Music and Lucid Dreaming

[Cord]

I was just wondering if anyone had any unique experiences with music in their lucid dreams? I myself have had 3 lucid dreams and can only imagine the possibilties and benefits lucid dreaming will have on a musician. This is something I so dearly want to experiment with.

[Kyros]

I had a nonlucid dream where i was playing the organ and numerous other instruments and drumbeats were added in by my mind. It was a cool song but i forgot how it went when i woke up

[queensofthestoneage]

well yeah.. i havent had any lucid dreams that ive remembered... so yeah as a musician i am MORE than eager to experiment with it.. but the problem is.. how the heck are we gonna remember it???

[ronso]

Originally posted by queensofthestoneage well yeah.. i havent had any lucid dreams that ive remembered... so yeah as a musician i am MORE than eager to experiment with it.. but the problem is.. how the heck are we gonna remember it??? that's one problem with dreams, at least for me I sometimes remember a quote or something I read in dreams but it's not often. And when I do remember it's just nonsense

[Leo Volont]

Originally posted by Cord I was just wondering if anyone had any unique experiences with music in their lucid dreams? I myself have had 3 lucid dreams and can only imagine the possibilties and benefits lucid dreaming will have on a musician. This is something I so dearly want to experiment with. Oh, yes, I began by playing… or fooling around with Violin, and then picked up guitar, and then bass guitar and then keyboard. I was never serious, but played as a diversion. I would simply put on a record or tape (that is how old I am) and later CD’s and then just play along by ear, developing my chording as I could progressively become more elaborate. Studying Music would have been a wonderful shortcut to proficiency, but I simply wanted a hobby, not another profession. But even at my level I often enough had dreams. In one dream, I accompanied Bob Dylan in concert for a rendition of his “Like a Rolling Stone”, on violin, where I counter-posed his harmonic. Then in another dream I played guitar with Carly Simon. She was sweet. After the dream concert she asked us all to her estate in on Martha’s Vineyard where she was the most gracious party hostess, and she even sat down on the sofa with me and chatted pleasantly with me for 5 minutes. I truly was enchanted. There have been other dreams where I have displayed my aptitude on keyboard. Luckily I always seem to be better than adequate when playing in my dreams. What I suppose is happening is that one is Auditioning for Heaven. We think of living for all Eternity in our Afterlives, but what shall we do? I think I have earned my place in the Heaven of Popular Musicians and their serious fans… being a serious Fan more than one of the actual musicians… playing only well enough so that my appreciation would not be seem as meaningless and rather gratuitous. Of course, most of my attention goes toward writing, and that is something I have never done in a dream… nor have I made any stirring speeches. But maybe music is all part of that. What makes good writing is what makes good music – a sense of rhythm and cadence and a dash of rhyme. Good narrative, like good poetry, like good music, must have melody, harmony and even percussion. It brings to mind an essay I recently read from one of my favorite authors, Raymond Chandler, who said that American Writers miss one of the great things the English have a sense for, and that is ‘tone’. American writing is monotonously flat, but the English can adopt and project in their writing what they naturally do in their speaking, and that is, use ‘Tone’ to convey subtly, beyond mere words, what their various emotional intents are – to be compared to Music which uses Major and Minor Keys to create the Emotional Milieu that anticipates the strict meaning of their words. Good Writing must have something of Music in it.

[TygrHawk]

Originally posted by Leo Volont What I suppose is happening is that one is Auditioning for Heaven. We think of living for all Eternity in our Afterlives, but what shall we do? I think I have earned my place in the Heaven of Popular Musicians and their serious fans… being a serious Fan more than one of the actual musicians… playing only well enough so that my appreciation would not be seem as meaningless and rather gratuitous. You know, I really believe that some people want to read way too much into dreams. Sure, maybe sometimes dreams have a deeper meaning, but I'm reminded of Freud's words, "Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar".

[queensofthestoneage]

Originally posted by Leo Volont Oh, yes, I began by playing… or fooling around with Violin, and then picked up guitar, and then bass guitar and then keyboard. I was never serious, but played as a diversion. I would simply put on a record or tape (that is how old I am) and later CD’s and then just play along by ear, developing my chording as I could progressively become more elaborate. Studying Music would have been a wonderful shortcut to proficiency, but I simply wanted a hobby, not another profession. But even at my level I often enough had dreams. In one dream, I accompanied Bob Dylan in concert for a rendition of his “Like a Rolling Stone”, on violin, where I counter-posed his harmonic. Then in another dream I played guitar with Carly Simon. She was sweet. After the dream concert she asked us all to her estate in on Martha’s Vineyard where she was the most gracious party hostess, and she even sat down on the sofa with me and chatted pleasantly with me for 5 minutes. I truly was enchanted. There have been other dreams where I have displayed my aptitude on keyboard. Luckily I always seem to be better than adequate when playing in my dreams. What I suppose is happening is that one is Auditioning for Heaven. We think of living for all Eternity in our Afterlives, but what shall we do? I think I have earned my place in the Heaven of Popular Musicians and their serious fans… being a serious Fan more than one of the actual musicians… playing only well enough so that my appreciation would not be seem as meaningless and rather gratuitous. Of course, most of my attention goes toward writing, and that is something I have never done in a dream… nor have I made any stirring speeches. But maybe music is all part of that. What makes good writing is what makes good music – a sense of rhythm and cadence and a dash of rhyme. Good narrative, like good poetry, like good music, must have melody, harmony and even percussion. It brings to mind an essay I recently read from one of my favorite authors, Raymond Chandler, who said that American Writers miss one of the great things the English have a sense for, and that is ‘tone’. American writing is monotonously flat, but the English can adopt and project in their writing what they naturally do in their speaking, and that is, use ‘Tone’ to convey subtly, beyond mere words, what their various emotional intents are – to be compared to Music which uses Major and Minor Keys to create the Emotional Milieu that anticipates the strict meaning of their words. Good Writing must have something of Music in it. im really starting to like you...

[Leo Volont]

Originally posted by TygrHawk You know, I really believe that some people want to read way too much into dreams. Sure, maybe sometimes dreams have a deeper meaning, but I'm reminded of Freud's words, \"Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar\". Dear Tygerhawk, You know, if you don't take your Dreams seriously, then why should your dreams take you seriously. How could it possibly help you, being so dismissive? What are you living for? To be utterly materialistic. Life is short. The practical things you do will not, in the end, matter in the least. It is the Spiritual Accomplishments which will last. Now, how can you read 'too much' into the only things that will ever have any lasting significance? Besides, Freud's cigar was a turd. The man was a pig.

[Artie J]

Cord: I'm a musician, and I managed to have one LD in which I was composing a melody. It was an incredible experience; I played the melody part on the guitar and was able to hear other accompanying instruments. It was an upbeat instrumental tune. Even more incredible, I was able to remember the gist of the song, and when I woke up I immediately started recording a scratch guitar track in Sonar. (music/MIDI composition program) What I'd like to do is to develope the song further with future LDs, and have a completely LD originated composition! I hope you get to experience something similar. You can check out my music at http://www.artnc.com/music.html if you are so inclined. It's instrumental stuff with a jazz influence.

[Cord]

Artie, I like your music man! The one thing I like best is the quality of the production, what do you use to record? I havent had a LD in while but now im going to committ myself for this purpose.

[Leo Volont]

Originally posted by Artie J Cord: I'm a musician, and I managed to have one LD in which I was composing a melody. It was an incredible experience; I played the melody part on the guitar and was able to hear other accompanying instruments. It was an upbeat instrumental tune. Even more incredible, I was able to remember the gist of the song, and when I woke up I immediately started recording a scratch guitar track in Sonar. (music/MIDI composition program) What I'd like to do is to develope the song further with future LDs, and have a completely LD originated composition! I hope you get to experience something similar. You can check out my music at http://www.artnc.com/music.html if you are so inclined. It's instrumental stuff with a jazz influence. You're lucky to remember the tone. I once had a dream in which I was playing with The Who but when I awoke I couldn't for the life of me remember which number we did. There have been times that I have played what I knew to be 'Originals' but and even remembered upon waking what the song structure was, but later in the day.... But, anyway, it is probably not anything that ordinary hard work couldn't duplicate. The biggest problem with writing original music, anymore, is that our heads are full with everybody else's music. Now, everybody else's music is pretty good. When anybody hires a Wedding Band, they wouldn't even want an Original Group but rather prefer a Band that is proficient at doing 'everybody else's music'. Its one of the West's great cultural accomplishments that it has such a large 'record collection' of such great quality. Sometimes the pursuit of New Songs is quite annoying -- they are rarely as good as the best of the stuff we have already, but there is more money to be made in new copyrights and so we must tolerate listening to second rate crap while a catalogue of old Number One's and Grammy Award Winners sit collecting dust in our CD racks. But, yes, I do sympathize with aspiring Song Writers. A good source of original music is mixing of genres, in fact, that was the big secret of the success of American Music -- it sprung up from the cross-fertiization of many Musical Traditions. where every mexican song sounds the same, and every eastern european song sounds the same, when those two traditions meet, out comes a song that sounds differently. David Bowie used to take advantage of this phenomena -- he'd go to a new town and assemble a group of distinctively different musicians and just let his English Music Sensitivities ply upon that new mix for awhile, and it would give him ideas that would not occurred to him back in London. A certain short famous Musician also publishes on the road, but the rumor is that he outright steals the material from star-struck sidemen who play their tunes to him and ask him if he thinks their songs are any good... before the sun comes up the next day he has their songs copywritten under his name and he serves them with legal papers asking them to refrain from playing 'his' music anymore. Nice guy. One needs to wonder whether any of his Greatest Hits are actually his own. But even when done honestly, seeking for inspiration from other musical genres has its limits, especially when a more Cultured Genre has to reach into the Primitive. It seems like 'slumming'. so perhaps the best thing to do is to develop a random note, chord, and rhythm generator with a big stop switch, and just let the thing yammer away, and kill it every time you think you've heard an interesting progression which you can than mentally elaborate upon.

[Artie J]

Cord: Guitars, bass, and external sound modules are mixed on a "nothing fancy" Peavey Unity 2002-12RQ mixer, fed in to an Emu 1212m sound card. (great card! Excellent D/A A/D converters) That's just to get external sounds into Sonar. From there, other virtual instruments and effects are added within Sonar, where everything is arranged edited, mixed, etc. Leo: random generators are fine, but we seem to be wired to respond to certain rhythmic and melodic patterns. Each generation retells the classic themes in literature because they speak a truth to us. I think this applies to music as well. There can be statistically zillions of melodies, but certain melodies have a character that seems to resonate within us. So in melody creation, I'm reaching within myself to discover that character. If I arrive at a melody that speaks to me by this process, it is truer to me than a melody that was machine generated. The other side of the coin I guess, is that art reflects life, and sometimes life is pretty random. There have been a few jazz composers who literally rolled the dice to create music.