hi, i miss the better ones, maybe tomorrow i ll post some thoghts from my own (if i can find my brain), but by now i ll post an article from jacques attali (the guy who wrote "noises" (and many more books)):
" Potlatch Digital
A Perspective on the Future Economy of Music
Jacques Attali
I wrote »Noise« in 1977, and still today I try to explain that it’s impossible to look at music, or any other form of human endeavour, when you put it outside of the global context. Of course, music is very specific for a number of reasons. One economic reason is that music is pure information. In economies, information is a devil – it’s impossible to manage. For example, the whole of economic theory is the theory of scarce resources. If milk is freely available, then the price of milk is down; if milk is scarce, the price is up: this is economic theory. But it doesn’t work for music: it doesn’t work for information as a whole. If I had a pot of milk, and I give it to you, I don’t have it anymore. But if I give you a piece of information I still have it, I keep it. Which means that if I have something and I give it to you, I create something new: abundance. And this means that economic theory doesn’t work for information, when that information can be separated from its material support – a CD, or whatever is the case today.
When I have something that is scarce, its value is linked to the fact that it is scarce, and that it belongs to me and nobody else. In an information economy, something has more value when a lot of people have it. For example, if I am the only one to have a telephone, it doesn’t mean anything, not if there is no one else to call. If I am the only person to speak a particular language, its value is zero, because I cannot speak to anyone else. In info theory, the value of something increases with the number of people sharing it. It’s why we must be very careful, when we speak about music, not to have in mind the main economic laws.
But there are also other reasons why we cannot rely on economics to understand music. Every human activity has a history, and it is a history that existed before economics, when things had a value that was not a price. So if you want to understand something’s value, you must try to understand what its value was before it was given a price. This is true for everything. It is only when you have found what is the value, what is the role, what is the function of something before it had a price that you understand why it can be considered to have a value in economics, why it still has a value even today.
What is the value of music in precapitalist society? In my view, music is a metaphor for the management of violence. When people listen to music, they listen to the fact that society is possible: because we can manage violence. If violence is not managed, then society collapses. The only way for individuals to survive is for violence to be channelled or tamed. In anthropology, it can be explained that the best way to manage violence requires us to accept the two following hypothesis.
One: We are violent only when we have the same kinds of desire as the other person, and we become rivals. Two: The way to manage violence in society is to organise differences – not inequalities – between people, in order that they do not desire the same thing, and through the channelling of violence by the creation of scapegoats. Scapegoats are a crucial element in the organisation of a society. They are somebody or something which must be hated, and also admired. Without them society is impossible, because violence is everywhere.
What’s the relationship between that and music? If you look at music as a way of organising differences among noises, then you have music as a metaphor for the organising of scapegoats. Noise is violence, it is killing. Organising noises, creating differences in noises, is a way of demonstrating that violence can be transformed into a way of managing violence. And this is true everywhere. In thousands of myths there are relations between violence and noise; music and peace; musicians and scapegoats; music and relationship to gods; dance and religious ceremony. In every case they present the same thing: trying to find a way to organise possible life in society.
Music is prophetic. Why? If we consider music to be a kind of code, we can see that there are many different ways of organising that code: different melodies, different rhythms, different genres. Moreover, we can explore these different forms of organisation much more easily, much more rapidly, than we can explore different ways of organising reality.
Music is just one element in the management of violence, and there are different stages in this. The first and longest stage in the history of mankind was through religion. We may say it began at least 15,000 years ago. Music didn’t exist as an art – for art didn’t exist. Music, dance, prayer, daily life were exactly the same; everything was alive, everything had a spiritual dimension. In this world, music was an expression of God, as well as a way to speak to God. It’s what I call music linked to sacrifice or ritual.
The Bible is the first sacred book in which music is said not to come from gods, but having been invented by men. It is presented as a human way of managing violence, and from Babylon to Egypt, the Greek and Roman and Chinese empires, we see the appropriation of 'sacred' or 'holy' powers by emperors, that is, by men. It is the beginning of division of labour, particularly between the three main powers – religion, the arts and the military – in which each plays a role in the management of violence. Music is the beginning to become increasingly important in this management process, and remains so right through the Middle Ages.
The real change occurred when a new means of managing violence appears: money. There was another way of managing violence, and another way of managing violence through music. More people wanted to be part of society, so it became impossible to tame violence through the old model. Where an 'elite' form of music existed, it was in the courts, in the company of the king. But then a new group of money managers emerged in the form of the middle classes, the bourgeoisie, the shopkeepers. They wanted to access to music but were too numerous and not in a position to finance musicians full time. Thus emerged the public performance. What’s interesting is that not only does this begin to organise music economically – people would put on a concert and others would buy tickets – but that new stiles and new instruments begin to have an aesthetic impact, such as the symphony and the sonata. This is what I see as a period characterised by representation. All this is linked to the fact that there is an increased number of patrons for whom the musician can work, but also because music was being used as a representation of power. Patrons were there to show one another that they are the new elite, that they are powerful.
This developed through the 18th and 19th centuries, and then you have a whole new form of music appearing, linked to the need of developing a representational economy , leading not just to stars – individuals – but to large orchestras of 50 to 100 people… and ultimately the conductor. What is the conductor? He is someone who tames the orchestra, but also someone who is demonstrating to the audience that it is possible to tame the orchestra – we see one of us taming the workers, organising the division of labour, avoiding violence and creating harmony.
At the end of the 19th century, as the burgeoning middle classes began to consolidate their position within society, it was not enough for music to be confined to the concert hall – it had become impossible to give access for music to all those that wanted it. By the way, it is here that music begins to develop an economic value in the form of copyright. What is important to understand is that copyright is not property right. Copyright is given during the lifetime of the musician, and to some extent, that of their children – it’s limited. This means that music has never been accepted as being the property of the musician. Copyright exists to finance his life, but not as property in itself, such as a car. So, to continue: at the end of the 19th century, it was necessary to create another way of organising music, in order to allow more people access to that music. It was time to invent the gramophone. The gramophone was needed because it was impossible to build enough concert houses for the hundreds of thousands of people who were in a position to buy music.
There was a need to create a means of having a private concert, because this was the only way to accommodate all those in a financial position to access music. Actually, there were two ways, which would go on to influence one another throughout the 20th century. Firstly, there was the gramophone – the concert without limit. And secondly there was the radio, which would pose exactly the same problems as the Internet does today, in that it offered free music.
(continues...)
" Potlatch Digital
A Perspective on the Future Economy of Music
Jacques Attali
I wrote »Noise« in 1977, and still today I try to explain that it’s impossible to look at music, or any other form of human endeavour, when you put it outside of the global context. Of course, music is very specific for a number of reasons. One economic reason is that music is pure information. In economies, information is a devil – it’s impossible to manage. For example, the whole of economic theory is the theory of scarce resources. If milk is freely available, then the price of milk is down; if milk is scarce, the price is up: this is economic theory. But it doesn’t work for music: it doesn’t work for information as a whole. If I had a pot of milk, and I give it to you, I don’t have it anymore. But if I give you a piece of information I still have it, I keep it. Which means that if I have something and I give it to you, I create something new: abundance. And this means that economic theory doesn’t work for information, when that information can be separated from its material support – a CD, or whatever is the case today.
When I have something that is scarce, its value is linked to the fact that it is scarce, and that it belongs to me and nobody else. In an information economy, something has more value when a lot of people have it. For example, if I am the only one to have a telephone, it doesn’t mean anything, not if there is no one else to call. If I am the only person to speak a particular language, its value is zero, because I cannot speak to anyone else. In info theory, the value of something increases with the number of people sharing it. It’s why we must be very careful, when we speak about music, not to have in mind the main economic laws.
But there are also other reasons why we cannot rely on economics to understand music. Every human activity has a history, and it is a history that existed before economics, when things had a value that was not a price. So if you want to understand something’s value, you must try to understand what its value was before it was given a price. This is true for everything. It is only when you have found what is the value, what is the role, what is the function of something before it had a price that you understand why it can be considered to have a value in economics, why it still has a value even today.
What is the value of music in precapitalist society? In my view, music is a metaphor for the management of violence. When people listen to music, they listen to the fact that society is possible: because we can manage violence. If violence is not managed, then society collapses. The only way for individuals to survive is for violence to be channelled or tamed. In anthropology, it can be explained that the best way to manage violence requires us to accept the two following hypothesis.
One: We are violent only when we have the same kinds of desire as the other person, and we become rivals. Two: The way to manage violence in society is to organise differences – not inequalities – between people, in order that they do not desire the same thing, and through the channelling of violence by the creation of scapegoats. Scapegoats are a crucial element in the organisation of a society. They are somebody or something which must be hated, and also admired. Without them society is impossible, because violence is everywhere.
What’s the relationship between that and music? If you look at music as a way of organising differences among noises, then you have music as a metaphor for the organising of scapegoats. Noise is violence, it is killing. Organising noises, creating differences in noises, is a way of demonstrating that violence can be transformed into a way of managing violence. And this is true everywhere. In thousands of myths there are relations between violence and noise; music and peace; musicians and scapegoats; music and relationship to gods; dance and religious ceremony. In every case they present the same thing: trying to find a way to organise possible life in society.
Music is prophetic. Why? If we consider music to be a kind of code, we can see that there are many different ways of organising that code: different melodies, different rhythms, different genres. Moreover, we can explore these different forms of organisation much more easily, much more rapidly, than we can explore different ways of organising reality.
Music is just one element in the management of violence, and there are different stages in this. The first and longest stage in the history of mankind was through religion. We may say it began at least 15,000 years ago. Music didn’t exist as an art – for art didn’t exist. Music, dance, prayer, daily life were exactly the same; everything was alive, everything had a spiritual dimension. In this world, music was an expression of God, as well as a way to speak to God. It’s what I call music linked to sacrifice or ritual.
The Bible is the first sacred book in which music is said not to come from gods, but having been invented by men. It is presented as a human way of managing violence, and from Babylon to Egypt, the Greek and Roman and Chinese empires, we see the appropriation of 'sacred' or 'holy' powers by emperors, that is, by men. It is the beginning of division of labour, particularly between the three main powers – religion, the arts and the military – in which each plays a role in the management of violence. Music is the beginning to become increasingly important in this management process, and remains so right through the Middle Ages.
The real change occurred when a new means of managing violence appears: money. There was another way of managing violence, and another way of managing violence through music. More people wanted to be part of society, so it became impossible to tame violence through the old model. Where an 'elite' form of music existed, it was in the courts, in the company of the king. But then a new group of money managers emerged in the form of the middle classes, the bourgeoisie, the shopkeepers. They wanted to access to music but were too numerous and not in a position to finance musicians full time. Thus emerged the public performance. What’s interesting is that not only does this begin to organise music economically – people would put on a concert and others would buy tickets – but that new stiles and new instruments begin to have an aesthetic impact, such as the symphony and the sonata. This is what I see as a period characterised by representation. All this is linked to the fact that there is an increased number of patrons for whom the musician can work, but also because music was being used as a representation of power. Patrons were there to show one another that they are the new elite, that they are powerful.
This developed through the 18th and 19th centuries, and then you have a whole new form of music appearing, linked to the need of developing a representational economy , leading not just to stars – individuals – but to large orchestras of 50 to 100 people… and ultimately the conductor. What is the conductor? He is someone who tames the orchestra, but also someone who is demonstrating to the audience that it is possible to tame the orchestra – we see one of us taming the workers, organising the division of labour, avoiding violence and creating harmony.
At the end of the 19th century, as the burgeoning middle classes began to consolidate their position within society, it was not enough for music to be confined to the concert hall – it had become impossible to give access for music to all those that wanted it. By the way, it is here that music begins to develop an economic value in the form of copyright. What is important to understand is that copyright is not property right. Copyright is given during the lifetime of the musician, and to some extent, that of their children – it’s limited. This means that music has never been accepted as being the property of the musician. Copyright exists to finance his life, but not as property in itself, such as a car. So, to continue: at the end of the 19th century, it was necessary to create another way of organising music, in order to allow more people access to that music. It was time to invent the gramophone. The gramophone was needed because it was impossible to build enough concert houses for the hundreds of thousands of people who were in a position to buy music.
There was a need to create a means of having a private concert, because this was the only way to accommodate all those in a financial position to access music. Actually, there were two ways, which would go on to influence one another throughout the 20th century. Firstly, there was the gramophone – the concert without limit. And secondly there was the radio, which would pose exactly the same problems as the Internet does today, in that it offered free music.
(continues...)
