Author Archives: Paul Carr

Update on Current Projects: Sting and the Gravitational Pull of Newcastle

Posted on March 13, 2014 by Paul Carr

Just a quick update of some of my activities over the last month or so. So –  not in any particular order – here goes. Firstly, last weekend I contributed to a radio show on The Alarm’s Mike Peters – … Continue reading →

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The Semiology of Music Part 1: Is it the music or our words that are Vague?

Posted on February 3, 2014 by Paul Carr

This week was the first of a series of lectures on how music REFERS meaning.  What I am interested in is any examples of how music imparts meaning using – Saussures simple dyadic model as a starting point. The question … Continue reading →

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Vertical Melodic Analysis

Posted on January 21, 2014 by Paul Carr

Where as my blog last week focused on horizontal  melodic analysis – this session concerned the vertical movement of melody. More specifically, the session was related to how tension and release operates when specific note types come up against a … Continue reading →

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Melodic Analysis: horizontal techniques

Posted on January 13, 2014 by Paul Carr

This weeks musicology lecture examined  ways in which it is possible to analyse popular music melody – specifically from a horizontal perspective. As will be seen in the PowerPoint and the audio stream of the lecture – I get some … Continue reading →

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Christian Music: Art or Commerce?

Posted on December 13, 2013 by Paul Carr

I read an article the other day which asked the question, somewhat problematically for me – ‘Is Christian Music Dying’. Inspired by another, much earlier post by Michael Gungor – it focuses upon the relationship between using Art as a … Continue reading →

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Geoffrey Farmer:Lets Make the Water Turn Black

Posted on November 29, 2013 by Paul Carr

I have just returned from a great couple of days in Nottingham – giving a keynote address to coincide with Geoffrey Farmer’s amazing sound sculpture – Let’s Make the Water Turn Black. Alongside my two colleagues –  Prof. Richard Hand … Continue reading →

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More Analysis of Social Space: Sting’s Dead Mans Boots

Posted on November 11, 2013 by Paul Carr

Last weeks post commenced with a discussion of the ways in which the background of a musical mix can resonate with the persona in a song – describing it as ‘Inert’,  ‘Active’ or ‘oppositional’ (I still need more examples of … Continue reading →

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The Environment and Persona of a Musical Mix

Posted on November 4, 2013 by Paul Carr

This week, I have asked students to consider the ontological gap between a singer and the ‘environment’ or textual  backing. We started with two simple points: Texture can be ‘physical’ (descriptive sound) and/or ‘rhetorical’ (carry extra-musical meaning). It is the … Continue reading →

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Modern Uses of The Soundbox: Examples of Triangular Mixes

Posted on October 28, 2013 by Paul Carr

Today in my musicology session – we discussed a few ways in which a musical mix can be analyzed. It started by suggesting the following factors as a way to consider recorded sound. ¨Listen closely for  the relationships between instruments … Continue reading →

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