Combining Music and Photography

<p>Often when I am out walking or driving, I see/hear a connection between music and the landscape. Sometimes the landscape triggers a song in my head. Other times, I am listening to a song and it reminds me of a place I have been, and then I will go back to the location and photograph. So a few years back I decided to start to try to explore these connections through photography. I have been working on several ways to combine music and photography.</p>

<p>I am interested in listening to other people's opinions and ideas on the connecting the two mediums.</p>

<p>Usually I keep the two mediums separate, and provide a link to the music (If I can find it online) and allow the viewer to make the connection in their own mind. In one photo show I participated in entitled "Parallel Connections: South Asian Visual & Performing Arts", I put a 2d bar code with a link to the song on the description of the photo, so the user could listen on their phone if they wished. I am sort of limited to what music publicly available on the web for this method. In the future, I may be better off having the music directly available to the viewer or maybe a barcode link to my personal cloud account.</p>

<p>I also have displayed a series of photos on a large print 20"x30" in a grid (e.g. 3x3), this helps to create a flow of visual images to connect to the music. Occasionally I will make a video that combines the photos with the music when I think the combination works.</p>

<p>I have been working primarily with classical Inidan music and started to look at the connection to Indian dance in outdoor settings as well. I have experimented with some acoustic jazz, and bluegrass. I will talk about these connections in this message, and the Indian music in a separate discussion to keep the size of the message short.</p>

<p>I have provided two examples below:</p>

<p><em><strong>Example 1. New Chautauqua/Goin' Ahead - Pat Metheny</strong></em><br /> I was driving in the White Mountains in NH, one autumn afternoon, while listening to New Chautauqua by Pat Metheny. I started to notice a connection between the music and the mountainous country landscape, farms, churches, foliage. I took a series of photos that tried to express the experience.</p>

<p>The album is a fusion of folk and country jazz pieces performed by Pat Methney on solo acoustic guitar. He often experiments with musical imagery and muscial poetry in his compositions. He also wrote the music while living in Boston/New England. Which may add to my connecton. There was one song in particlar entitled Goin' Ahead (actually from 80/81) that captured the essence of the experience. So I learned, then recorded the song on guitar in brick mudroom in a farmhouse to give the photos a more personal feel. My playing and the recording are pretty rough, esp. compared to Pat's playing, but it captured what I wanted to express.</p>

<p>If you have access to an online music service like Rhapsody, you are better off listening to the music there.</p>

<p>Here is a link to the video</p>

<p>

<p>Here is a link to the short previews of the CD New Chautauqua, and Pat's version of Goin' Ahead.</p>

<p>http://www.allmusic.com/album/new-chautauqua-mw0000192195<br /> http://www.allmusic.com/song/goin-ahead-mt0001587461</p>

<p><em><strong>Example 2 - Some Strange Country - Crooked Still</strong></em><br /> I was driving down rt 100 through the Green Mountains in VT after a late fall snow storm. I was listening to several cd's during the trip, but felt that the CD "Some Strange Country" by Crooked Still had the strongest connection to the old barns and mountain landscape. Crooked Still is a Boston based bluegrass band, their music has a contemporary northern appalachian feel (to me) with hints of chamber music. I did not make a video for this, i chose to allow the audience to make the connection.</p>

<p>Here is a link to the photos and short previews of the music.</p>

<p>http://www.dphoton.org/New-England/Farm-Houses/Vermont-Beauties<br /> http://www.allmusic.com/album/some-strange-country-mw0001977346</p>

<p>When I put a series of photos together in a slide show, I tend to think musically, rhythmically. I want ebb and flow, rising and falling, building, stops, crescendo in some cases. I usually do this without accompanying music.</p>

<p>I didn't get around to it, but someday hope to. When I had my gallery show, I was going to consciously incorporate music into it. Just didn't get to it, and the music I did have playing didn't really get heard because it was quite crowded and the noise of voices was actually better accompaniment than music might have been, at least for this one.</p>

<p>More and more, I like putting on different kinds of music when I'm working on photos at the computer. I find music fills space. In that way, it's not unlike photos . . . or landscapes.</p>

<p>I think there's a lot of potential in mixing media. I also think there's a lot of potential in rhythm.</p>

<p>Music creates moods. Good movies always have good music that drives the emotions of the viewers. Music can create a sense of time and place. I scanned old photos of my cousins' folks from the 1940's and added Big Band music to a slide show to be played on HDTV. The music complemented the photos creating a time frame as well feelings and emotions especially for their children when watching.</p>

<p>This slide show uses music I selected to complement the place and time and activity on a day I spent with my daughter. Three sections, three songs. <a href="

</p>

<p>When I show people my photos in my own home, I put <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=91SqLKGIN-A">this</a> on.</p>

<p>Whew. I thought I was on speed or something. What's with her black eyes? </p>

<p>I think Angela plays football when the band has a night off.</p>

<p>Possibly my memory is playing tricks on me (as Google reveals nothing), but I recall a quote which I believe to be attributed to Beethoven: <em>Architecture is silenced music</em>.<br>

This quote always stuck with me; it reveals an important bit of expressive artforms, to consist of shapes, structures, to have foundations, ornaments and so on. Photography is no exception to that. Many good photos have rhythm. Music has colours. Both deal with shapes and structures, have a context or foundation on which those structures rely, both deal with smaller themes within the total, that interact and play with (or against) one another. It can be an unified message, it can be ambiguous or contradictory.<br>

Alan touches on something very simple yet essential (I think): <em>Music creates moods</em>. And so do photos. A dark low-key photo with Vivaldi in the background makes relatively little sense. A happy spring landscape, yellow flowers and fresh green, with Jeff's choice of music would neither.</p>

<p>Personally, I've never felt a need to actually bring the two together, though. Partially because the viewer of my photos might not share my preferences for music, and I do not feel a need to steer them there. Partially also because my moods change, and so do my interpretations of photos and music. So what seems a perfect cohesive couple today might annoy me to the bone tomorrow. Yet, I can really like it when others do it (if done with care, obviously), as it certainly can be a richer experience. But even there, I get moody ;-)</p>

<p>I think (tasty) hors d'oeuvres with photography work better than music with photography, especially where one is expected to be polite.</p>

<p>Well, Julie, anything that you can add to a slide show helps the presenter. My experience with family years ago with a slide projector and today with slide shows on HDTV was that as soon as I start setting up the show, my guests turn green, start <em>hrumphing</em> and making excuses why they have to go home early. </p>

<p><<<<em>A dark low-key photo with Vivaldi in the background makes relatively little sense.</em>>>></p>

<p>Wouter, it's funny. When I first considered the question, that's just the kind of combination I thought of, but positively. Combinations can be played with in so many ways: ironically, contrastingly, etc. Vivaldi and darkness could be made to make sense, in the right hands and with the right thinking. I think it's only when we fall into the obvious <em>Fantasia</em> paradigm that the potential is to make a cliché of it.</p>

<p>__________________________________</p>

<p>Julie's likely trying to be funny or clever, but she makes a point. The <em>purity</em> of photography will be important to some. But I'll tell you something about <em>hors d'oeuvres</em>. At my recent gallery/studio opening/party, there were about 75 people and the studio leads out to the back deck and back yard, and it was a beautiful, crisp San Francisco fall day. Out there, we served wine, cheese, a big smoked salmon platter, humus, crackers, a nice spread as they say. I was aware in advance but very taken on that day that my photography seemed to become an experience more than just a bunch of still pictures. The photos were a focus of attention, elicited questions, stimulated conversations, and also provided a backdrop for good cheer and for people meeting new people. Andy was dressed to the nines and at times felt like a celebrity guest. I can relate to what Julie says because the <em>hors d'oeuvres</em> wound up being a more integral part of the day than the music playing in the background, which we kept low because it was so crowded and the "music" of conversation and cheerful greeting weaving with serious reactions to the photos mostly drowned out what was coming from the iPod.</p>

<p>I'm one who likes live theater. The presentation of photos has unlimited potential, which excites me, especially now that I've seen first hand what an <em>experience</em> an exhibition can be.</p>

<p>So I raise my champagne glass with pinky proudly aloft and I blow the bugles or choose a frame or a mat and a hanging position on the wall and I present to you photos.</p>

<p>________________________________________</p>

<p>By the way, most of the slide shows I've seen with musical accompaniment are bad. Frankly, most of the photos I see are bad, too. None of that defeats me or convinces me the combination is not full of potential.</p>

<p>I recently saw a show ( <a href="http://www.mfa.org/exhibitions/ori-gersht"><strong>Ori Gersht</strong></a><a href="http://www.mfa.org/exhibitions/ori-gersht"><strong>: </strong><strong><em>History Repeating</em></strong></a>) at the MFA that had ambient electronic "music?" throughout the exhibit. I found it annoying and contributed to my negative views of the show -- it pretty much sucked. I have nothing against electronic <em>noise</em> art -- but to have it on as an inescapable part of a visual show is bad. It was an accompaniment, not integrated with the show.</p>

<p>I understand collaboration. I understand mood. I see it as a type of performance medium that doesn't need kick ass images and wow music to work. The images and music are <em>vehicles</em> for an idea and shouldn't both require dominant attention. The art is in the totality of <em>effect.</em><br>

I'm thinking of Allen Ginsburg reading a poem, showing a few snaps, maybe playing his thumb-ploinker</p>

 

<p>Fred, I was actually thinking the same thing.... Vivaldi's Spring with dark, edgy and violent photos. It would probably work well, if you do only one of the three parts... The choice for a cliché was intentional.</p>

<blockquote>

<p>The <em>purity</em> of photography will be important to some</p>

</blockquote>

<p>This might be a bit what I aimed at with the reasons why I wouldn't easily combine music and photos myself. It's not so much a purity of photography, but the purity of the photo itself. Adding a mood or theme by means of music imposes on the photo, and vice versa, so will the content of the photo impose on the music. As said earlier, I can see the richness when these two go in good harmony. But even then, still, it might affect my perception of the photo (or the music) and I do not always like to be steered that way. I like photos (and music) that tickle my fantasy, that open a door and show a glimpse of what's behind... but who leave it up to me to find out what's in there. The combination would (in my view) quite probably interfere with that because it becomes too explicit.</p>

<p>Write me down for the hors d' oeuvres too - I prefer them over music for photo exhibitions. If the photos are bad, a bottle of wine (p.p.) is appreciated too.</p>

<p><<<<em>imposes on the photo</em>>>></p>

<p>Yes. This is what I would want a good selection of music to do: impose on the photo. What I don't like is music as background acting as most elevator music does, which is usually revolting and either ill-conceived or just not substantially considered. But if I sense the photographer or curator has chosen the music specifically to act in concert (pun intended) with a photo (even if by way of contrast), that can be something to appreciate. Sure, a mat, a frame, reflections in glass, lighting, music, the space the photo is viewed in, the book the photo is shown in can all impose themselves on an individual photo. There will always be context, a space in which the photo is viewed and it will always impose itself. Yes, music is probably a stronger influence than many other contextual elements and these other contextual elements are more necessities where music seems much more of a choice to have to begin with.</p>

<p>I don't mind a photographer imposing a more specific viewing context through music if that's what he wants to do. While my imagination and freedom is an important part of the viewing experience, the photographer's communication and expression is also an important part. There will always be more and less ambiguous photos and contexts. The ambiguous ones are what they are but the less ambiguous ones are also what they are. My imagination just works differently in the different situations. No matter how detailed, specific, and even guiding a photographer is in his work and presentation, I am still free to approach that work BOTH concretely and abstractly. But a photographer ought to be free to express himself as pointedly or ambiguously as he desires. If adding music accomplishes what he wants, so be it.</p>

<p>I don't know what to think about this <em>imposition</em> thing. I certainly see your point, Wouter, and it's persuasive on many levels. At the same time, I think some of my favorite artists are ones who do impose quite a bit . . . Hitchcock, the recent Tarantino film <em>Django</em>. (Note, by the way, what an important role music plays in both those directors' work.) I think of a couple of Avedon shows I've seen where the exhibition itself, in terms of size of prints, placement of photos, juxtapositions, was quite an imposition, and a successful one at that. These two exhibitions went well beyond the sum of the individual photos, as much because of contextual elements as because of the aggregation of the photographer's works.</p>

<p>I'm certainly not suggesting it would be a good idea for all photographers to suddenly start accompanying their photos with music. But, on the occasions that they choose to do so, if in fact it is an imposition, what exactly is wrong with that?</p>

<p>"A photo should stand on its own," some will say (not saying anyone here said that). Totally understand the sentiment but that darn <em>should</em> haunts me. What's wrong with some photos standing on their own and some not? Photography, like most arts/mediums has a lot of flexibility and potential.</p>

<p>Fred, if I sound decided on the imposing, it's less so than it might seem. I guess I should have phrased myself a bit more careful, though your post makes me realise that. It's not the imposing that is a problem. It's feeling that I am being imposed upon.<br>

That simply means it's not being done good enough. Not seamless enough, not provocative enough, not convicing. I think the examples you mention, well, it's been long since I saw Hitchcock and I did not yet see the new Tarantino (in this country, movies are dubbed, and I go insane watching sync'ed movies). But judging from the Tarantino classics: that is imposing done right. It is not music and video. It is one, and convinced me it is conceived as one. So, rephrasing, the risk is not that music or photo might impose on one another too much, but that they might do so in a noticeable way. Quality matters.</p>

<p>And it seems we react different. I can get very annoyed if I'm pushed too much into a way of seeing something. Sounds like you're better at dealing with that :-)</p>

<p><<<<em>And it seems we react different. I can get very annoyed if I'm pushed too much into a way of seeing something. Sounds like you're better at dealing with that :-)</em>>>></p>

<p>Yes, I actually like and appreciate it a lot . . . at times.</p>

<p>Wouter, still pictures are not movies. The latter have duration as does music. Still pictures do not.</p>

<p>"You can turn away but when you come back they'll still be there looking at you." -- <em>Diane Arbus</em></p>

<p><<<<em>Wouter, still pictures are not movies. The latter have duration as does music. Still pictures do not.</em>>>></p>

<p>Yes! So?</p>

<p>Julie, in which way would the obvious statement that video is not the same as still images change what I wrote? I'm not sure whether I understand what you're trying to point out to me?</p>

<p>I recognize that the addition of music changes the perception of the photo. Also, in some ways even the photo alone is imposing on the blank space of the wall. The viewer has to decide whether the photo's imposing on the blank space is worth while or not. I only have a limited number of photos where combing music works, it is usually I have the this in mind when I am creating the photos. Sometimes I have the photos displayed on the wall w/o music and also have the same photos in a video w/ music for web viewing only. The perception is different which can be interesting on a creative level in itself.<br>

<br />one difference in particular, is that I can only watch a video with music a few times before I am saturated by the work, especially my own work. With a photo, you can hang it on the wall in your home and it becomes a natural integrated part of the environment, that lasts for years before getting tired of it. </p>

<p><em><strong>1. 2D Barcode Link</strong></em><br>

I have also been trying to work with ways to give the viewer and option to listen. In a gallery, you can provide a link to the music w/ a 2D bar code on the description of the photo, The viewer can scan the bar code with their phone and listen to the music w/ ear plugs. This gives the viewer an option on whether or not they want to listen to the music or not. An doesn't interfere w/ the other viewers.</p>

<p>The only problem I have had with this method. Is getting a clean link to the music (no other video). Because of copyright issues, I have only been able to find entire songs on youtube, which always has some else's video. If anyone has any ideas to provided clean links to music I would be interested. Maybe something can be with with a personal cloud account..not sure.</p>

<p><em><strong>2. Power of suggestion</strong></em><br>

Sometimes I make reference to the music on the lablel of the photo. If it is a well know piece of music that the viewer is familiar with, then the viewer can make the mental connection between the two in their own mind. I have had positive results w/ this method at art shows. People have come up to me and have said that they can hear/see the connection. THis is a problem with my Indian music/photographs because only the people from India can make the connection. So I tried to combine it with the 2D bar code idea enable anyone to make the connection<br /><br /></p>

<p>It's a tough but intriguing challenge the more I think of it. Having music referenced in titles is common. Having the option to hear the piece, or not, is better. With a <em>docent</em> iPad it could almost work. <br>

Having an obscure reference of any sort in a title is a good way to be pretentious, tedious, and boring. Kind of like performance art.</p>

<p>Don, just a very practical note on the idea with a barcode (which is nice, with QR codes it quite easy to accomplish too - good idea!). You will run into problems if it is a public place you're doing this. The source where you take the music doesn't really matter, it is that you are using the music for public hearing and broadcast. Even if you own the CD you use, you will still have to pay fees for such use - at least so I've been told (but I am no lawyer by any means).</p>

<p>Interesting point about posting on YouTube. If you look at the link to my video post at 1/19 6:46pm, you'll see that one of the songs I used ("Under the Boardwalk") is captioned on the page with links to purchase it. I did not add that. YouTube did. In fact, on my private page they mention to me that I am using copyrighted music and they could pull the video. But they haven't. They have just added links to purchase the music for viewers who might be interested in the song to buy.</p>

<p>In effect, the music industry appears to have made a deal with people who use copyrighted music on videos and with YouTube add these purchasing links. They get free advertising on my video with no loss of revenue from my semi private use of their material. Now, if a million people wanted to watch my video, maybe they'd pull the video, but I really don't know. That would mean they would have a million potential buyers of the song.</p>

<p>Glad to hear that they let your video stay on - it sounds like a win-win-win situation for you, the industry and the public who gets to know the music better.</p>

<p>If anyone is holding an exhibition in a public gallery he/she might want to check with the gallery about playing music to go with it - some galleries (or perhaps most or all of them) already have a blanket licence that allows one to freely playback any recorded music at the venue.</p>

<p>I used to be an amateur musician and music has often inspired my photography in the planning stage (where I imagine how I might want to compose the shot in a way that is as beautiful or dramatic as the music) and the post-processing stage (when listening to the music reinforces what I find pleasing about the shot, translating into judicious post-processing adjustments that communicate my photographic message more compellingly to the audience).</p>

<p>I have been grappling with the dilemma of whether to play music with photos or not, as many of you have. On the one hand I wish to communicate my world of sound and sight to the audience, but on the other hand they might derive more pleasure from assigning their own favourite music to the photo than from being forced to listen to the Mahler symphony I would choose to accompany my images. Maybe it's nice to play music when you actually have an opportunity to explain to the audience in person about your conception, but better to let them use their own ipods when you're not physically there, unless of course sound is an integral part of your artwork.</p>

<p>Music has become like High Fructose Corn Syrup. It is in everything. And like the sweetener it's design is often nefarious. The music everywhere idea has pretty much ruined my enjoyment of it. If you make everything sweet, it soon looses its sweetness, because sweetness is a contrast.</p>

<p>I have seen some photographic exhibits in which music was playing in the background. I thought, why? Under what pretense does the curator assume a musical background applies to some photographer's work, or worse, some specific photograph? Or, is the curator just taking a queue from the dress shop down the street that "music encourages shopping?" </p>

<p>All music has become Muzak in a sense when it is randomly spewed out over the public like so much rainwater. In the normal course, my mood would drive my selection of some musical piece to hear. But in the common course now, the music is trying to select me. No thanks, I am not in the mood for Sibelius just because there are some landscapes on the wall. </p>

<p>I think "music everywhere" is an insidious drug to be avoided to the extent humanly possible in order to preserve what appreciation we might have remaining. </p>

<p>Of course one <em>choosing</em> music to accompany one's viewing of anything, is another matter. That would be the old way of doing it. </p>

<p><<<<em>All music has become Muzak in a sense when it is randomly spewed out over the public like so much rainwater.</em>>>></p>

<p>Hopefully, a good curator or photographer wouldn't be spewing out music randomly. Just a thought. </p>