Allerleirauh and Sempreverde

[imomus]

"I will marry my daughter, for she is the counterpart of my late wife, otherwise I can find no bride who resembles her."

I haven't made much music this year; half the gear in my studio seems to have broken down. But I have made a couple of collaborations here and there, one in Tokyo (demos for a project called Bambie) and one here in Berlin, back in late May and early June, with Japanese visual artist Yukiko Sawabe. Yukiko wanted some music for a piece she's making about the Brothers Grimm fairy tale Allerleirauh.



"Then she ran into her den, washed herself quickly, and took out of the nut the dress which was as silvery as the moon, and put it on. Then she went up and was like a princess, and the King stepped forward to meet her, and rejoiced to see her once more, and as the dance was just beginning they danced it together. But when it was at end, she again disappeared so quickly that the King could not observe where she went. She, however, sprang into her den, and once more made herself a hairy animal, and went into the kitchen to prepare the bread soup."

Yukiko has agreed to let me post two of the songs here today, along with the artwork she's made for the project. The mp3 file below contains "Allerleirauh" (from the Daughter side) and "King Song" (from the King side). Yukiko wrote the words and sang, I made the music.

Allerleirauh + King Song (Yukiko Sawabe and Nick Currie) 2.1 MB, 128 kbps stereo mp3 file, 2.19mins.

"Then he grasped her by the hand, and held her fast, and when she wanted to release herself and run away, her fur-mantle opened a little, and the star-dress shone forth. The King clutched the mantle and tore it off. Then her golden hair shone forth, and she stood there in full splendour, and could not longer hide herself. And when she had washed the soot and ashes from her face, she was more beautiful than any one who had ever been seen on earth. But the King said, "Thou art my dear bride, and we will never more part from each other." Thereupon the marriage was solemnized, and they lived happily until their death."

Yukiko explains: "I'm going to use small space for my exhibition. It was brothel. The exhibition schedule is undicided detail now. Please introduce songs with my art book 'temperature'. These works is based on Grimm's fairy tail, Allerleirauh and Snow White and Seven Dwarfs."

I also want to mention today that Andrew Snyder has set up a new Momus Forum called Sempreverde.

Comments

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Only my belief that everything is belief. Then again, some things are beyond belief, or so I believe.

[w-e-quimby.livejournal.com]

So...the universal truth is that there is no universal truth?

[(Anonymous)]

...which is a contradiction in itself.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Things can be true within systems; it's "true" that you lose the game of Chess if you can't move your king to an unthreatened square, for instance.

Rhetorical questions

[w-e-quimby.livejournal.com]

The universe contains all systems, but is it a system in itself? Can it be systematically unified? Physically, mathematically, philosophically?

Re: Rhetorical questions

[(Anonymous)]

If it weren't a system, how could all the different sub-systems co-exist?

[thetemplekeeper.livejournal.com]

Well, if you can't move your king or any other pieces and you're not in check (and if it's your turn!), the game is tied in stalemate.

It seems to me, though, that your relativism is checkmated by the contradiction pointed out by Mr Anonymous above. For example, to use your systems analogy, if something can be true within a system, then surely something can also be false within it (eg, if I can't move my chesspieces and I'm not in check, I've won). Perhaps you could say that the contradiction "the universal truth is there is no universal truth" is false only within the system(s) of mathematical logic , which are transcended by relativism; but then you appear to invoke a universalist metaphysics (or maybe just an epistemology) of systems interlain with more systems, with a corresponding hierarchy of truth, not an absence of truth; then the only thing you can say is that we cannot know the "ultimate" truth (if there is one) of what lies beyond all these systems, which statement seems to be true by definition if these systemic layers encapsulate all we could ever know. I cannot see what else you may have in mind, as your analogy seems to envisage a system of belief called "relativism" which is of a higher level than logic (as it includes all mathematical logic in its definition) and contains only the epistemological conviction that "truth is relative"; yet (1) there seems no reason to hold that that level exists and (2) again, it is posited as a universal.

I hope you can catch the gist of the above, even if you believe it is false; I find it hard sometimes to use language as the prime means of argument, as I find it easier to visualise problems than turn them into words - I wish I had time for a scanned diagram, but that would probably be deeply inappropriate on a blog!

Thanks for your time

Simon

[imomus.livejournal.com]

I think that behind my "true in systems" statement was the idea that we designate certain things true. Like computer programmers, we say "Let x = true", and then build a system (chess, the law, religion) around that designated relationship. However, people who believe that these things are objectively true, independent of human agency and independent of designation, have forgotten or repressed this. To my way of thinking it's a very serious mistake. An example would be those who talk about "natural law" (as Tony Blair does from time to time), meaning law which is somehow objective and universal, rather than simply a system of manmade designations which can be re-assigned arbitrarily and still be "true" if so designated.

[thetemplekeeper.livejournal.com]

Hi Nick

Thanks for your reply.

I agree with all of what you've said above; however, if we are right in our beliefs here, then the idea of "natural law" must be a false one, as it cannot be true in certain circumstances - after all, the concept necessarily involves the idea of a law pertaining in all situations. Thus, if you are right about the arbitrary or cultural bases of any conception of law, it appears that the statement "there is no natural law" must be absolutely true. In other words, there are such things as claims to universal validity; and the truth of these claims can only be decided in terms of "is", "isn't" or "undecided". The problem with relativism is that it claims universal validity for the idea that there is no universal validity, so is self-refuting.

Of course, it may be that logic cannot tell us what really pertains independently of the mind. However, I think it would then be better to argue that this is the edge of what we can hope to understand, rather than posit a self-denying universal just beyond comprehensibility. We could be ideosyncratically human in using experimentation, observation, language, imagination, art and reason to describe and explore our world, but these are our only means of understanding, limited as they are. Given that the world is as it appears to us and that, for example, it just follows that, if I have two apples on the table and I eat one, there is one apple left on the table - or, if Kennedy is not a doughnut, then Kennedy is not a doughnut - I think we have to say that, at least within our common modalities of thought and experience, there is the possibility of asystemic truth and falsehood. This qualifies the idea of the universal by making what seems universally true (such as "2 + 3 = 5") only true as far as we can tell, but does not go so far as to deny the possibility of universal truth when such a denial seems neither logically possible nor a statement one can therefore make without claiming to know the unknowable.

Ach, this seems a bit of a rant, I believe... Please bear in mind that my mental state when writing the above was simply one of enthusiastic investigation - I hope you will take this comment as such!

Best wishes

Simon