The Instrument: The Sounds of Music

     Instrumentation is everywhere, and through this blog, I attempt to extend this metaphor of the instrument to places where it takes on a whole new level of meaning. There are political instruments, educational instruments, artistic instruments, and even corporate instruments, such as the instrumentation of advertisement that I tackled last time. I plan on unpacking as many of these hidden instruments as I can, since I believe that viewing the world as a function of a million instruments sheds light on important motifs such as hidden intention, artistic expression, and role. However, as of right now, I think it would be incredibly beneficial to dig deep into the true core of the metaphor of the instrument. Specifically, I want to look at instrumentation in the most common sense, the instrumentation of music. After all, the primary use of the word "instrument" is in a musical sense, and when a person is thinking of an instrument, he or she would imagine a piano or a guitar and not a piece of advertisement or a political campaign. This definition of the instrument as a musical tool is the foundation for my extended metaphor. So, why don't we see what makes this metaphor tick?

      Starting with the basics, instruments create music. Quite simply, every song is a combination of sounds from a variety of instruments. However, creating music isn't as simple as compiling sounds on top of each other haphazardly. There are many intricacies to music that distinguish good songs from mediocre ones. An example of one such intricacy is role. In other words, what purposes do instruments serve in a song? What components are necessary for a dynamic and cohesive sound?

Bone Bass And Drums - Debra Hurd

      There are two primary roles that a musician must fill when playing playing or composing a tune: rhythm and melody. Now, I hope to avoid doing music injustice by oversimplifying the endless possibilities of sound and musical purpose by lumping everything into two categories, but I do believe that rhythm and melody are the fundamental roles of music, the roles that encompass most instrumental sounds. The rhythm section, illustrated by the painting above, usually consists of instruments that work with a lower range of notes, such as the drum set, the bass guitar, and the baritone saxophone. The purpose of these instruments and their sounds in regards to rhythm is to set a pace that the rest of the band can follow with ease, and to drive this pace forward relentlessly. Being a bassist myself, I am all too familiar with this instrumental role of music. The rhythm section is the map of the song. The bass and drums provide the tempo, the time signature, and the key of the song, the guidelines necessary for the rest of the band to create a full and dynamic sound. 

      Here is an example of the rhythm section at work through the hands of legendary funk bassist Victor Wooten. In this clip, Wooten utilizes the slapping-technique, a technique that literally requires the musician to slap the strings in a very coordinated way, in order to achieve that tight popping sound that you hear in the video. This slap style jam gets at what the rhythm section is all about, a tight foundation that digs out the groove that the rest of the instruments can slide into. Now, in this video, Victor Wooten skillfully forays into the boundaries of the melody, as it is clear that in a jam with only a bass guitar and a drums, a strictly rhythmic approach would be incredibly dull and boring. Imagine a house with a foundation and structure but with no furniture and decoration, no color and vivacity. This house is the rhythm without a melody. The melody is the detail, the flair that fleshes out the song. When it comes to creating a balanced sound, the melody is just as vital as the rhythm for the simple reason that nobody wants that lame house with no decoration.

      Ultimately, it is important to recognize the roles that instruments have to play in musicianship because they shed light on how musical expression is achieved. The ideal product of musicianship, a beautifully crafted song, can only be created when instruments are used thoughtfully. The mere presence and use of the instrument isn't enough. Each sound needs to be carefully designed to play their role perfectly, whether it be to drive the song forward or to create the detailed audial complexities that are just really pleasing to hear. Now when I extend the metaphor of the instrument to other worldly aspects, we will have a deeper metaphorical understanding of what the instrument should be accomplishing. Not every instrument will be the "rhythm" or the "melody", but there is an intrinsic purpose to each instrument that, when carried out successfully, drives the "musician" towards their goal. That is instrumentation at its finest.

The Instrument: Advertisement

Advertisement is a corporate instrument. I came to this conclusion while reading my fellow classmate's blog, The Power of Promotion, which describes the influence and implications of media-driven advertisement and other promotional tactics. Now, everybody knows about advertisements. We see advertisements everywhere; in her post, my classmate describes how the vast majority of information that a person receives on any given day from the media has been tailored to sell them something, a characteristic of our massive consumerist culture. However, the majority of the population merely consumes advertisements and fails to question how the advertisement is being played, how the advertisement has been crafted and designed to make the consumer believe that their product is the best of them all.

It is this aspect of advertisements that led me to believe that they were a form of instrumentation. In my previous post, I defined an instrument as any tool that could be used to express an idea, with the quality of the instrument depending on the possible depth of expression. Advertisements fit this definition to a point. You can complain about the negative aspects of a consumerist society all you like, but you cannot deny the fact that advertisements are expertly constructed in order to portray a favorable image or idea, almost like a work of art.

So, what are the "sounds" of the advertisement? There are many. Since advertisements come in a variety of forms, ranging from commercials to billboards, they could utilize a variety of appeals to attract the average consumer. However, the most common of these is the visual appeal, and this has been the case since the invention of advertisements.

This is a print advertisement for Newport cigarettes from 1947. This advertisement shows the product being smoked by an attractive and seemingly carefree man, sailing the waters with a beautiful blue sky and woman by his side. In this case, the visual appeal is the entirety of the image itself. The advertisement suggests that by smoking Newport cigarettes, the consumer can be like these beautiful, cigarette-touting individuals. Every visual component of this advertisement, from the attractive appearance of the people to the aesthetically pleasing color contrast of the blue sky and the man's stylish red shirt, was intentionally and instrumentally placed in the ad for this very purpose. 

Now here is a more recent example of the aesthetics of advertisements. In this advertisement, corporate giant McDonalds is promoting the availability of free wi-fi in many of their restaurants throughout the world. To highlight this service, this advertisement simply shows an arrangement of one of McDonald's most popular products, the french fry, in the shape of the symbol for wi-fi. There isn't anything particularly dazzling about this advertisement, but its simplicity is a part of its appeal. The simplicity of the french fries against the solid red backdrop of the advertisement is incredibly pleasing on the eye. 

Advertisements are so abundant and prevalent in our lives that we often feel bombarded by them and neglect the potential artistic value that they possess. Yes, there are many irrelevant advertisements that do no more than flaunt their products in a meaningless way, but there also many that are intricately designed to create and project a powerful image. Advertisements are a form of instrumentation that goes largely unnoticed in our lives, a manner of expression that deserve more recognition.