[jessupe]

Originally Posted by steve s

Thanks for the reply. I'm still trying to digest it.

Any thoughts on the minor issue?

Steve

To summarize Rich's thoughts....There is a mathematical/pitch based reason, as well as an undefined "human" element that "we" "humans" "feel" related to what we hear in "Resolution" it can take many forms and leave us "feeling" a certain way..

."Keys" such as major and minor or "happy and sad" again can be explained, as Rich gave examples, in a pitch/mathematical way, but really, both listeners and composers "feel" these things that , well just are there...Much in a way that we know we have emotions and feelings that are happy and sad, and that in time, we named these felling happy and sad, but I suppose we could have reversed them, or we could call the color orange blue, but for what ever human reason we named things the names we did, and we identify these feeling with those names, happy and sad...

so really what it comes down to is that a good composer/ song writter will be able to convey complex feelings and emotions using sound.

adding lyrics can "pinpoint" the meaning , whereas a long symphonic journey can be laid out where many different feelings can be conveyed to the astute listener in one long piece without saying a word...

When we hear the William Tell Overture {the lone ranger} suddenly via association, many of us feel like jummping on a horse and riding full blast, but even if you had never heard it before as the intro to the show, you'd still associate those types of feelings of "exhilaration" or "charging" more so than say, a tranquil walk on the moors...

and so in a way there is no concrete reason as to why we "feel" these emotions about certain combinations of notes/chord progressions as they change through a sequence of rhythmic time where there is a beginning, middle and end, but they do, and thats why we're all here...

So in this hypothetical situation Rich Posed, if you were a male who was attracted to females, and you saw a very very pretty woman walk by, you would get a certain feeling, you could describe it in so many words, but really when it comes down to it, we'll probably never really know exactly why that is other than you like pretty girls and that they make you feel good when they like you and are being nice to you, and they make you feel sad when they are not and who the heck knows why. We could explain it all in a biological way that could represent a mathematical sort of equivalent to pitch in music, make it all "sciency" but of course that only explains the half of it that's not explainable...

So its good to ponder, but its better to understand that your trying to convey emotion and that you can learn to "string feelings together" which is what its all about, telling a story in sound