Forum - Wk 4 Collaborations

David Dowling's S and M.

First off, Happy Birthday David. Fancy having to give a talk on your birthday.

Cool DVD cover

David chose to discuss the collaboration between Metallica and Micheal Kamen to create Symphony and Metallica. Although I knew about S&M, I had never actually heard it, so the highlight of David's talk was actually listening to what was produced. A couple students who claimed to be Metallica fans thought (in contrast to David) that the collaboration was a failure. As someone who is not a fan I tend to disagree and can appreciate David's view point. The orchestral composition based around Metallica's music stood out in its own right. In my opinion, it was genius in its use of harmony. If the orchestra had just followed the guitar riffs, it would not have done justice to the music, nor would it have been as powerful.

Micheal Kamen

Vinny Bhagat.

Trilok Gurtu

This topic gave Vinny an opportunity to showcase someone who is evidently a major role model in his life. This man is Trilok Gurtu, however I had never heard of him before Vinny's talk. The Trilok Gurtu songs Vinny played were quite intriguing, and I can highly appreciate his ability and what he has achieved as a musician. The use of amplified bells and shakers within water is a fantastic showcase of ingenuity as a musician. I think the point Vinny was trying to bring home was the eagerness of Gurtu to step outside his Indian culture and embrace other musics of the world, particularly that of Africa. This lead him to collect styles of different nations and amalgamating them into something new and exciting. A very positive example about what collaborating can achieve.

William Revill.

Final Fantasy XIII


Rather than focusing on collaborations within music, Will decided to discuss collaborations between musicians/composers and other art forms. His main point of focus was Game Design. Will mentioned that while all the other areas within game design can collaborate in a board room discussion style manner, for the people working on sound design and in game music an isolated environment is necessary for them to create. An area I was interested in, which I don't recall Will mentioning, was at what point in time the sound artist and composer begins to create their work. It seems as though they would have to wait until there was a visual piece of work for them to base a sonic structure on. Would there be any discussion about the mood of the music or types of voices and sounds required for scenes that were still under construction?

Khaled Sanadzadeh (Sanad)

Sanad decided to challenge the importance of cross-cultural collaborations when it would appear that it is dictated by Western commercial music. He views the term "World Music" as a misnomer of the music that is being produced. To support his claim he wrote, 'Producers of our "world music" are... big corporations.' These corporations are out to make money and do not care for creative freedom and integrity (I can support this argument as I wrote an essay on it last year). Any music created, whether collaborative and/or cross-cultural should not be dictated by corporations. It can be argued that people write music which others will enjoy and hopefully incur an income so they can follow their passions. By doing this it will obviously be commercial. I think the over-riding issue is that these corporations spend billions of dollars on marketing to influence people's decisions. They also have the power to shelve any music they don't like. How much potentially popular music is not given an opportunity to reach a market?

I think it would be brilliant for Western instruments to be used in a different culture's musical style. I also think it's brilliant that so many different cultures have actually incorporated their instruments and styles within the Western style.

At the end of the day I think that Sanad is justified in pointing out the one sided approach to music, and especially showing his disgust with the control major corporations have over music. I'm not sure why so many people took offence to this. My only criticism was that he should have articulated what he was saying in his talk as well as he did on the paper he handed out. I also liked the point raised by one of the 1st years about what comprises Aboriginal music. Does the music lose its cultural significance if they choose to adopt Western instruments, or is the culture still inherent in the way they choose to portray their music?

And thus ends Luke's weekly sermon.
Be at peace, my children.

References

Dowling, David. "S&M" Forum Week 4 talk Collaborations. Lecture presented at University Adelaide. 22 March 2007.

Baghat, Vinny. "Collaborations of Trilok Gurtu" Forum Week 4 talk Collaborations. Lecture presented at University Adelaide. 22 March 2007.

Revill, William. "Collaborations in Game" Forum Week 4 talk Collaborations. Lecture presented at University Adelaide. 22 March 2007.

Sanadzadeh, Khaled. "Collaborations in music" Forum Week 4 talk Collaborations. Lecture presented at University Adelaide. 22 March 2007.

Pic References

Steve. S&M Pic. 2006 metallicaworld.co.uk http://www.metallicaworld.co.uk/releases/s&m.htm (24 March 2007).

Nikitin, George. 17.08.2006 Micheal Karmen Pic. http://www.nrk.no/musikk/1.860130 (24 March 2007).

Harari, Guido. May 2002 Trilok Gurtu Pic. http://www.ejn.it/mus/gurtu.htm (24 March 2007).

Rajiv. September 29, 2006. Final Fantasy Screen Shot. http://www.bdgamers.net/2006/09/29/ps3-tgs06-screenshots-2.html ( 224 March 2007).