Steering the Pitches

One of my favorite online video bloggers is a guy named Christian Henson. He's a media composer and a "big cheese" at Spitfire Audio, who produce some of the orchestral samples I use my composition. Christian is a very intelligent guy who -- as I do -- tends to wander through diverse topics. His "vlog" is often about composition and often about life -- always about both. I have learned a great deal from him about the craft of composing "orchestral mockups" -- in short, orchestral music from recorded samples of real players -- and he has often left me thinking long and hard about life. (A man after my own heart.)

But, the other day, he made me realize that I have had just about enough of The Information Age.

The topic was whether "the media composer" (he or she who composes for film, games and TV) will become extinct with the recent inception of artificial intelligence "composition." Apparently -- this is the first I have heard of it -- there are services through which you can have music composed through A.I. And...you know what? I just don't effing care.

I can't be wringing my hands over whether the machines will take over the world or whether I will lose my next gig to a Mac Pro. What I have to do is what I know I can do: keep writing music that is better than that which any machine will ever write. I know that some people will not be able to tell the difference between mine and a tune generated by algorithm, but...what, exactly, am I supposed to do with this information? -- that one can order music written by a program that comes more cheaply and more quickly? One only has so much energy for lifetime. One only has so much "bandwidth" for each day.

We live in the "Information Age," so, every moment, we see another article that tells us how we are doing everything wrong. Apart from the fake stuff (and it is out there, in droves, despite Trump's absurd attempt to claim credit for the "fake news" phrase and his tendency to paint anything he doesn't like as "fake") there is a never-ending parade of bad news and revisionist philosophy about what we do and how we do it. "Information" shared among "communities." (Both worlds just about make me puke at this point.)

It seems to me that, in futuristic retrospect, one of the virtues of a person of our time will have been determined to have been the ability to ignore the smothering torrents of information we endure all day, every day; to push forth regardless of the world's attempt to overload our memory banks.

Those who distinguish themselves to future recognition will be the ones who acted upon their feelings and instincts: the dad who handled his son's scraped knee the way he saw fit and not the dad who read a ton of articles about how comforting the boy too much is a mistake or that not comforting him as much as he wants is a mistake; the mom who lets her frightened kid sleep in her bed because it feels right and not because the choice is validated on several websites; the writer who still uses a typewriter and delivers his manuscripts in person because it feels right; the guy who holds doors because it is right and does not fear the implications about gender relations; the businessperson who is not afraid to tell his or her employees they"look nice today;" the teacher who is not afraid to tell a student his answer is wrong.

Am I raising my kids right? Am I brushing my teeth right? Washing my face with the right soap? Is soap okay on my face, at all? Is artificial intelligence going to start writing books? Are there not enough black men in baseball? Are there not enough white guys in football? Is every person who voted for Trump a racist? Is time in sun worth the vitamin D, in spite of the cancer risk? Are hallucinogens the future of treating depression? If we treat suicide with too much understanding, will more people do it? If we call it cowardice, will it cause more suffering? How many sexes are there, exactly? Should we change everything if .00000000908% of the population is unhappy? Does Mozart really make babies smarter? How many hours should I allow my son to play Call of Duty? Is Call of Duty causing mass shootings? Is my house a more healthful place with the windows open? Or...closed?

...are composers going to become obsolete?

I just don't care. I need to live and do. I need to feel and act. Every one of those things in the long paragraph above -- with a pinch of hyperbole, perhaps -- is something that social and conventional media have attempted to chloroform me with over the last week.

I don't blame Christian for bringing up the topic and, in fact, he had some encouraging things to say about us humans. But, good Lord, I find myself saying, more and more, "What am I supposed to do with this information?" Rather than work to comfort myself that it will all be okay for composers, I'm just going to crank out more music. Rather than worry about what is socially acceptable, I'm just going to keep being nice to people.

Some time ago, there was a piece on the radio about publishers using e-reader algorithms to track reader tendencies: How long do they read per session? Which pages do they spend the most time on? What content makes them slow down in their reading? What makes them skip forward? Do they read inside or outside? When Stephen King was asked about what he thought about this, he said it better than I could. He said he wants nothing to do with this info. He needs to write. Using this information before writing, he said, would encourage a pitcher to try to steer the ball after it leaves his hand.

Yep.

Maybe worst of all the consequences of The Information Age is the fact that as we are being filled with information, we are forgetting how to use reasoning. Why should we think things through if we can scoop up all of our procedures in a quick Internet search?

Maybe I can sum it all up with the example of the map and the GPS in a car. Sure, a map is information, but you need to reason your way through it; see what road connects to which; decide whether to go north, south, east or west...choose scenic routes over highways... The GPS gets us there; tells us where and when to turn. We've though about nothing, planned nothing and have been more-or-less uninvolved in our own journey.

We have turned from explorers into direction-followers, literally and metaphorically. We think less and react more. We join on-line "communities" and thought-groups. It's easier that way.

The Nameless Craftsman

I'm thrilled beyond description that
I found pics of Sam and his shop on line!

Those of you who read this blog for a thrice-weekly dose of thought-provocation might be initially disappointed by what I am about to say, but, stick with me.

My drum cases are the single best purchase I have ever made. The story behind them is meaningful, though, so let's see if I can save myself, here.

When I went to get my first drum kit, at the age of fifteen, my dad took me to a small music/drum shop in South Philadelphia: Sam D'Amico's. Sam was a drummer who had played in bands with my dad when they were teenagers.

(We brought along the [wonderful] drummer  in my dad's band, Carl Mottola [hear him play and hear my dad's arrangments, here], a tall, gangly fellow with kind of an early Beatles haircut, even though he was primarily a swing/jazz player. Carl was of a particular kind of Philadelphia Italian guy: he gave me a dollar whenever he saw me, all the years I was growing up. He was also only one of two people who was allowed to call me "Chrissy" into my adult years -- the other having been my maternal grandmom.

Scripted Sincerity

Welcome to The Borg Collective.

On the radio, this morning, I heard a guy explain, with no sense of outrage (or even mild, wistful amusement) that hospitals, in order to get higher customer satisfaction ratings, are "scripting" doctors and nurses. For instance, they are telling a nurse who is transferring a patient to say things like: "Oh, you are going to the third floor. You'll have so-and-so as a nurse. She's wonderful."

Isn't that heart-breakingly hilarious? They are scripting the personal touch.

One must, after all, impress the queen bee of the hive, right? Or, in this case, the "team" that heads the "team," which is composed of more "teams."

Now, people are being told what to say in a workplace that is supposed to be driven under the energy of compassion and a desire to help others to heal. In a hospital, for God's sake. This is fine with the general population, because it is good for the work community. And what is good for the community is all that is important, right?

And what do you say, as a nurse or doctor? Do you say, "No, I won't do this," and risk losing your job in a struggling economy? No. Of course you don't. It doesn't seem like such a great evil, when you look at it that way. But, splice all of these little evils end-to-end, and you have the road to Orwell's worst nightmare.

I didn't start writing this blog with an agenda in mind, but you will notice that I keep coming back to this theme of the not-so-slow death of the individual in an increasingly hive-minded society. It just keeps slapping me in the face.

Well, call me old-fashioned, but when I get hit, I tend to hit back.

The Social Prison

The other day I was at an educational conference and one of the speakers -- a very peppy, short-haired woman with, if I'm being fair, a lot of talent as a teacher -- uttered the phrase: "None of us is as smart as all of us."

Those of you who read my stuff from time to time probably know what is coming next: God, I hate phrases like that. And, besides, it just isn't true. (This is a generally profanity-free blog, or I would make reference to the excrement of a particular horned animal with a strange attraction to red capes and the rib-cages of Hispanic fellows in tight pants.)

I can't stand acrobatic phrases like the one the speaker used. It is supposed to be a "we get more done when we work together" phrase, but it twists and flips itself to be so. And, truth is, it winds up really being yet another of our steps toward a world in which the individual is continually smothered or assimilated, whether it be philosophically or politically.

Some of us are smarter than all of us. There are people who can accomplish feats of creativity and problem-solving in the solitude of their rooms or studies or labs that no committee or board or think-tank ever could.

The Heart of Hope

Most people agree that it is always uplifting and jolly to have me as a Facebook friend. For instance, the other day, I posted this, in the wake of the recent American embassy attacks:

Let me get this straight: some ass in California releases an offensive video about Islam and those who are offended by it go on a killing spree against America. Explain to me, again, how it is that I'm not supposed to lose my faith in humanity?

My first friend to respond was Denise, who said, quite powerfully (and very sweetly): "Your children."

At first, this made me feel nice -- I got that warm belly feeling. I thought: Yeah. My kids are good people. They will do good things. Maybe there is hope. 

But then I thought about it more. They are good kids. But guess where their worst behavior happens? In groups.

They're not bullies. They're not evil. In fact, they are so exceptionally well-behaved, I often find myself wishing, just once, they would do something wrong in school -- just for the sake of establishing a little bit of a sense of power and a tiny pinch of healthy rebellion in their hearts.

Escaping Streaming Virtuality

I even joke with myself about my being an "early-onset curmudgeon." But, the truth is, I have always been a bit of an anachronism; a fan or solitude; a guy with a distaste for either conformity or blatant, conformist non-conformity; a lover of conversation over wasted hours under flashing lights and noisy, empty-headed music. I've always been a reader and a thinker. I college, I used to sit in the woods and write before the mists had lifted for the morning. I've always valued reason and good-sense over unreasonable fulfillment or risk.

The only time I ever got "in trouble" in high school was because of a piece I wrote for the school "newspaper"; a short, satirical play called Spamlet. Otherwise, not a single detention.

Holding the Melon Together

Days off from work are good for reflection and reflection is good for putting scares into you.

I took the kids to school and then went to a lab so a relentless, sadomasochistic harpy with needles and tubes could suction half the blood out of my body. Got that done and went over to take care of my sister's cats, one of whom thinks I am Satan incarnate (the first animal I have ever known that didn't like me) and the other of whom, whom thinks (hehe) nothing of me.  In short, if the second cat is Wolfgang Puck, I am a microwaved hot dog (without mustard) in a grade school cafeteria.

In the waiting room at "The Lab of Horrors," I listened (had no choice) to the mediocre philosophizing of The Today Show hosts. (There is nothing worse than a gaggle of mediocre thinkers who think they are making illuminating points. Total idiots are, at least, entertaining. Mediocre thinkers with jobs on TV are dangerous, because they lead the other mediocre zombies in brain-seeking lines of cultural destruction.) "Host one" made a statement about Mark Zuckerberg and his tendency to wear hoodies. "Host two" was "offended" by that statement and tried to make it a "white/black" thing by connecting host one's tangential statement to the death of Trayvon Martin. "Why is it that when a black kid wears a hoodie....but when Mark Zuckerberg wears a hoodie..."

Holy crap. Sometimes my head feels like a sliced melon and I have to hold the two halves from slipping apart. Just: holy crap. I've little doubt the kid's death was racially motivated, but doesn't anyone know the definition of non-sequiter anymore? There's a fine line between uncovering a hidden connection and stuffing a humpback whale into sandwich bag. JEEEEZOOO!!

Resisting the Twisters of God

Some years ago, I bought Sting's album The Soul Cages. Lyrically, I think it is his best work -- in fact, I would group the lyrics on that album in with some of the finest works of English literature. No I'm not kidding. Only time will tell, I suppose.

Be that as it may, on one song, "All This Time," Sting utters the line:

"Men go crazy in congregations; they only get better one by one."

This, I worked out years later, is derived from Charles Mackay's statement:

"Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, and one by one."

Sting is putting a slant on it, of course, at the expense of organized religion, but the principle is the same: We need to work things out for ourselves, in the end. But how many of us do?