Imagine being a farmer in a middle of nowhere Europe in the 18th Century. You work in the field year round. You hear the sound of nature all day long. Maybe you sing to yourself and with your co-workers. Maybe at night you gather around the fireplace and sing to the accompaniment of an instrument. Then, you go to the church on Sunday. There, you listen, and sing to the pipe organ. Your ears ring. You hear the echoes. You feel your whole body vibrate with the sound. You feel your voice resonate with the organ, the echoes, and the whole congregation. Imagine how that communal aural/vocal experience must have affected you.
Imagine being a resident of Yokosuka, Japan in 1853. Your country has been isolated from the rest of the world for over 200 years. Then, American black ships land your port. Along with the military threats, you hear the military band for the first time, with its drums thundering, and the brass instruments splitting the air. Imagine the awe that must have struck you.
When Edison held a demonstration of phonograph to the National Academy of Sciences in Washington D.C. in 1878, audience members fainted. The invention of phonograph introduced a new era of Schizophonia, combining Greek words Schizo “to split” and phone “to sound.” Psychologist and musicologist, Eric Clarke describes the primary function of hearing as “to discover what sounds are the sound of, and what to do about them.” The phenomenon of acousmata – sound with an unknown sound source – has been used to awe since Pythagoras, who gave his lectures behind veils to make his lectures more effective. But it had always been assumed that the sound source and the listener still share the physical space and time: not since the invention of the phonograph. Thus the shock, and the fainting.
Now, in the age of digitized sounds, the sound did not have to have physically existed. Ever. We do not faint at a video like this, but rather find it amusing.
…and find this more disturbing:
Various civilizations through our human history used the communal experience of music to strengthen our ties. But today, we use personalized recreation of digitized music playing in our ears to shield ourselves from the rest of the world.
That may be the real threat to our security, and our humanity.
P.S. For all of you who were too uncomfortable with the Star Wars without music.