Society has always differentiated between two types of music-making, the music-making of the well-trained “classical” musicians and that of the untrained populace.
So what clearly differentiated both groups in Mozart’s day and still differentiates most today?...[t]he answer lies in their manner of performance. Specifically, in how each group managed the flow of the sounds in time (the flow of the music in time, if you will). The difference lies in how each group kept track of the orientation of the sounds in time, i.e., how they kept track of the rhythm, the note values, etc. Even more specifically: how they were able to manage themselves, their own person, in short, their control over and use of their own bodies in regard to preserving the orientation of the sounds in time.
Man started as a vulgar, uncontrolled, inelegant beast, incapable of refined higher experience. We still do, when we start out as babies...[t]he first expectation of all society when classical music was developing was that refined, educated people be in control of everything about their physical person. Allowing one’s body to wiggle, scratch, or follow any uncontrolled impulses was considered vulgar. Why? Because the word vulgar comes from the word vulgate, the uncontrolled populace of the street, which was the untrained, disadvantaged masses that did not have access to training or circumstances that developed higher personal self-control. Only the advantaged of the time had access to upbringing and training that taught self-control, elegance, refinement and physical control in all circumstances, including those of music-making.
The differences between the formally well or exquisitely trained musicians and the untrained musicians of the vulgar populace showed itself most obviously in their ability in, and ways of keeping, a beat and of keeping a rhythm in relation to the beat, i.e., in their keeping time. Tapping one’s foot or physically using any other part of one’s body to keep time was then a vulgarity, plain and simple, and actually still is, today...[p]opular music is, therefore, still firmly rooted in the realm of the street-music, the vulgar, etc., some tenuously some quite firmly. But a problem of differentiation these days is that classical musicians have very much regressed to the point where the original mastery of the myriad aspects of the flow of music in time, i.e., of “tempo”, is reduced to little more than simply trying to keep a steady beat and still needing some overt physical means of keeping the pulse in order to not lose one’s control or not lose one’s place in the score altogether.
To recapitulate:The basic, most obvious difference between the finely trained musicians, of Mozart’s ilk, for example, and the street bands and other not formally trained musicians was that the musics of the untrained musicians was characterized by a drum beating time, by foot tapping, and by otherwise moving along with the music in order to keep track of the beat and the progress of the music.
Similar arguments can be made in fine art such as oil paintings by masters found in art galleries and street graffitti murals.the aporoaches are different, watch an episode w bob ross and a landscape developing and watch a thug tag up or street artist create on a wall or side of a building. They look different because they are different, the creative process is not the same.You can hear differences quote classical vs street pop music because the creative process us different. So the end result end product is significantly different as well.
Topic: "The Differentiation Between Classical and Street Music" article