Brilliant: How is the music we make shaped by where we listen to it?

singemonkey

David Byrne of Talking Heads takes us through the influence on where and how we listen to music and what it means to the music we make. Are we writing the wrong music for the wrong venues? It's long, but almost essential reading for musicians.

http://www.salon.com/2012/09/16/david_byrne_my_love_affair_with_sound/

It helps me understand why some of our best live experiences have been in certain places. Will definitely affect the way I think about writing music.

Seventhson

I must admit I feel most inspired while listening to music in the car. seeing the world pass by.

Also sitting on my roof also inspires me. lol

Squonk

A very good read and I can identify with this, even with my limited Open Mic nights and a couple of live performances.

The musical pieces I write at home in my small 3 x 3 room, I did find hard to play live in a room of talking, drinking people, and the extreme acoustic differences. And I am just talking about simple fingerstyle guitar!

I have learned to adapt the pieces, the more I play live.

A real silly example, I have a song "From Padstow to Polperro", a musical piece that consists of about 5 distinct sections , where each section is part of journey across Cornwall to find the perfect pasty. With recorded music I would have the little story explaining the piece printed on the sleeve. But how do I get this information across in a live setting, with all the munching, drinking, talking etc.
So I started to do a bit of a narrative between all the pieces, giving some revelation here and there. Works well in that setting.

And obviously I have composed a whole bunch of songs for that setting.

Bear with me....

I visited another Acoustic Club in the area that had a stage in a very loud bar full of people getting louder and drunker by the minute. My whole idea was to have a go, but realized my current set list wouldn't work in a place like this, I would have to tweak some songs and possibly compose a whole new batch.

Good Stuff

Psean

Fascinating stuff! Thanks ?