PROJECT PRAGMATIST | LESSONS IN AUDITORY PERCEPTION
Pragmatism is a philosophical mentality: a practiced assessment of any theory’s inherent truth, meaning or belief in terms of the success of its practical application. It is, fundamentally, the deconstruction of ideology for the assessment of realistic applications.
Pragmatism is a philosophical mentality: a practiced assessment of any theory’s inherent truth, meaning or belief in terms of the success of its practical application. It is, fundamentally, the deconstruction of ideology for the assessment of realistic applications.
In musical terms, pragmatism is a rejection of musical convention, for conventions’ sake.
It is an audit of mankind’s musical history, in composition and theory, and an ongoing experiment on its most primal sensory effects.
Music moves us, not only mentally, but physiologically, and in the application of the most advanced tools in the musicians arsenal, the producer gains a power to impose a somatic effect on the listener.
Pragmatist inhabits a cross-genre wasteland in which the corners are dominated by our predisposition to conform to a genre. With such conformation comes an indoctrinated application of the relevant musical theory.
One could describe Pragmatist as Trip-Hop, but only for want of a better convention or tag.
And so Trip-hop comes out of the cafes and the lounge bars in which it has long propagated due to its ‘ambient effect’, and is taken back under the command of the musical artisan.
With no preconceptions of the genre, and with no hesitations in departing from the normal, Pragmatist will never reach the wider credit-card wielding masses. However, I humbly invite you to join me over the coming months on a voyage into the experimental, and on a departure from the “Top-40 Charts”, so that I may show you the effects and sensations you can experience.
I will teach you to control your mind and your concentration as your ears attempt to absorb the plethora of aural textures. In time, as you really listen, for the first time in your life, you will appreciate sound with great profundity. You will listen to a piece of music, not as an entity in itself, but as a collection and tapestry of intricate auditory illusions.
It takes a classical musician many, many years to hone his ear to focus on the ‘shape’ and ‘value’ of each individual sound: to pull each weave in the texture apart in order to see where it comes from; to hear each of many layers of sound; to understand the fundamental application of each sound, interacting with one another in creating an homogenous sum of parts. That is music: pragmatically, it is purely the application (the manipulation) of individual vibrations in the air, thus imposing an impression on your senses.
Music, as a theory, and as an established ‘ideology’, has no inherent value. In its deconstruction we will find that pure sounds, in their rawest forms can illicit remarkable responses in your corporeal self, and when these simple parts are combines as aural textures they manifest wonderful responses from our bodies and minds.
This humble project, this experiment in Pragmatic Auditory Perceptions, will refine the keenest musician’s ear, and train the most tone deaf listener to experience more from any musical experience. Even the most irritating of sounds can be fascinating and intellectually stimulating, given the correct pragmatic approach of the listener.
The first, and most important step of all, is to make listening to music an activity in itself. Sit, concentrate, and listen avidly. Listen without distraction nor whilst doing any other task. Only then can you begin to unravel your life-long habit of ignoring any sound that isn’t immediately important. Music stops being a background ‘noise’, and suddenly takes on ‘density’ and ‘intricacy’. Your consciousness will wander between instruments, between layers, and soon you will find yourself focusing it at will, in the same way you move your eyes around the room, concentrating on individual objects, rather than purely taking in the room as whole.
So join me, as I’ll be posting plenty of music up on here. Some will be my own compositions, some will be that of so many great artists that grace my iTunes playlists. I’ll even be posting up some “musical experiments”: exercises in sound that will hone your auditory perception, illustrate some amazing biological effects induced by sounds and, obviously, I’ll post absolutely any awesome music that I come across in my cyber-safari.
Stay tuned... it’s coming soon.
