Most teaching of kids in general, and the teaching of the violin specifically, is a form of abuse. But that's another story for on this occasion I'm on the side of teachers. The Musicians' Union, along with a cabal of other disreputable organisations like the NSPCC, have created this insanely creepy patronising video to advise music tutors to avoid all physical contact with their charges.
Let's not forget it was this same shower who successfully voted to have synthesisers and drum machines banned in the early 80s. As you can imagine, I had a few run-ins with them myself - the first upon being forced to pay a tribute to their muso crime family when Essential Logic did a John Peel (topical irony unintentional) session on BBC Radio. You had no choice. And because of the electronic music issue, it was also another reason a degree of subterfuge was necessary when Whitehouse did shows at traditional London venues the ever-officious MU kept tabs on. By playing our EDP Wasps, we were depriving 'real' fiddlers and trombonists and other card-carriers of their god-given livelihood. Apparently.
That said, if you go peruse the MU's most recent campaigns and issues, you realise that so much more of this is about finding increasingly elaborate ways to raise revenue to support, and thus validate, this thieves' guild's very existence.
If there's one good thing that kids are going to get out of music classes, it probably isn't music; it's physical and metaphysical connections with other kids, the instructors, their audiences. More than being healthy, it's what makes it fun. Of course, coming from a society already damaged enough by paranoid Edwardian hang-ups toward all forms of physical contact and display (even to oneself), this neurotic no-touch obsession is but a logical extension.
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8 comments:
Good write, enjoy reading it.
Reminds me of that work by Balthus, the Guitar Teacher I think it was...
BTW did you see that movie the Black Swan yet?
I loved Black Swan to bits, LJP, what did you think?
One of two good movies I saw all year. The other one was Trash Humpers...
Haha, excellent video - that violin teacher was all over him like a cheap suit! ;-)
'If there's one good thing that kids are going to get out of music classes...'
In your Wire Jukebox you seemed proud of the fact that you can read music and play instruments but choose not to?
Ollie, pride is probably too strong a word; in fact, that musical literacy was acquired despite the best efforts of school music teachers to impose their flea-ridden attitudes and tastes - things haven't changed much, I saw the local schools' annual 'Battle Of The Bands' a year or so ago here, it was a depressing procession of formula classic rock, think Jack Black in some nightmarish acid trip
Considering how synths and drum machines are industry standards today its hard to imagine people throwing a hissy-fit over them. And what would be the point of hiring a unionized band when the instruments were not on the original recordings to begin with? A violin is not the same as a high-pass filter (although it can try). It seems whoever enacted that law was simply afraid of what they don't understand. And has violins and flutes and tubas disappeared yet? No. I just don't want my records to sound like a Tom Jones backing track form the 70's.
Being an electronic artist myself, the challenge today is to use them without the total automation that they allow. I treat my VSTs as if they were real instruments. When recording or doing live play them as if you were playing a guitar or a dulcimer or anything that doesn't have batteries. The quality of the performance is far more 100%, even if there are slight errors. And if you have a drum machine tap out the rhythm to the entire song with your fingers instead of using the sequencer. Its just like drumming your fingers in a classroom. That's the way to do it.
I wonder why they never mentioned that law on "Synth Brittania"?
And for a goof throwing a snowball at you from Michigan USA
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