Example of Adorno's ideas

I think this video is a good example of Adorno's theory on popular music. There is obvious standardisation and it is highly repetitive and catchy which complies with the listeners wants and needs as this is what they are used to “pre-given and pre-accepted”.  Willow Smith is showing pseudo-individualism as she has started her career at age 10. People think she is different because it is not often that a 10 year old could do something like that. But in reality there are lots of 10 year olds that can sing, they just dont have a famous father to make it happen so early in their life. This video shows what Adorno talks about with star qualty and glamour as Willow Smith is so young and is wearing lots of make up and portrayed in a sexual manor.

Portfolio task 2 - Popular music by Theodor Adorno

In his first essay "The musical material", Adorn looks at the structure of popular music. He writes that popular music can be characterised by it's difference from serious music. In his opinion classical music is a serious art form whilst popular music is the creation of an industrial society and has no creative content. He uses Beethoven's work as an example of serious music saying that every detail of the music has a relationship to the rest of it and it is this, that creates the totality of the work rather "than a mere enforcement of a musical scheme".

Popular music is a product of what he called standardisation. A popular piece of music always has the same structure, so no matter which combinations of lyrics, beat or melody are put together, it would in the end remain the same piece of music. He explains this further by adding that if one bit of a popular song was taken out and replaced with a different part of another popular song, for example the chorus, it would not be noticeable, as it all sounds the same. Even songs of very different styles from jazz to the big bands are essentially the same formula. Adorno goes on to say that not only hits such as dance music are standardised but also home songs, nonsense songs and laments. Regardless of any changes that are made to the music, "the hit will lead back to the same familiar experience, and nothing fundamentally novel will be introduced"

Popular music "is composed in such a way that the process of translation of the unique into the norm is already planned and, to a certain extent, achieved within the composition itself". This, he explains, takes out any effort in listening to the music as it is already structured to be familiar. Listeners do not wish to waste time and energy listening and trying to understand, and so popular music is instead mass marketed as the producers know that this is what people like to listen to and will create commercial success. To make it easier for listeners the music has been "pre-digested".

Much of the standardisation is kept hidden from listeners by what he calls "pseudo-individualisation", which disguises the fact that the music is mass produced. If listeners realised that popular music was intentionally formulated and by its very nature was a way controlling the masses, this would provoke resistance. An example of pseudo-individualisation is improvisation, the listener thinks that the individual artist is introducing their own variations into the composition but even this is really done within the strict limits of the formula. The music industry gives credit to individual artist and composers but their work still conforms to a predetermined structure. Songs for the masses are essentially goods for sale and produced to a quasi-industrial formula, although he notes that popular music does not actually employ industrial production apart from at the distribution phase.

In his second essay Adorno considers the "Presentation of Material" and in particular the marketing of popular music which he refers to as plugging. For a song to be a commercial success its listeners must hear it repeatedly, "plugging aims to breakdown the listeners resistance to musically ever equal or identical" He ponders the paradox that for a song to be successful it must be similar to all other songs around, so that it is immediately familiar but also it must be a little different so that it will stand out from the crowd and be remembered. In other words it needs a hook line.

Part of the process of plugging is the assignment of star quality, or glamour, to performers, this brings their songs to the attention of the public and adds to their popularity. He also notes that both lyrics and music can use child like phrases and repetition this attracts the attention of the listener and may make a make that music stand out from the crowd.

In Adorno's third essay "Theory about the Listener" he expounds his theory that when poplar music is repeated constantly the listener is no longer aware that it is a device but thinks of it as an element of the natural. The shared experience of recognising a tune creates a collective experience within society and the listeners' resistance to authority is broken down because he feels part of a group. To put this idea into context Adorno was writing at the time of the Second World War he had left nazi Germany to work in America. He had escaped from Fascism and its use of mass media for advancing its message. He feared that the emerging American phenomenon of mass culture could also be socially destructive.

He noted that poplar music in America was not influenced by political partisanship but it inspired two types of mass behaviour, the rhythmically obedient and the emotional.

The rhythmically obedient responded to the strong beat in dance music or marches, the shared experience bonded them together and they felt safety in numbers. The emotional type of listener was attracted to the "Dream factories" of Hollywood or Tin Pan Alley, they were allowed a brief taste of happiness through their experience, only to realise that they were fundamentally unhappy. Adorno said "One who weeps does not resist any more than one who marches" and so they realise their social dependence.

Towards the end of his essay he talks about what was then the latest fashion in America, the jitterbug, this the fast rhythical dance, featured in Grease, where the dancers no longer dance in pairs but all perform in lines. Adorno considers this to be people transforming themselves into insects, who's frenetic behaviour, he sees as fury. Adorno equates the mass dance craze with collective conformity and sees a similarity to the mass rallies and military parades in Germany. Yet he can also see a ray of hope for society, he concluded that "To become transformed into an insect, man needs that energy which might possibly achieve this transformation in a man"