https://guitarnoise.forum/opinions-and-polls/timlessness-of-music/ Guitar Noise Discussion Board en-US Fri, 05 Jun 2026 11:13:51 +0000 wpForo 60 https://guitarnoise.forum/opinions-and-polls/timlessness-of-music/#post-343824 Wed, 02 Dec 2009 08:24:20 +0000 Opinions and Polls JoeHempel https://guitarnoise.forum/opinions-and-polls/timlessness-of-music/#post-343824 https://guitarnoise.forum/opinions-and-polls/timlessness-of-music/#post-343819 Wed, 02 Dec 2009 05:45:46 +0000 I fell for it . . hook, line and sinker.]]> Opinions and Polls KR2 https://guitarnoise.forum/opinions-and-polls/timlessness-of-music/#post-343819 https://guitarnoise.forum/opinions-and-polls/timlessness-of-music/#post-343784 Tue, 01 Dec 2009 22:52:05 +0000
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Z2vU8M6CYI
:)]]> Opinions and Polls boxboy https://guitarnoise.forum/opinions-and-polls/timlessness-of-music/#post-343784 https://guitarnoise.forum/opinions-and-polls/timlessness-of-music/#post-343780 Tue, 01 Dec 2009 22:36:49 +0000
I think having narrow age gaps between parent and children helps spread music between generations. My mom was about 22 years older than my and she still listened to rock n' roll. She introduced me to the Beatles, Stones, Hendrix, Pink Floyd, Motown, etc. I'm only 19 years older than my oldest son, so we have a lot of cross sectional music tastes. I introduced him to all of the stuff my mom shared with me, along with Guns n' Roses, Van Halen, Rush, Pearl Jam, Dream Theater and the stuff of my generation. He keeps me up to date on the newer bands. Although I still find new stuff sometimes that he's never heard of.]]> Opinions and Polls jwmartin https://guitarnoise.forum/opinions-and-polls/timlessness-of-music/#post-343780 https://guitarnoise.forum/opinions-and-polls/timlessness-of-music/#post-343691 Mon, 30 Nov 2009 21:53:05 +0000
To me timeless music is just a matter of public opinion. If it is well liked it will continue to be played somewhere, the more that it is liked the longer it will be played so one hit wonders although cool for awhile eventually fade out unless you buy the Time-Life CD set.

It has nothing to do with how "good" the music is whatever that even means. There is no way to rate music.

And no one artists complete works will be timeless, no matter how great they are they invariably will write some not so great music .]]> Opinions and Polls cnev https://guitarnoise.forum/opinions-and-polls/timlessness-of-music/#post-343691 https://guitarnoise.forum/opinions-and-polls/timlessness-of-music/#post-343591 Sat, 28 Nov 2009 19:16:30 +0000 If that were true, then I seriously doubt only a handful of people would know them. Oh, they'd know the names, but most would have no idea what they did that was important.
but rather that folks like the Beatles and Stones will be completely unknown. As long as there are video games....they will be known...which kind of brings me to another thing which was discussed in another topic in which older music is gaining a comeback due to the popularity of games like Rock Band and Guitar Hero. That was Noteboat that said that, not me. But to speak to the question: Can you tell me who Fritz Kreisler was without looking him up?

What's popular this decade and next says little about what will be 30, 40 or more years down the road. The best known performer of their day one decade is next decade's obscure trivia question.]]> Opinions and Polls kingpatzer https://guitarnoise.forum/opinions-and-polls/timlessness-of-music/#post-343591 https://guitarnoise.forum/opinions-and-polls/timlessness-of-music/#post-343582 Sat, 28 Nov 2009 17:33:28 +0000 but rather that folks like the Beatles and Stones will be completely unknown. As long as there are video games....they will be known...which kind of brings me to another thing which was discussed in another topic in which older music is gaining a comeback due to the popularity of games like Rock Band and Guitar Hero.]]> Opinions and Polls JoeHempel https://guitarnoise.forum/opinions-and-polls/timlessness-of-music/#post-343582 https://guitarnoise.forum/opinions-and-polls/timlessness-of-music/#post-343578 Sat, 28 Nov 2009 16:53:30 +0000 Opinions and Polls kingpatzer https://guitarnoise.forum/opinions-and-polls/timlessness-of-music/#post-343578 https://guitarnoise.forum/opinions-and-polls/timlessness-of-music/#post-343576 Sat, 28 Nov 2009 16:30:43 +0000
If adults aren't continuing to re-invent their taste, and the media is controlling whats put out there, so if all that's put out there is top 20 and more current stuff then how are decades of music still getting into the kids heads, and almost nothing from the past 15-20 years getting in the top 10 of any list? First, lists are meaningless. If someone were to ask me the 20 best guitar riffs of all time, I'd bet only a handful of people on this board would recognize all 20 of the artists I'd name, let alone the specific riff. But every artist I'd name would, I assure you, be an exceedingly influential musician whose impact is still being felt today. Does the obscurity of my list mean the riffs aren't as good as someone who sticks to songs that happen to be on the spin list of the local oldies station? Certainly not. And in 50 years it may well be that my views are shown to be closer to the mark, or further away, but timelessness is not something easily identified while in close proximity to the artist.

Second, when I was learning to play the guitar I learned a lot of songs from decades past because it was good music. The first song I really went after was Johnny B. Goode. That wasn't exactly current at the time. Music that is decades old is easier to see as being exemplary in some fashion. Moreover, as music ages it appears in more venues. It gets more time on the radio, it might show up in a movie, it gets covered by other bands, etc. Exposure is a big part of what makes people interested in a song, and when talking about large scale popularity (which is not really the same as being a timeless piece of music, btw) it's essential.
It just seems that when this generation grows older, that the music still being inducted will be from the past decades, and not 90's and more with a few exceptions. Old folks have been saying that for a long time ;)]]> Opinions and Polls kingpatzer https://guitarnoise.forum/opinions-and-polls/timlessness-of-music/#post-343576 https://guitarnoise.forum/opinions-and-polls/timlessness-of-music/#post-343573 Sat, 28 Nov 2009 15:56:39 +0000
If I ask a random musician who the greatest baroque composer was, the most likely answer is "Bach". If I asked the same question two hundred years ago, I would have gotten the same answer... but they'd be arguing about which Bach was better, and J.S. wouldn't have been part of the argument.

That's always puzzled me. By the early 1800s, the Bachs involved (J.S., J.C., and C.P.E.) had been dead for a while - the last of the bunch left us in the 1790s. So how could a listener of 200 years ago come up with a different composer than we would today in answer to the same question? I've been puzzling about that for years. My current thinking is that "standing the test of time" depends on several things that aren't directly related to their music:

1. Timing. Each era or genre in music, even a short one (e.g. disco) generates hundreds of composers, and longer eras have tens of thousands. The ones who are remembered fall into two groups: they're the ones who defined the genre by being there first (or at least very early on) - or they defined the height of the art. Of the thousands of punk music bands, the Sex Pistols are remembered today because they were in early, not because they were the best example.

2. An academic champion. The composers who are remembered as defining the height of their art are identified a long time after - maybe 75-100 years after they're gone. We keep them around because their works best illustrate the contrast between the music they wrote and that of other eras. We learn about them in music history classes... which means some academic made the decision that this composer was important, and they had the power to get others to study the works (in the case of J.S. Bach, the champion was Felix Mendelssohn).

3. Wide accessibility after the fact. If you aren't exposed to the music 100 years from now, you can't consider it "great", no matter how good the music might objectively be. Here's where popularity during your time plays a role - if you sell a lot of records, there's a much better chance some will survive to be heard. Stephen Foster is considered a great 19th century songwriter because millions of copies of his tunes were printed. Others might have been just as good or better (James Bland, Samuel Francis Smith, etc), but didn't get quite as much distribution.

I think that last one is an essential factor for longevity. And I think the composers of today who will still be listened to 100 years from now aren't any of the ones the average guy today will mention. Here's why:

What do you know about the music of the 1930s, before the "big band" era? Probably very little. But let me name some tunes: Easter Parade, Let's Call the Whole Thing Off, Cheek to Cheek, I Got Rhythm, Summertime.... chances are really good you know one or more of those, and I only named five. They've got something in common: all were in musicals, and all those musicals were adapted to films. So you can be exposed to the music without actively deciding to go hear something written in 1935.

100 years from now, my money is on John Williams to make the cut. He was at the cutting edge of creating film music that works as stand-alone compositions, academics will love him for taking opera composition techniques into the movies, and the "Star Wars" films are going to be seen by new viewers for a long time, so he'll keep getting new exposure. Folks like the Beatles are going to end up like Stephen Foster - they'll get a brief mention in the textbooks, and people will be familiar with one or two songs (kinda like Pachelbel today - name something he did other than the Canon in D). Most other folks will be footnotes at best, no matter what we think of them today.]]> Opinions and Polls NoteBoat https://guitarnoise.forum/opinions-and-polls/timlessness-of-music/#post-343573