songs,
and try to come up with a story that fits them together. You pick a play,
or a poem, or a novel, or some (usually preexisting) dramatic work, and
write an opera on that. The music (and this is the really important part)
serves as a dramatic device, to amplify the character development, to
convey a message to the audience. Example: in Verdi's _La Traviata_,
the main conflict is between Alfredo's duties to his family and his
family's honor, and his love for Violetta, a woman of ill repute.
Violetta, meanwhile, is torn by the question of whether she should
selfishly keep his love for herself or drive him away so that he can
attend to his family duties. In scenes where the protagonists are being
"sensible" and prudent, the music is in 4/4 time, with a classicist
(symbolizing duty, tradition, the glories of the past, etc) flavor; while
when they are abandoning all for their passion, the music is in 3/4 and
romantic in flavor. (Here I mean romantic in the sense that Tchaikovsky,
Rachmaninoff, etc. were composers in the Romantic movement.) My point is
that the music is an important part of the drama, and reveals important
things about the character. This is necessary, as the actual lyrics are
frequently such as to make one wish to leave the theater in disgust, and
the translations are invariably even worse.
This is a large contrast with music videos, in which the song is written
first and is most important. The music video is written primarily to
clarify and elaborate on the important parts of the song, and only
secondarily to be an independent artistic statement. Also, it's good
advertising for the song. Now, I am not contending that music videos
are not artistic or that they are unimportant, only that they are
secondary to the music itself. I cannot think of a music video that has
become widely popular that was not made with a popular song. This is
not the case in opera, where the music and the drama work together to
make a single, cohesive artistic statement, the one inextricably bound
up in the other.
And how about the so-called "rock operas" such as "Tommy" and "Jesus Christ Superstar?"
I haven't seen JCS, but I suspect that it would be classed as a musical, like most of Lloyd Weber's work. Still, by objections to comparing it with music videos are valid. It is still dramatic, epic, and the music is based on a pre-selected theme, which it enhances. I don't know "Tommy".
Don't forget "Hair." That too has been labeled a rock opera. Re #8: That's odd, because the self-titled Information Society CD + Graphics has the lyrics in the graphics, along with other interesting bits like "semi-biographical background of Information Society..production notes, [and] INSOC trivia," at least according to the liner notes. I'll probably never know because a Graphics Adapter for a RGB monitor is needed to view the graphics, and I'd probably need a CD player with an adapter component. I was impressed with the Romeo + Juliet PC graphics. No lyrics, but then, for a soundtrack disc like that..
(flem, I hope we'll see you over in the opera item; I'll move some of my opera-specific comments there...) U2 came in for some snide comments on their recent tour when they cancelled a show or two because the giant TV screen broke.
Backtracking a bit, Blind Melon's "Nico" has the best computer bit I've seen on a CD. Really tastefully done.
Hrm..I'd like to see that.
I don't own a copy, unfortunately, but recalling from my friend's copy... A lot of the screens are just pictures and such clumped together. Clicking one of those will bring up a short video clip. It's done in such a way that it's obvious where to click most of the time, but it's still possible to 'explore' and find new stuff. There's also a list of all their music videos, and you can view the videos by clicking on them. Also, I think, some interviews. Eldrich would be the one to ask about this, though. He's the one who owns a copy. Perhaps I could coax him over here.
Wow. does that mean that U2 is relying more on the media than the music now? tsk tsk tsk! Shame. Didn't they start out with the music? *dripping sarcasm*
Backtracking a bit again: 'Rock opera doesn't quite seem the proper term for Jesus Christ Superstar, Tommy, Hair, etc...Rock Musical seems more appropriate'. As for 'music videos have no narrative', I could point out something like Thriller to you, but I'd be reaching. Don't even compare U2 now to U2 then. They're not even the same band: just the same people with the same name.
Oh geez-- you sound like an old goat :P I suppose this is because these 'musicals' have speaking parts? And then, can we assume opera is a dead art form? (I mean that according to your logic, no one writes contemporary operas-- it's 'musicals.') I should have stated it as a type of evolution-- I never intended it to be a direct comparison. Silly me for not pointing it out. But you don't need to hop all over me :P A music video _per se_ does not have a storyline independent of the song. There are a few that come close. However, music movies do-- such as the ones the Beatles starred in. "Help!" is probably a better example than "A Hard Day's Night," but either film did have a story, however trite it may have seemed. So U2 is cashing in big on the whims of the masses. A band has to change to survive, and this one has made big changes to be financially successful. I say, if you're a fan, it shouldn't matter. Besides, I thought they were making a statement against the onslaught of multimedia-- at least with the ZooTV tour. I could be wrong :P
Hey, I wasn't accusing U2 of selling out or any such. I just think they've changed far enough from their roots that you can't expect a fan of their early stuff to like Zooropa or Discotheque, and you can't expect a recent fan to like War or October. No, I'm a young goat :P And opera isn't dead, I just don't think Jesus Christ Superstar counts as one.
I scratched a long response on the definition of opera. Using the definition of "drama through music," JC SUPERSTAR counts. TOMMY probably counts as well, though it is pretty unsatisfying as a drama.
I am a semi young gal! And I like "classic" U2. For some reason there are alot of bands that just knock down on quality sometimes when they hit it big. That is why I totally respect Peter Gabriel even if he hasn't *snif* produced an album for my poor ears in eons! *sniff* but he is off to do cool stuff so I will forgive him.
krj - under your definition, "Oklahoma" is also opera. I'm not going to get all elitist about this, don't worry. If you're willing to put "Oklahoma" and "Das Rheingold" in the same category, fine by me, but I know a lot of people who would object.
It would seem there's a fine line between opera and musicals-- that being when opera died and musicals began. (Name me ONE contemporary opera.) Speaking of music vids again, I bought Depeche Mode's "Some Great Videos" today. I got a really big laugh out of seeing the band (and this is probably the only one with Vince Clarke in it) in their motorcycle gear, looking sooo young, with punkpop dressed vixens cavorting around them as they sang and played their keyboards for the first vid, "Just Can't Get Enough."
Contemporary operas: Glass, BEAUTY AND THE BEAST and lots of others
Argento, THE ASPERN PAPERS (actually a very riveting drama)
Adams, NIXON IN CHINA and DEATH OF KLINGHOFFER, neither of which I
have any direct knowledge of
Ann Arbor's own William Bolcom, McTEAGUE
Re#25: And, of course, the line is blurred further by things like Les Miserables or Phantom of the Opera, which I wouldn't call opera but which are heavier than your standard fluffy perky musical.
I forgot to mention that the vid I commented on wasn't at all what I expected. It was done in 1981, and I was expecting crappy film and mostly whitescreen. They did use a whitescreen backdrop in some scenes, but the qualty of the film used was good enough that they didn't look washed out.
I'm surprised no one mentioned VH1's "pop-up" videos. My suspicion is that it's heavily World Wide Web influenced. Oh well-- it gives you some quick trivia on the vid, and then some :P I was watching it the other day-- interesting to note "Bohemian Rhapsody" was the first vid to have a BIG influence-- not just on propelling a song to popularity, but on music videos themselves.
I don't belive I've ever seen that one - what's it like?
I've even seen both versions of the "Bohemian Rhapsody" video by Queen. When the song was featured in the movie "Wayne's World," a revised video was produced, which mixed in scenes from "Wayne's World" into the original 1976 issue.
I think I saw the Wayne's World one a while a ago. (A real *long* while ago, like when it was new.) I wan't real impressed, but then, I didn't like Wayne's World.
I have actually never seen that movie, except for a brief chunk that they had playing in Grooveyard a while back.
I don't think anyone answered Dan's question (#30). Some of the pop-up notes will be my references, actually ;P The vid was cheap-- it cost under $7000 to produce. Most "videos" were just taped performances, actually, yet this song was too complicated to perform live (as per se the studio version). So the video has the look and feel of a small performance, almost, but they used some techniques that were later refined and became known as "MTV effects." I'm referring to the 3-D like effects that move and wave-- I don't think anyone else did the face shots in various sequences and multiplications that are hallmarks of the video. The end of the video goes back to the four of their faces transforming from their old look to their new one. Freddy Mercury seemed to have the biggest change in his look-- he had long hair, and then cut it very short; he was clean-shaved, and then grew a handle-bar moustache; he had Egyptian eyeliner, and then got rid of that; and then he traded his bell-bottomed, bell-cuffed catsuit for a yellow tank top, jeans, and a brown leather jacket. The video was rather wasted on a poor movie-- I wasn't too impressed with "Wayne's World," either. The sequel was much better-- better plot, and better comedy. The part I found the funniest was when the crew was disguised spying on Wayne's girlfriend. Wayne was dressed as a telephone pole repairman, Garth as a cop, and one of their friends as a biker, I believe. When they were spotted and they went running into a back alley, the gag was obvious-- they looked like the Village People! It was even more obvious when they escaped through a backstage door into a club called "The Tool"-- evidently a gay dance club. It turned out they were right on stage, so the DJ hit the lights on them, put on "Y.M.C.A."-- and what do you know, the naked Indian that showed them to Jim Morrison in a dream was there dancing with them. Speaking of movies, that was part of another new trend-- showing clips from the movie, or editing clips into, in a music video. If a song is part of a movie soundtrack these days, you're more than likely to see parts of the movie in the video. From that point, they are beginning to include audio clips from movies in studio tracks, as well, so movie songs have dialogue in them, too. *sigh* As if the song couldn't stand on its own..i.e., why couldn't Bruce Springsteen force those producers to leave those obnoxious lines from _Jerry MacGuire_ out of his song?
This week I am being slightly weirded out by the fact that my new PC comes with five pre-installed music videos, ready to use as screen savers. The only song I recognized was "I Can See Clearly Now". I'm going to have to browse around and look for some more clips I can download, just for fun.
That's funny, ken, for I was listening to the song a few minutes ago.
Is the version they included the original hit version by Johnny Nash?
That song will forever more be associated in my mind with traipsing
around the island of Hawaii ("the big island..") with my brother.
We heard the song so often during our short stay on the island that it
soon got to be a running joke.. To this day I have no idea why it
was being played so much, but hey, it gives me an extra memory trigger
on recollections of a pretty happy trip..
BTW, more recently, Jimmy Cliff did a cover version of "I Can See Clearly Now" in the movie soundtrack of "Cool Runnings."
This is even funnier, bruin! I was just listening to Jimmy Cliff! Hee hee!! Curiouser and curiouser!
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- Backtalk version 1.3.30 - Copyright 1996-2006, Jan Wolter and Steve Weiss