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Funk University Disappointment

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#263
wade_b said:
It don't mean a thing if it ain't got that swing.

And I was married to a Greek - I've been to Greece twice, and I spent extensive time amongst the locals there.

I've heard plenty of off-time bazouki music.

That stuff wouldn't swing if you hung it, sorry to say.
Click to expand...

"Swing" is not the "absence of stiffness", it's a way of feeling a pulse that superimposes triple over duple meter. I wouldn't say Greek music swings. That's a different thing. Although some Iranian and some Armenian music swings like a mofo.
And a great deal of funk music does not swing. Some does, but a great deal is built rock solid on a bed of straight sixteenths. Swing? Nope. Syncopated? Yep, like all get out. Fat, massive groove, but not a hint of swing.

Regardless, as a recent poster said, I'm more interested in playing it and feeling it than in going intellectual about it.

But remind me, how does this relate to whether particular individuals feel like FU is giving them value for their dollar?
 
#264
kesslari said:
"Swing" is not the "absence of stiffness", it's a way of feeling a pulse that superimposes triple over duple meter. I wouldn't say Greek music swings. That's a different thing. Although some Iranian and some Armenian music swings like a mofo.
Click to expand...
I know what swing is.

You left out something important. Triplets aren't the end of the story. it's letting one note go a little long, and letting another go a little short that gives it the feel.

Otherwise you're just playing straight triplets with no feel.

So yeah, i stand by what I said. If it don't swing, it's stiff because every note is "on the grid" - there's no push and pull there.
 
#265
Back on the original topic, while people argue that Euros are stiff, funk university is a WASTE.

$30 bucks a month for people with zero skills to educate rambling about "the one". Do we really need dozens of videos of people babbling about the importance of counting to 8?

I don't care how famous you are, or think you are, we git it.

sure some of the background about how different bands used the downbeat accent, but beyond that where is the content?

Funk U. is pathetic so far. As said above, 80% fluff, and 20% random tab explanations. I'll add a bonus 10% that is all-star(?) faculty announcements. The site is confusing to navigate, cheezy beyond words, and the videos aren't even listed in chronological order. You have to read all the titles to even figure out where to start.

Endless videos of Bootsy squatting in front of a wall of gear saying the same thing over and over again, with different titles on each one. Some of the only useful stuff is buried in phony mystique/schtick, and features a static shot of an imaginary bass player named Thee Ram Jam as the video content.

PATHETIC

Whoever the web developer is on this, they stole the start up cash, and handed them a gilded turd of a website.

The mandatory automatic monthly renewal should have been enough of a warning that this was not being done with anything other than the intent to suck money from you.

The forum is full of kool-aid drinking patsies all chiming in with "man I dig, I dig, it's all about the ONE!" Said in the same gravitas with which one mentions the poor at a political convention.

Bootsy is one of my all time heros, we share a birthday, and I finally got to meet him last Jan. I was very excited to see what it would be like. To say that I am disappointed at what the Funk U. site actually has to offer, is an understatement of epic proportion.


[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]
 
#266
kesslari said:
But remind me, how does this relate to whether particular individuals feel like FU is giving them value for their dollar?
Click to expand...

Kinda silly, imo. If you don't learn oodles the first month, it's not gonna change. Drop it.

If you're flourishing, keep going.

Not much there to base a thread on.

The other bit has potential to be interesting to me. And for what it's worth, at many real colleges, and in many real libraries, you can learn about stuff like this, and more importantly gain the skills to think critically.
 
#269
Evidently SoupcanDan is listening. Times are a changin' at F.U.? Growing pains...

Swing? Take quotes from Louis Armstrong and others-about it. Then, pull out old timey swing music, become grounded with that, and move forward!
Feelin' the swing is so important. Soul-less technicians scare me...
 
#270
JAUQO III-X said:
Most rhythms that are of European origin is for the most part stiff. How could some one who has a natural life in their rhythm naturally would even want to be influenced by a form of rhythm that is stiff and lifeless for the most part.
Click to expand...

Now I have only skimmed through this thread but a lot of what I read in Jauqo's posts worries me.
There is zero back up to most of it and loads of it is simply not true-The stuff about influences-what influenced blues,jazz,the funk etc...there sure was european classical music, just as well as anything else that the "fathers and mothers"of these styles were exposed to.
A little browse through sections of the library of congress,new grove online and a look into Lomax will show this.
Alongside biographies.
Statements like "that's the truth" or similar don't make it so and are simply not good enough.
No even here on TB.

But the stuff in the one I am quoting here is real bad. Sorry.
Who says that european rhythms or those originating from them are for the most part stiff?
Only someone ignorant to european rhythms and possibly deaf to the musicality therein.
But after a little research that can surely be remedied.
Nonetheless; a little care and thought before making certain statements may be called for at this point.
Over and out.
:)
 
#272
cnltb said:
Now I have only skimmed through this thread but a lot of what I read in Jauqo's posts worries me.
There is zero back up to most of it and loads of it is simply not true-The stuff about influences-what influenced blues,jazz,the funk etc...there sure was european classical music, just as well as anything else that the "fathers and mothers"of these styles were exposed to.
Statements like "that's the truth" or similar don't make it so and are simply not good enough.
No even here on TB.

But the stuff in the one I am quoting here is real bad. Sorry.
Who says that european rhythms or those originating from them are for the most part stiff?
Only someone ignorant to european rhythms and possibly deaf to the musicality therein.
But after a little research that can surely be remedied.
Nonetheless; a little care and thought before making certain statements may be called for at this point.
Over and out.
:)
Click to expand...

+1,000.
 
#273
JAUQO III-X said:
Most rhythms that are of European origin is for the most part stiff. How could some one who has a natural life in their rhythm naturally would even want to be influenced by a form of rhythm that is stiff and lifeless for the most part.
Click to expand...

And you`ve researched the topic extensively, to back up such claims? :)

Some euro-stiff classical rythms:


My point being - there is A LOT music in our history so summing it up in one sentence is - in my opinion - just not valid as an argument. I sincerely doubt that Jaquo knows as much as european music and it`s origins as he claims to know based on his authoritative statement.
 
#274
Stacatto said:
If FU is doing their job, they will find/read parts of this lengthy thread.
Click to expand...

Soupcandan has been part of this thread. In a PM exchange with him I tried to be more specific about what I thought F.U. should try to teach. I basically asked for some theory: what are popular intervals played in funk songs, what time signatures tend to dominate, what are some favorite chord progressiosn and what note patterns are common. Dan replied that while transcribing some notation he had uncovered some of the elements I had asked him for, and that he would be bringing it to the table. I ended up cancelling my subscription - it was extremely easy to do. So far one positive review of the school popped up in this thread. If it changes for the better I would certainly give it another look.

On the influence debate, Bongo, Nicky and the other "naysayers" have carried the day. By that I mean they have delivered the empirical evidence to prove their points. Funk, Blues, Jazz are communicated through a melded, but predominantly European system of musical expression predating and leading up to those particular forms. But I don't think the "stiff" European rhythms would ever have given birth to Blues, Jazz of Funk on their own. The emotional kernel of those forms of expression are the result of the African American experience at the time the musical forms came about.
 
#277
Johnius said:
On the influence debate, Bongo, Nicky and the other "naysayers" have carried the day. By that I mean they have delivered the empirical evidence to prove their points. Funk, Blues, Jazz are communicated through a melded, but predominantly European system of musical expression predating and leading up to those particular forms. But I don't think the "stiff" European rhythms would ever have given birth to Blues, Jazz of Funk on their own. The emotional kernel of those forms of expression are the result of the African American experience at the time the musical forms came about.
Click to expand...

For the record: I wish everybody associated with FU good fortune! And I think a vigorous, if blunt, feedback loop is helpful to SoupCan Dan; it's good that he's responding to what his customers are looking for.

That said, I want to pick a serious bone about calling the European rhythmic conception stiff! (Not you, Johnius; that assertion was made earlier in the thread.)

You've never heard somebody make a Bach piece groove?

Or never caught the way a good player uses rubato in bringing Liszt or Chopin to life?

I'm not saying it's funky; I'm just saying it ain't stiff.


As for the harmonic conception: does it hit ya that Webern, Stravinsky, and Schoenberg got people to start hearing dissonance as expressive, rather than error?


The cool thing about music, IMHO, is that it transcends ethnic identity.

My .02. Peace, I'm out.
 
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