Scaling Back: The Pattern of Music’s Return to Simplicity

Feb 15, 2018
8 min read

Minimalism: it’s not just a great way to save money – its concepts and philosophy has a presence throughout music history. There seems to be a pattern of music reaching a peak of certain elements and then scaling back, embracing minimal concepts of the time. The focus here is on artists that made a conscious choice to simplify, rather than out of necessity or convenience.

Baroque to Classical

Let’s start back in the 17th century, during the Baroque era of music history. Before it was applied to art or music, the term baroque meant abnormal, bizarre, exaggerated, or grotesque. (b) Initially, it characterized visual art as flamboyant, decorative, and expressive. Later it was applied to a specific era of music, mainly due to shared qualities in architecture, painting, philosophy, and literature of the time. (a) It is important to note that a variety of diverse styles presented themselves during what is deemed as the Baroque period. As with other eras of music, bookend dates and one word descriptions are too limiting. One common thread that is prominent in music of this era is a focus on displaying feelings, or what they called, affections. Visual art of the time often displayed distorted images. Music followed suit, and composers focused on expanding limits to portray the sought-after affection. They did this by breaking conventions, such as the rules of consonance and dissonance and regular rhythms. (1)

By the end of the Baroque period, roughly 1750, the style was characterized by melodies that shifted between voices, a polyphonic texture (2), rapidly changing chords, and sections with a single theme. (b) Baroque musicians considered ornaments (3) essential to portraying the affections, rather than superfluous or decorative. (a)

Then came the Enlightenment, and with it an overall preference of naturalness over artificiality. Education became more universal, rather than confined to one class of society. Ethics became more utilitarian. The privileged class came under public scrutiny. All of this contributed to a sense of universal humanity. (a) Public concerts replaced private concerts and academies. Amateurs became intellectuals in music literature. The 18th century musical taste can be summed up as: music should be universal, expressive, natural, and free of technical ornaments. It should be able to immediately please any listener. (a)

The Classical period of music history coincides with the Enlightenment. The term classic stems from the simplicity of Greek and Roman art. It is characterized by a focus on equilibrium, diversity within unity, and being free from excess ornamentation. (a) Classical music portrays uncomplicated harmony, slower harmonic rhythm, and clear key relationships. It had simple melodies, short phrases, and regular rhythm. The phrasing of Classical music is comparable to speech patterns. (b) In short, it was more accessible to the common man. Opera in particular mirrored society more so than before – by using the common language and characters based on real people, rather than gods and goddesses. As a true partner to the Enlightenment, Classical music gave the general public something they could relate to via an art form that had become much more open to them.

Again, a disclaimer about generalizations, for it is definitely generalizing to say that the complexity of Baroque music led to the simplicity of Classical music. Again, all music of a particular era cannot be confined to one individual descriptor. Also, the style of Classical music was a natural progression, one that happened to appeal the public. And it certainly cannot be pigeon holed as simple – one of the things that fascinates me about Classical music is its ability to be both complex and accessible within certain confinements. The people of the 18th century related to Classical music the way we relate to pop songs.

Romantic to Twentieth-Century

Now let’s fast forward to the end of the 19th century, during the Romantic era. By this time, composers were taking full advantage of a certain level of artistic freedom that was not available to composers from previous eras. This resulted in works that were bigger, longer, descriptive, much more personal and even autobiographical. By the end of turn of the century, composers were really pushing the envelope. Debussy expanded the boundaries of tonality; Wagner created his own musical language. Wagner’s operas not only require an attentive listening, but a whole other level of commitment, such as a willingness to sit through a series of four-hour long operas to get the full effect.

In the 20th century, composers such as Schoenberg did away with tonality altogether, and wrote atonal pieces. (4) This led to a method of composition called serialism, which methodically manipulates a set of specific pitches. The result is music that sounds random, static, and cold. It is not at all what our ears are accustomed to because it abandons principles of melody, harmony, and rhythm. This would be the music to put on at a party… if you are trying to get everyone to leave. Atonal compositions were unconventional to say the least. They opened the box for a free for all of experimentation in the late 20th century, including chance music (5), electronic music, and minimalist music.

Minimalist music is characterized by a steady pulse, clear tonality, and repetition of short melodic fragments. Elements such as harmony and texture remain constant. There is an emphasis on simple forms, clarity, and understatement. Again, a natural progression, minimalism was a reaction against the complexity of serialism and randomness of chance music. (c)

Composers chose to deliberately limit musical material. Minimalist music was inspired by Non-western music, particularly Asian and Indian music. (6) It made use of the controlled improvisation, alternating patterns of rhythmic units, micro-tonal intervals, and drones present in Indian ragas. (a) (7) Minimalist music relies heavily on the reiteration of patterns. It embraced the synthesizer, which made it easy to improvise over rhythmic and melodic motives. Minimalist composers were also inspired by the directness, hypnotic rhythms, consonant harmonies, and repeated phrases of rock music.

Extremes such as atonality removed music from its common and shared everyday usage. Whereas the tonality and pulse of minimalism were familiar, essentially equivalent to language. Minimalism engaged the composer, performer, and public simultaneously. (d) Corresponding with visual art of the time, minimalist music seemed to pursue simplicity: “a concern with the gap between composer and listener has led to simplification and even minimization of content.” (a)

Stadium Rock to Punk

Popular music in the 60’s and 70’s also displayed a backlash of experimentation. (Yet another disclaimer: as with other periods, no one style defines these eras as well). As recording technology progressed, so did the possibilities for experimentation. The “Wall of Sound,” crafted by producer Phil Spector, utilized a giant orchestra for recordings by artists such as Tina Turner and the Righteous Brothers. The singer-songwriter movement was born out of a reaction against the wall. Cat Stevens (Yusuf Islam) felt as if he didn’t recognize his music that was heavily produced. He wanted more control and less interference. (e) This was the essence of the singer-songwriter movement: people writing their own songs, telling a story, and expressing themselves personally. Carole King’s Tapestry is considered the embodiment of a self-expression album.

The live performance reached a peak of decadence in the 70’s. The stadium show became more theatrical and idolized the rock star. It forced the musicians to play back, and the distance between them and the audience grew. Enter Bruce Springsteen, who “created his own counter culture” that really spoke to America (f). The Born to Run (1975) album represented escaping claustrophobia and decadence. By the same measure, and at the same time, Punk was born in Detroit. It was minimalist and represented the backlash of stadium rock. Across the pond in England, Punk was a social and political statement, driven by anger and frustration. By the end of the eighties, the music video market had become saturated, and MTV ushered in the unplugged series, featuring a variety of artists in scaled back, exclusively acoustic performances.

In the studio, artists had begun making music that could not exist outside of it. The concept of simply recreating a live performance was thrown out the window. As the technology of multi-track recording progressed, and more and more tracks were added, the possibilities for experimentation and synthetic music progressed. Of course, one of the foundations of rock music is experimentation and pushing boundaries, but it is also about choice and doing your own thing. And some producers made the choice to ignore the limitless possibilities of using multiple tracks. Artists such as Eurthmics, Beck, Bon Iver, and St. Vincint chose to compartmentalize by using equipment such as a four-track recorder or a digital home studio.

The pattern of scaling back reflects the ebb and flow of music itself. It is an understandable, if not inevitable reaction. It is also an ode to simplicity, a reminder to us all to take a step back, and trim away anything that is not necessary. By far, my favorite assignment I had as an undergraduate was in a Philosophy of Music class. The professor gave each student a “mystery tape,” (yes, a cassette tape): a recording of a different song for each of us, but did not give us any information on it. The assignment was to figure out what the song was and who recorded it, and, of course, to wright a paper about it. I figured out mine (thanks to the Blues DJ at the college radio station where I also did a radio show) was “Dark Was the Night – Cold Was the Ground” by Blind Willie Johnson. A voice, a guitar, no words…pure Blues. Many years later, I still agree with the twenty-two-year-old version of me that said, “The art of listening is often taken for granted; it is often thought of as being automatic. Those who are tempted to characterize this song as ‘simple’ do not know how to listen to music. Music is a natural element, and does not always need to be filled out and added onto. It is often the simplest songs that are the most remarkable because they are able to relay a message using the raw elements of music.”

Say What?

(1) Consonance: a stable, agreeable sound; Dissonance: a sound that is disagreeable or that requires resolution.

(2) A polyphonic texture, also called counterpoint, consists of two or more lines of melody.

(3) An ornament is a decorative element, such as a trill or turn, written or improvised, that adds expression to a melody.

(4) Atonal music does not have a tonal center.

(5) Chance music, also called aleatoric music, is music that deliberately leaves the choice of pitches, rhythmic values, or the order of events to chance.

(6) As well as Javanese and Balinese gamelan (an orchestra consisting mainly of gongs and percussion) music.

(7) An Indian raga is similar to a scale in Indian classical music.

Giving Props:

(a) Donald J. Grout & Claude V. Palisca. A History of Western Music. 6th ed. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2001

(b) From the notes of my professor for all of my music lit classes in grad school: Dr. Schmidt, who has encyclopedic knowledge of all things music history

(d) Salzman, Eric. Twentieth-Century Music. 4th ed. London: Pearson, 2001

(e) From the PBS documentary “Soundbreaking,” Part 1: The Art of Recording”

(f) From the CNN documentary “The Seventies,” Episode 8: “What’s Goin’ On”

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