The Musical Future

[Fatalysm]

We've come through ages of music, as technology has developed our abilities to produce music and even recreate sounds has come to a stage where humans can at least digitally reproduce any noise they hear. More recently we've had "decades" of music that changed, whether it be dance, brit-pop, jazz, swing, rock, metal and tons of other genres backed by the cultures of the world.

 

From the digital age onwards, the music industry has explored so many more genres and more are likely on their way. This being said, do you think there will be a time where there just wont be a time to make new music? I do think as we progress, music is categorized and blended into older categories. New genres of music seem to come and go, mostly down to popularity.

 

There is no doubt, we have revisited decades in terms of style and all music borrows certain elements of the past. I'd say most notably the 1980's we have seen quite a lot of style from that decade, focusing mostly on indie bands but reaching out into the rock scene. In the last couple of years we have seen a surge in dubstep, drum and bass and other types of beat-music. There is no doubt that the younger generations are going to be grandparents listening to all sorts of music.

 

There used to be quite a big between elders and youngsters, but technology and music seem to be bridging that gap.

 

tl:dr -

• Will we run out of new music genres?
  
• What will music be like in the future?
  

[Sk8skull]

Everything is soon going to have electronic music in it cause the computer is a limitless instrument

[Fatalysm]

Everything is soon going to have electronic music in it cause the computer is a limitless instrument

Okay, that's quite the possibility in the next 50 years. I'm not sure how far we can advance. I don't disagree with you, there is bound to be a serious amount of electronic music infiltrating the marketplace. What about in the next 100 to 500 years or maybe even 1000? Can we even begin to imagine. Try and even go outside of what we have now, maybe all instruments will be different. There might be new ones instruments, there might be a new way of listening. I've got this terrible idea that dubstep is going to be old and outdated when I'm 80 odd, if I get to live that long. That the kids will be listening to something beyond my comprehension.

[Jacky]

Music really has endless possibilities. There's a reason why basically every genre in the last 500 years has been used and is still thriving atm.

 

I'd wager in the distant future, we could end up listening through illusions possibly created by distorting the brain, or something like that.

Classical music reigned for 300 or so years, Electronic could do the same to be honest.

[Lonelywolf]

I hope it circles around and goes back to the 60's and then 70's and stuff

[thepope1322]

Electronic music doesn't have to mean dubstep, techno, etc. As computers become more sophisticated it may be possible for them to mimic any instrument. It'll eventually be possible to have electronic rock that sounds like actual rock music played by humans.

 

Besides, great music is timeless. People will still be listening to the Beatles, to Nirvana and to Queen, even 100 years from now.

Edited November 16, 2012 by theking1322

[Twist of Fate]

^ I just

Electronic music doesn't have to mean dubstep, techno, etc. As computers become more sophisticated it may be possible for them to mimic any instrument. It'll eventually be possible to have electronic rock that sounds like actual rock music played by humans.

 

Besides, great music is timeless. People will still be listening to the Beatles, to Nirvana and to Queen, even 100 years from now.

I'm just kind of hoping computers don't replace actual rock concerts. That goes for holograms too. Especially hologram Tupac.

[Newtking]

I wonder if they can program robots to play instruments in a band.

[reap-]

 

also in a few hundred years 99% of today's music will be forgotten so it doesn't even matter if it repeats

[reepicheep]

I think that we won't run out of genres anytime soon. But here's the thing: I think genres are really just an arbitrary way of differentiating music most of the time. Of course it's easy to differentiate between pure heavy metal and country music, but all of these music styles are slowly blending into each other. And then there's the fact that genres tend to be very vague.

Let me put it differently; I think we're not even close to having 'discovered' all different types of sounds.

[Master of Mining]

Go back to the middle ages, slingle line(Monophonic), chant music was the norm. Then Leonin and Peritin started adding multiple lines(Polyphony) somewhere in the 1200's I believe. Music evolved. In the baroque period, music was becoming much more like it is today(but still pretty far off). With the classical period, we saw larger orchestras than in the baroque period, yet a lot of the music was "the same". Much of the music followed the same forms...i.e. Sonata form. Later in Beethoven's life, he said "to hell with this, I'm doing my own thing!" and began the transition into romantic music.

 

With the romantic period, we move even closer to the music of today. Demands for virtuosity was something being found in several romantic compositions. Compositions were larger, orchestras were of brilliant sizes, etc. The music was very personal to the emotions of the composer. Music, in many cases, became more than just music, but music about something. In the 20th century, music was highly experimental....but in the 1950's the technique of Music Concrete came about. In this, composers could record a sound such as a bird chirping and use the recording device to modify the sound if he wanted. Then, the recorded sound(s) would be added to the composition. Not long after the craziness of the beginnings of the 20th century, we run into rock and roll, etc. etc.

 

 

This is all very summarized, may contain a few small inaccuarcies, and dang, I forgot to add in jazz. However, just by the history of our music, there's nothing that has changed. The ways of making music evolve with technology. We didn't have pianos in the 1600's like we do now. Not only that, but music is often times a reflection of society and the world to say the least. Will music change? Certainly. Will I like it? Maybe. Maybe not. But will new music stop? Absolutely not.