On Tue, 28 Mar 2006 07:14:36 -0500, "Stephen M"
wrote:

Music is math. You need not be aware of the math
to make great music, but the number of people who can actually do it
is limited.

The best music is not in the simple ratios of harmonics but the subtleties
of being *outside* (a little sharp of flat) of these ratios. The perfect
envelope of a guitar bend is what separates the "artists" from the 6-string
craftsman. A good drummer will play a little ahead or behind the beat to
create push and pull (tension).

Which is all still math Computer generated music is lifeless
compared to the real thing, but that's because the program doesn't
know to do those things not because it can't do those things.

IMO plaster walls look better than sheet rock, specifically because of their
imperfection. In may cases perfection *is* unapealing.

So if a piece of furniture one of us made came out "perfect" should we
hang our heads, take it apart and try again? I make these intarsia
leaves where the edges and grain of the pieces simulate the veins of
the leaf. I get the gaps between the pieces to an acceptable level
and then I stop, and I like to think the finished leaf looks better
with the small gaps in it. But at the same time if pieces fit
together perfectly I don't sand a gap in where there was none. I
can't have it both ways.

I think for most of us we have to worry more about the border between
"having character" and "careless" than "perfection". If you do manage
to get to the latter you did it by first overcoming the former and you
probably don't need any help understanding it.


-Leuf