the symbolic meaning (or lack of ) in aesthetics

Chris

fractured oscillations
So I've been considering this idea for a while... how universal are the symbolic meanings attributed to (or gut reactions to) basic aesthetic qualities? Is there an almost inherent primordial symbolism (or rather an aptness for certain interpretations) in colors and sound qualities, or in the specific qualities of shapes and forms? (edit* I suppose "proportion" plays a big role in the way visual forms can be interpretted...?)

Nature might have the best examples of the gut reactions that can be triggered from aesthetic qualities, because the "messages" communicated through colors and sounds among animals are clear, without them having any cultural baggage to perscribe meaning (but I'm admittedly more of an art person than a science person, so feel free to correct me if I'm wrong on any of this). For instance, say, a cat purring is pleasant and soothing, while a dog growling or snarling sounds threatening...

Do major chords generally sound "happy" to everyone, and minor chords sound "sad?" Would the practice by fast food places of using the color orange on their buildings (because it supposedly triggers hunger in people) work in every country?... (I'd imagine the answer is yes to that, because orange would instinctually remind us (mostly) carnivores of meat). Anyone here have any perspective on different cultural interpretations or meanings for colors, etc, and do these cultural meanings seem to have any apparent "logic" to them... or does it all seem to be completely open to any interpretation?

My take so far has been that aesthetics are very open to interpretation but tend to be better suited for some meanings (or more likely to cause certain reactions) than others...

I've mostly thought of this from a musical perpective, but Momus had an interesting essay on Click Opera (I believe last year) on the "politics of color" or something, which I'll link to later if I can find it...
 
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swears

preppy-kei
This is a subject that's always fascinated me, what I find interesting is the morality of aesthetics. In one momus blog entry he actually comes up with the idea that certain aesthetics are "morally good", saying that an arrangement of shapes or a pallette of colours can be virtuous. I sort of see what he's getting at, but it still seems strange.

As a child and a teenager, the look of something could just bowl me over, I would look at a painting or photo or design and be mesmerised, I really miss that intensity now.
 

Chris

fractured oscillations
I actually have a decent theory I think on why major and minor chords sound happy and sad... so at the risk of derailing my own thread... ;)

The major and minor chords, as the two most basic and common chord structures (consisting of the first, third, and fifth notes of a scale) correspond well to the two most basic emotions, happy and sad. I think that the mathmatical structure of these chords, especially in contrast to each other, seem to cause this happy/sad response in the (western) human temperament... because of the variability of the third. The third is in the middle, it is the content, it is the bridge, the support, etc. When the third is major, it's higher, the chord is erect, positive, fuller, it "has". In a minor chord, the third is lower, it is empty (at least seemingly in relation to it's lack of an overt major third), negative, it "doesn't have", or "has less". I won't even get into the obviously phallic or Freudian implications in it. ;) But one could imagine how the structure of these chords could so easily have that black and white, good/bad effect, especially in members of a competive, capitalistic, paternalistic, etc society (sorry, I didn't want to get into any of that, but it really would seem to apply here) where bigger and more is better...

Anyways... I'd imagine perhaps the best way to get to the bottom of this question of our inherent response to aesthetics, wouldn't be in studying arbitrary cultural meanings, but perhaps rather in scientific studies of people's gut responses...
 
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borderpolice

Well-known member
The biological basis of emotions has been a hot topic in academic psychology for a while. Regarding music, especially the emotions expressed in the human voice, this guy is the daddy. Check out his books. Overall i think that the issues are not really understood.

My personal suggestion is that the major/minor chord emotional qualities are related to the acoustic qualities of breathing in/breathing out, and the biology of fight/flight reflexes.
 
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nomadologist

Guest
i think you're making about 15 different points in the first post, but to focus on major/minor key thing for a moment: check out leonard bernstein's harvard lectures for a fascinating narrative on the history of the western tonal system.
 
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nomadologist

Guest
Anyways... I'd imagine perhaps the best way to get to the bottom of this question of our inherent response to aesthetics, wouldn't be in studying arbitrary cultural meanings, but perhaps rather in scientific studies of people's gut responses...

Studying anyone's gut reactions now would only get you "to the bottom" of our own very particular cultural predilections, tendencies, prejudices, etc. There's no way to universalize from a set of human preferences today what may be biologically determined "symbolic" aesthetic content in general.
 
Sorry to be all boring and scentific but I think the reason we perceive major chords as happier and minor chords as sadder is this -

the ratios of the frequencies of the notes is quite simple in a major chord.
the ratios of the frequencies of the notes is a bit more complex in a minor chord.

when we hear chords, our brains try to make sense of them by subconsciously calculating what simultaneous notes we are hearing.

with a major chord this is a simpler calculation than with a minor chord, so we tend to perceive the major chord as more harmonious or natural-sounding.

if you're interested the ratios are:
major chord - 4:5:6
minor chord - 10:12:15
 

Martin Dust

Techno Zen Master
when we hear chords, our brains try to make sense of them by subconsciously calculating what simultaneous notes we are hearing.

Of that we will never know (subconsciously calculating) but I don't think it goes that deep, it's just the years of "programming" that are to blame.
 

Chris

fractured oscillations
Studying anyone's gut reactions now would only get you "to the bottom" of our own very particular cultural predilections, tendencies, prejudices, etc. There's no way to universalize from a set of human preferences today what may be biologically determined "symbolic" aesthetic content in general.

Hey Nomad... Yeah, that's the main point I was trying to get at, how universal are these reactions in people, or are they at all? I'm just wondering if they did a pan-cultural study, would there be any similarities that could only be explained at a biological level, or is it all entirely culturally subjective?

Sorry to be all boring and scentific but I think the reason we perceive major chords as happier and minor chords as sadder is this -

the ratios of the frequencies of the notes is quite simple in a major chord.
the ratios of the frequencies of the notes is a bit more complex in a minor chord.

when we hear chords, our brains try to make sense of them by subconsciously calculating what simultaneous notes we are hearing.

with a major chord this is a simpler calculation than with a minor chord, so we tend to perceive the major chord as more harmonious or natural-sounding.

if you're interested the ratios are:
major chord - 4:5:6
minor chord - 10:12:15

Not at all, thanks. I was hoping someone would chip in with a scientific perspective, because I've tend to focus on or interpret things from an art design and/or cultural tradition/myth/fashion angle. I guess that I, and this is personal preference, can be just as interested in the "content" of our thoughts, the ways our minds interpret and project meaning onto things, not just on the fact that it's all a result of chemical reactions. I like mytho-poetic narratives, even if they're interchangable. I suppose, based on your point, it could perhaps come down to varying degrees between cohesion/harmony/form and distortion/complexity/dissonance... and the effect that has on our experience?

I'll definitely be checking that book out Borderpolice, cheers.
 
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In most cultures you will find the same simple ratios are used in music - ie. most types of traditional music contain what we call 4ths and 5ths, which are the simplest ratios apart from an octave.

Of that we will never know (subconsciously calculating) but I don't think it goes that deep, it's just the years of "programming" that are to blame.

Of course you're right that we'll never know exactly what goes on in the subconscious but
for example:
it's not a cultural thing to perceive frequencies in the ratio of 1:2 as being the same note an octave above - there might not be the word "octave but people from ANYWHERE can tell it's the same note regardless of "training".
Similarly, harmonic ratios of different frequencies are universal because the ratios determine how often the same sections of waves occur simultaneously and we can perceive this consciously or subconsciously.

I could explain this more but it's hard without diagrams, a bit of googling should suffice if you're interested.


Of course it's a cultural thing whether you prefer listening to fourths or fifths or whatever, for example flattened fifths used to be against the law in Europe because they were considered satanic.....
 

Chris

fractured oscillations
^ Your illustrating here a bit why I'm even asking this question... because although "symbolic meanings" or values attributed to qualities are subjective, there still seems to be a consistent subconscious or emotional effect that certain qualities can have on people that goes beyond "meaning"... hence there being almost a "science" to making dance-floor functional music, being able to engineer music that creates particular responses in the crowd...
 
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Martin Dust

Techno Zen Master
In most cultures you will find the same simple ratios are used in music - ie. most types of traditional music contain what we call 4ths and 5ths, which are the simplest ratios apart from an octave.



Of course you're right that we'll never know exactly what goes on in the subconscious but
for example:
it's not a cultural thing to perceive frequencies in the ratio of 1:2 as being the same note an octave above - there might not be the word "octave but people from ANYWHERE can tell it's the same note regardless of "training".
Similarly, harmonic ratios of different frequencies are universal because the ratios determine how often the same sections of waves occur simultaneously and we can perceive this consciously or subconsciously.

I could explain this more but it's hard without diagrams, a bit of googling should suffice if you're interested.


Of course it's a cultural thing whether you prefer listening to fourths or fifths or whatever, for example flattened fifths used to be against the law in Europe because they were considered satanic.....

Great post Ed, I've always been interested in things that are "universal" and deemed subconscious (whatever that is). Maybe it is programmed in, it would make sense that some kinda of scale of sound was locked deep inside us all, maybe it's there in the old brain.

I know I find "sad" tunes harder to work on because I end up getting so wrapped up them I often never finish them...
 

Martin Dust

Techno Zen Master
^ Your illustrating here a bit why I'm even asking this question... because although "symbolic meanings" or values attributed to qualities are subjective, there still seems to be a consistent subconscious or emotional effect that certain qualities can have on people that goes beyond "meaning"... hence there being almost a "science" to making dance-floor functional music, being able to engineer music that creates particular responses in the crowd...

Are they subjective tho and aren't we trying to get to "beyond" word and cutulral differences? I think it is possible, if I remember correct - in language there are only two things that are universal, the word/sound Ma and the childish taunt Na, Na, Na Nah Nar...
 

swears

preppy-kei
I saw a documentary a while back in which a musicologist studied various Beatles songs and how they triggered emotional responses. When examining Elenor Rigby, he noted that the chord progressions and scales used were basically similar in a lot of ways to church organ compositions that you would hear in almost any church in England from the Victorian era onward. His conclusion was that McCartney had used these musical devices in order to give his song a certain solemnity or seriousness that you wouldn't usually find in most popular music.

If that's not "cultural baggage", I don't know what is.
 

Martin Dust

Techno Zen Master
I saw a documentary a while back in which a musicologist studied various Beatles songs and how they triggered emotional responses. When examining Elenor Rigby, he noted that the chord progressions and scales used were basically similar in a lot of ways to church organ compositions that you would hear in almost any church in England from the Victorian era onward. His conclusion was that McCartney had used these musical devices in order to give his song a certain solemnity or seriousness that you wouldn't usually find in most popular music.

If that's not "cultural baggage", I don't know what is.

I'm not so sure about this stuff, I think I've seen the same program where they broke Pulp's Common People down to being an hummpa song.
 

swears

preppy-kei
Eleanor Rigby sounds pretty "churchy" to me. It's an example of how musical compositions can evoke feelings in a cultural way rather than an "instinctual" way.
 

gek-opel

entered apprentice
How can you draw that distinction though? How did those common cultural emotional evocations come about in the first place? And how much of the "churchy" evocation comes from the lyrics and the arrangement? If it was sped up and played on massively distorted guitars with guttural death metal vocals on top, would the "churchy" evocation remain?
 
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Chris

fractured oscillations
Interesting point Swears, and I'm sure a lot of references made in musical gestures perhaps need to be understood in the proper cultural context to have the intended effect... However, I'm still not entirely sure yet that it's all entirely subjective... I mean, wouldn't Bathory sound violent and hateful to someone of any cultural background? Wouldn't someone who doesn't speak english, and has never heard, or heard of, Frank Zappa, still pick up on the silly and sarcastic tone in some of his music? How about when jazz or rock and roll first came out, and some preachers were calling it evil, carnal music? Racism in some of these critics aside, wasn't it partly the sensuality, sexuality, or energy conveyed in the music that worried them? And regarding old church hymns... maybe they actually are effectively solemn and serious sounding, based on mathmatic harmonic rules, the slowness that they are played, etc...
 
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swears

preppy-kei
How can you draw that distinction though? How did those common cultural emotional evocations come about in the first place?

Well exactly, this is the question. Why do I associate this music with "church"?
It's cultural, I've been exposed to these scales and chord sequences, like most western people (who may or may not have ever even gone to a Christian church) alongside images or words that are symbols of piety and Christianity. This is what devotional music traditionally means in the UK, in other parts of the world there are different musical signifiers for "religion".

Your edit there: Well, if the arrangement changes too much, then a lot of the musical nuances that made it "churchy" are lost. These associations are in the subtle details a lot of the time aren't they?
 
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