Comments on: I now hit things in ensembles http://blog.melchua.com/2008/09/16/i-now-hit-things-in-ensembles/ Braindumps on things Mel Chua has found shiny lately. Sat, 11 Feb 2012 03:06:02 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: nikki http://blog.melchua.com/2008/09/16/i-now-hit-things-in-ensembles/comment-page-1/#comment-962 nikki Wed, 17 Sep 2008 13:40:34 +0000 http://blog.melchua.com/2008/09/16/i-now-hit-things-in-ensembles/#comment-962 No offense, but... this really bothers me. It just back again and again to the idea that percussion is something anyone can do, because it isn't real music, and so requires no actual training to excel at. It's considered normal to throw someone who knows fuck-all into a percussion section and say "here, music, hit things in time". I swear, if you put someone who'd never played violin in the middle of a violin section, what would happen? Or, say, someone who didn't know anything about piano [piano, like percussion, can be "played" by a raw beginner - they can get noise out of it]. And all of this undermines anyone who plays percussion instruments who actually /does/ have training, actually /does/ use interpretation and technique towards musicality - it's nearly impossible to get any respect as a musician if you play percussion because all anyone's ever met is that guy in the back of the group who smokes pot in the band room and got suspended twice or the dude who reads cheap novels during movements. Also also, I'm pretty sure there are parts of the snare drum that are outside your hearing range. No offense, but… this really bothers me. It just back again and again to the idea that percussion is something anyone can do, because it isn’t real music, and so requires no actual training to excel at. It’s considered normal to throw someone who knows fuck-all into a percussion section and say “here, music, hit things in time”. I swear, if you put someone who’d never played violin in the middle of a violin section, what would happen? Or, say, someone who didn’t know anything about piano [piano, like percussion, can be "played" by a raw beginner - they can get noise out of it]. And all of this undermines anyone who plays percussion instruments who actually /does/ have training, actually /does/ use interpretation and technique towards musicality – it’s nearly impossible to get any respect as a musician if you play percussion because all anyone’s ever met is that guy in the back of the group who smokes pot in the band room and got suspended twice or the dude who reads cheap novels during movements.

Also also, I’m pretty sure there are parts of the snare drum that are outside your hearing range.

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