Will Musical Instruments Become Obsolete?

Barry Blackwood · Post by **Barry Blackwood** » 25 Feb 2011 6:06 pm

We've been down this road before. "Tax cuts" translate into corporate welfare, and the monies, instead of creating new hires, go into corporate pockets. C'mon.

Tony Glassman · Post by **Tony Glassman** » 25 Feb 2011 7:56 pm

Barry, maybe you're right,I don't know. I just hate to see the continual downward slide of the US manufacturing base and jobs.

I think offering corporate tax credits for each new hire is a win/win situation. Better corporate bottom line in trade for more jobs. Lord knows corporations get enough tax cuts as it is. If we based them on payroll, maybe we'd get something out of it.

Anyway I'll sign off about this. We're talking economics now but are probably getting perilously close to discussing politics...which is verboten (and rightly so) on the forum.

Randy Wade · Post by **Randy Wade** » 26 Feb 2011 1:46 pm

Don't worry fellows, musical instruments will never become obsolete. According to the bible there will even be stringed instruments played in heaven. Try this test: Listen to some computer generated music and see if you get excited. Next go listen to a good steel guitar player with a live band and see how that makes you feel. I find more folks wanting to learn to play real music nowdays than ever before. Good music, real instruments, here to stay!

Clete Ritta · Post by **Clete Ritta** » 26 Feb 2011 2:24 pm

Whew that was close!
I thought the thread was about to be closed for going political.

There is a political aspect to the question I hadnt considered earlier.

Our personal freedoms are controlled by governing laws.

In an Orwellian Future (or, some very restrictive places on earth today) where music itself becomes illegal, musical instruments still dont become obsolete, they just go underground as in prohibition.

The human voice is the first musical instrument, and the inspiration for the invention of many of the instruments we play today.
Musical instruments will become obsolete only if we become obsolete!
Still dont think so.

Clete

Theresa Galbraith · Post by **Theresa Galbraith** » 28 Feb 2011 3:47 pm

I steel so NO !

Kevin Hatton · Post by **Kevin Hatton** » 28 Feb 2011 9:11 pm

Tony Glassman I'm with you.

Glenn Suchan · Post by **Glenn Suchan** » 1 Mar 2011 10:05 am

As a extension of modern human culture, I think not. The need to create musical sound using an fabricated appliance dates back thousands of years and coincides with the beginnings of complex communication within primitive tribal groups.

The earliest documented (controversial) evidence of a deliberately manufactured musical instrument dates to approximately 43,000 years ago, near what is now Cerkno, in Slovenia. Although modern man (Homo Sapien Sapien) existed at that time, they were not in the Central Eurasian steppe until around 30,000 years ago.

The instrument is a flute made from the femur of a juvenile cave bear. It was found at the Divje Babe archeological dig. Other artifacts at the site indicate Mousterian culture which was exclusive to Homo Neanderthalensis (Neanderthal Man). Many scientists claim the flute was not deliberately made, and that it's only the remains of an animal kill. In my opinion, these same scientists have difficulty equating Neanderthal culture to include artistic expression. With that said, the earliest discovered and documented musical instrument made by Homo Sapien Sapien was, once again, a flute dating to approximately 35,000 years ago. This flute was discovered in a cave in southwestern Germany along with the "Venus of Hohle Fels" figurine. These specimens were found among other artifacts of the Aurignacian Culture, prevalent of European homo sapien sapiens from 45,000 to 35,000 years ago.

With people making and playing musical instruments for 35 millennia or more, I don't think we'll be seeing the end of musical instruments any time soon. Hmmm, I wonder what the pedal steel guitar will be like 35,000 years into the future.

Keep on pickin'!
Glenn

Ray Minich · Post by **Ray Minich** » 5 Mar 2011 8:06 am

Synthetic music generation will never replace musical instrument generated sounds, but it augments the product.

I hear the output of a synthesis program called "Dream Station" every so often in commercials and on the radio. There was even background music to the Weather Channels "Weather on the 8's" the other night that came from that program. "Dream Station" is great for generating long strings of 1/128th notes to sampled inputs.

Additional, alternative, modified, augmented, mashed-up sounds... yes. Drop-in replacements... no.

Dale Bennett · Post by **Dale Bennett** » 5 Mar 2011 1:43 pm

Some may, but, as far as i'm concerned, they can never get the true sound of a steel guitar or a good guitar with the electronics, to me theirs nothing like the sound of a steel and and a good picker playing it. But I play bass and a little, very little guitar and i'm sure I can be replaced. So what do I know. db

Clete Ritta · Post by **Clete Ritta** » 5 Mar 2011 9:11 pm

Glenn Suchan wrote:...The earliest documented (controversial) evidence of a deliberately manufactured musical instrument dates to approximately 43,000 years ago...The instrument is a flute...

I suppose the horn and its harmonic series was also recognized very shortly after in human musical history.

The modern day air horn says no as well, it is not obsolete.
It just means Look Out!

Clete

The Steel Guitar Forum

Will Musical Instruments Become Obsolete?

Musical instruments becoming extinct?

Will musicial instrument someday be obsolete