40,000 years of music explained in 8 minutes

40,000 years of music explained in 8 minutes | Michael Spitzer

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The history of music from bone flutes to Beyoncé.
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The evolution of music over millennia is tied to human civilization.
For example, hunter-gatherers, who were very mobile, had to have small, light instruments to carry with them. Once we settled into bigger cities, larger instruments could be built.
Today, music is as accessible as running water. But if you were born in Beethoven's time, you would be lucky to hear two symphonies in your lifetime.
Read the video transcript ► bigthink.com/series/the-big-t...
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About Michael Spitzer:
Michael Spitzer is the author of The Musical Human and professor of music at the University of Liverpool, where he leads the department’s work on classical music. A music theorist and musicologist, he is an authority on Beethoven, with interests in aesthetics and critical theory, cognitive metaphor, and music and affect. He organized the International Conferences on Music and Emotion and the International Conference on Analyzing Popular Music and currently chairs the editorial board of Music Analysis Journal.
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Пікірлер: 705

@bigthink Жыл бұрын

What do you think the future of music will be like?

@danielabetts Жыл бұрын

A missing element: music and it’s evolution is inextricably tied to dancing. The rhythms have been honed through millennia to make us move and sing. Not just listen.

@_evolj Жыл бұрын

This is a very western-centric view on music and it’s history but I mean just look at this guy, what did we expect?

@daveconrad6562 Жыл бұрын

but you don't really care for music, do you?

@timkeane2719 Күн бұрын

I got skeptical as soon as he claimed nomads didn’t have instruments as if indigenous people and drums and horns aren’t literally archetypal

@roachmancam9012 Жыл бұрын

Music can make my 83 yr old mother with dementia/alzheimers go from completely unresponsive with her head down to dancing, playing air guitar ,and even singing word for word if its certain songs.its unbelievable. She needs assistance to stand and walk but she can do the twist without anyone holding her hand for atleast 30 seconds before her legs get tired lol.. music is medicine.

@AV-db5fb

Not a lot of take aways from this one

@ragtagvagabond

From what I’m hearing on the pop charts… we’re getting closer and closer to monkeys banging rocks together. The future of music is bright!

@StanleyGrill Жыл бұрын

This was commentary from someone who seems to actually hate written music. Sort of like saying the invention of the alphabet was just a mechanism of control as opposed to a brilliant means to share and preserve ideas.

@CadoPack

We've discovered bone flutes buried with Neanderthals

@detunedpaper8150

Bro casually skipped over 12TET

@ChristopherOrth Жыл бұрын

Most people think that the internet has allowed us to make a huge modern change in how we experience and share music. But it's really moving us closer back to how music was all along. The "weird" period in musical history are the last several decades of commercialized music. So great to see this author sharing bigger ideas about music and humanity!

@citlalli9410 Жыл бұрын

I never regret clicking on the videos of this channel.

@JamesVibe Жыл бұрын

"There is no such thing as old music.....there is only good music and the other kind." - Duke Ellington

@art-ificialblon-die7013 Жыл бұрын

As another commenter pointed out, music is linked with dancing, which further corroborates with the notion that music is an activity, rather than an object. However, just as music became objectified with the advent and progression of modernity, the element of dance has seen diminishing prominence. Music has become more isolated and solidified. And this parallels the development of human societies, from nomadic people to permanent establishments. In my perspective, modernity was the culmination of the quest for man for claim permanence over everything. But the modernist project failed, and we’ve been living in postmodern times. And an era of experimentation and technological developments released music from a static shell towards a dynamic intercourse of sounds.

@UnblestMATT Жыл бұрын

Hunter-gatherer societies have more leisure time than in industrialized societies. It was often spent sitting around, talking, singing, dancing, etc. Many indigenous dance and music routines are performed by skilled performers and enjoyed by crowds. I think it is inaccurate to map the evolution of music with the advent of concerts coming about in industrialized societies with social hierarchies as prerequisites.

@williamg780 Жыл бұрын

I would disagree that music notation turns music into a mechanical process. I'm not a professional violinist, only played in high school and had an extremely good orchestra director. And engaging in classical music as a listener, being able to appreciate it more with my experience with the violin, there is a solid argument to be made that there are litanies of interpretation available for the musician, as well as the listener. Maybe I didn't understand his argument but I think music notation has been a great advancement. It's extremely intimate: to be able to materially and audibly produce what was only in the mind of, say, a deaf composer hundreds of years ago is deeply fascinating to me and I don't think should be discarded or downplayed in the slightest.

@fretnesbutke3233 Жыл бұрын

Remember, budding music students - and the professor is touching on this,the notation is the script that the actor must breathe life into. Notation is the map,but the sound is the actual territory. Musicians who can move hearts have a superpower that few other activities can match,the power to unify us.

@PcGamerHero Жыл бұрын

That's a rather cynical view on music notation. As other pointed out, notation existed way before the middle ages. Scales were a subject of study for the Pythagoreans Greek, and rhytmic notations existed in ancient Egypt.