Emotional Value of Chords

Check out my article in Ukulele about the emotional value of chords. http://www.ukulelemag.com/stories/news/the-emotional-value-of-chords

Excellent article, thanks for posting. I was reading it earlier this week in the hard copy of the magazine. Looking forward to the next article...

Whatever works. I enjoyed your article very much.
Music innovators have toyed with the inscription stuff for centuries. It's all about new languages, isn't it? (Yours may work better than those of John Cage!) But, what if a IV chord emits a different emotion in someone else? Your system will still work, but very differently.
This is all very interesting stuff. Thank you Jim, for sharing your innovative and always interesting work.

Ha ha, when I opened up Uke Talk this morning and saw this thread, I didn't look to see who posted it. I was going to get on there and tell whoever started it that they should try to attend a Jim D'Ville workshop because he does a real good job of exploring it.

On a similar line of discussion...I found this about a year ago.
http://www.gradfree.com/kevin/some_theory_on_musical_keys.htm

ubulele said:

I'm sorry, but since the widespread adoption of equal temperament, any association between keys and particular emotional qualities is rubbish; it's like the astrology or homeopathy of music, except inasmuch as it once did have a basis in reality, back when the intervals of scales had different sizes and instruments were more tied to specific keys. If I play the same song in two different keys, you won't hear a whit of difference in mood.

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Hmm...very interesting.
Honestly, I do sense certain emotions from certain keys; unlike a robot, I have feelings. Have you checked lately to see if you might be a "replicant"?

ubulele said:

It's not worth trying to reason with you. And watch your mode of expression: a smiley doesn't give you a pass to be offensive.

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I hope one day you can open your mind to the emotional side of music.

Now go play some happy keys, Mr. Roboto!

Okay, you're both right. Let's be friends/friendly.
ubulele, I get what you're saying. I'm also in the camp that chords do not invoke emotion any more than they create it. I too find the notion ridiculous. But, as is obvious, from only the original post, people have emotional responses to chords. Is it the same kind of response a mother feels when hearing her baby cry? No. But it's probably not too distantly related. We are wired to have differing emotional responses to various sights, smells, (very strong responses to these) and sounds. Do we all have the same responses to sounds? Certainly not, but to say emotional responses to sounds or chords don't exist is surely wrong. My previous post on this thread addresses my thought that trying to create, from emotional response alone, a language universal enough to use in notation is unrealistic. Interesting idea, though. Maybe there is something to the commonality of emotional responses to chords, or chord progressions (slightly more likely). But, it's all learned from life experience, not pre-programmed commonality. My response will be different than Jim's. So, although he may create a way to notate it, it will only work perfectly for him. And the less like Jim we are, the less useful it will be, for each of us. Make a commonly useful language of it? Ridiculous. But, say it's a bad idea? Just as wrong.

By the way, the equal temperament was developed to deal with sound, not emotion. You're right it's intended to sort of balance out the way music will sound when played in different keys. But, it's not perfect. Plus, our instruments are even more imperfect than equal temperament. So, big can of worms there.

Temporarily locking for review.

It's fine for people to disagree with you here. In fact, it's pretty much fine for people to disagree with you anywhere. Once you accept that, you'll find you grind your teeth less and your blood pressure drops to normal levels.

It is not fine for you to insult or (attempt to) belittle those who disagree with you here. Really, it's true. If you don't believe me, just keep doing it and see what happens. Play nice.

A general heads-up: moderators can (and always do) read deleted posts.

Have a lovely week.

buddhuu said:

A general heads-up: moderators can (and always do) read deleted posts.

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Thanks for the heads up.
That is a good bit of info to know.

Cheers,
Johnson

music in the unspoken language of soul. i totally agree that most chords have certain emotions but more importantly you can put your emotion into chords and notes you play ... believe me it works