As I was playing around with this whole idea of the harmonic functions of
language, I got in touch with a couple of ethnomusicologists who have been working
in the field. and approached them about this concept of
do we really establish atonic do we go subdominant motion away from tonic
dominant motion toward tonic both subdominant and dominant being unstable
the tonic sort of being the fact the tonic being honesty the tonic being
statement. And I just let them know, you know, some
of this stuff that I had been thinking about and one of the folks, a guy by the
name of Joseph Jordania, who's written two books, one called Who Asked the First
Question. And his latest book called Why Do People
Sing? And he contacted me and said that he
though that the idea was was a valid one and that he wanted me to continue to
explore it. he said, he hadn't really seen anything
about it. and so I continue to explore it.
But in the meantime, I've been taking a look at his books, particularly his book,
Why Do People Sing? And I think that it's I think that it's
worth talking about. When we were in our infancy as hominids,
we were living in Africa, we were living in the trees and we were living in the
trees because on the ground was a very dangerous place, on the ground there were
lions. And so there we were and the higher we
could climb, the safer we would be so being light was a good thing.
At some point we discovered according to Joseph Jordania, that we had this thing
here, and not only did we have this thing here that could make noise, but we could
and learned to make noise together. We made noise together so that rather
than just you know random calls from tree to tree and so on we could actually
concert our voices. We can sound them together and it sounded
loud, it sounded maybe a bit scary and so tentatively, we came down out of the
trees onto the very dangerous ground. And as a group, learned, over the
millenium we learned to make noise together, we learned, according to Joseph
to stand on our hind legs to make us appear bigger, we learned to stomp on the
primitive drums and earth and we learned to bang rocks together while making noise
and stomping, and even throw rocks. Why did we do this?
Well, according to him, when the lion made its kill, killed the antelope, we as
a group. Appeared to be this big thing, making all
this noise, and throwing sticks and rocks, and stomping, and particularly
yelling, yelling. and approach the lion, and we learned to
drive the lion off its kill. And once the lion started leaving its
kill and we had that protein then we started to gain weight, we started to
grow. Banging the rocks together by the way,
some of them broke. Had very sharp edges, learned to gut the
antelope with that, the formation of tools, so that we spent, according to
"Why Do People Sing?," basically the first two and a half million years of our
existence as hominids as scavengers. Driving the lion off its kill.
And according to him the bone records of the hominids and the lions across Africa
match perfectly. So that we really did follow the lion and
the lion was our hunter, our designated killer and I think thats an incredibly
interesting therory and what what seems so interesting and compelling about it is
that when we make noise together, when we sing together part of our brain lights up
that has to do with survival. Not with pleasure, not with all of that
stuff, with survival, that is, singing together, like sex, like breastfeeding,
like breathing, like flight or fight, all of those instincts that light up the
primitive brain stem. The survival portion of our brain are lit
up when we sing together so that singing together is actually an essential
survival marker. It's something that is linked to survival
and according to Joseph Jordania nobody spoke a word, but we did learn that
singing with tones, yelling with tones when we sang together, if we, if, if, our
tones were all stable it didn't sound as loud as when we use dissonance.
And he calls that the birth of polyphony so that we were singing together long
before the first word was spoken. Consequently, when we sing together
something happens, it's the same thing that happens when we have sex, it's the
same thing that happens when we breastfeed.
There is a reward system, called oxytocin, that creates a strong bond that
that gives us pleasure, that rewards us for this act of singing together.
So that singing is fundamental, it is hard wired into our DNA.
When you write a song, remember that one of the things that your song is capable
of doing is engaging the tribe. Is engaging the tribe to drive the lion
off its kill and feed us all so that in terms of questions like, simple,
singable, memorable chorus? Complex, intellectual, how smart I am,
chorus? Invite your audience in, let them sing
with you, let them bond with you, let them be your tribe.
So there it is. Now we only have six weeks, and boy,
songwriting is really a lifetime, of fun, a lifetime of exploration, a lifetime of
growth. so, where do you go next?
Well, you know Berkeleymusic.com has a fabulous online school.
I've written five courses for it tools and strategies, writing lyrics to music,
writing from a title, writing poetry. I've been teaching poetry at Berkeley for
my entier time here and finally, creative writing finding your voice which is based
on my newest book Songwriting Without Boundaries.
So, those courses are there and available.
Now, we couldn't do everything in this course and what got the shortest amount
of attention was harmony. We've got nothing really in harmony.
And what a world that is. Berkley, Berkley music has wonderful
songwriting course in, in harmony by Jimmy Kachulis.
his melody course also really wonderful. Andrea Stolpe has songwriting course
here. There's just all sorts of songwriting
stuff to take a look at if you're interested.
the courses are limited in the number of people that can take them which would be
an unusual experience for you, I'm sure. and they're all instructor driven so you
get feedback from the instructor on either a daily basis or at least a weekly
basis for the 12 week course that a that, that you a that you do.
So you know, I strongly encourage you to at least take a look and see what what
Berkley music has to offer. they are such a crack team.
I have four books out. you've seen seen them referred to in
suggested readings as we, as we go. of course, I encourage you to take a look
at those if you haven't already. but for the most for the most part, I
would simply like to say, thank you. Thank you so much for staying the course.
Thank you so much for being interested enough in your growth to understand that
information, rather than stifling your creativity, actually enhances your
creativity that Knowing stuff is something that helps you to locate where
you need to go, where you might want to look in this vast woods of options.
To find due north, to find the place to go for that idea is most likely to live.
So that information, combined with inspiration, combined with intuition, is
unstoppable. And I hope that if nothing else, that
that has become clear that is exercises that you have been doing have been
stimulating. Have pulled back the bow.
Have held you back to some degree, but now when you release the string that
you're straight and true to your target or as straight and true as anybody can be
in the arts. So thank you so much for coming.
thank you so much for your attention and write write fearlessly, write prosity.
Make sure that Aristotle is alive and well in your hearts, that everything you
do strives toward that wonderful goal of unity.
