Will We Ever Run Out of New Music

Hey, Vsauce. Michael here. And the iTunes store contains 28 million different songs. Last.Fm carries 45 million songs and the
Gracenote database of artists, titles, and labels contains 130 million different songs.
That's a lot.

If you were to listen to all of the songs in the Gracenote database one
after the other in a giant playlist, it would take you more than 1,200 years to complete. But since there are a finite number of tones
our ears can distinguish and because it only takes a few notes in common for two musical
ideas to sound similar, will we ever run out of new music? Will there ever be a day where every possible
brief little melody has been written and recorded and we are left with nothing new to make? A good rule of thumb might be to say that
if modern recording technology can't distinguish the difference between two songs, well, neither
could we. So, let's begin there, with digital downloads, MP3's, CD's, and a calculation
made by Covered in Bees. Digital music is made out of "bits."
Lots and lots of bits.

But each individual bit exists in one of two states: a "0" or a "1." Now, what this means in that for any given,
say, 5-minute-long audio file, the number of possibilities, mathematically speaking,
is enormous, but mind-blowingly finite. A compact disk, which samples music at 44.1
KHz, is going to need about 211 million bits to store one 5-minute song. And because a
bit can exist in two states, either a "0" or a "1," the number of possible different
ways to arrange those 211,000,000 bits is 2 to the 211th million power. That value represents every single possible
different 5-minute-long audio file.

But how big is that number?
Well, let's put this in perspective. A single drop of water contains 6 sextillion
atoms. 6 Sextillion is 22 digits long. That's a long number.

But the total number of atoms
that make up the entire earth is a number that is about 50 digits long. And estimations
of the total number of hydrogen atoms in our universe is a number that is 80 digits long. But "2 to the 211 millionth power," the number
of possible, different 5-minute audio files, is a number that is 63 million digits long. It is a number
larger than we can even pretend to understand.

It contains every possible CD quality 5-minute
audio file. Inside that amount is everything from Beethoven's "5th" to Beck's "Loser" -
it even contains a 5 minute conversation you had with your parents when you were 3 years old.
In fact, every one of them. It even contains every possible conversation you didn't have
with your parents when you were 3 years old. But, it is finite, not infinite.

It's cool
to think about, but it doesn't come very close to answering the question of this video, which
is "how many possible different songs can we create and hear the difference between?" So, for that, we're going to need to narrow
down our hunt. On Everything2, Ferrouslepidoptera made a
calculation that involved some assumptions that I think helped narrow the field down
in a really nice way. She took a look at the total number of possible
different melodies you could create within one octave, containing any or all of the intervals
we divide octaves into. Of course, sound frequencies can be divided much more granularly than that,
but giving ourselves more notes might mean we could make more technically different melodies,
but they wouldn't necessarily sound any different to our ears.

Now, given a single measure containing any
combination of whole, half, quarter, eighth, sixteenth or thirty-second notes, she calculated
that there would be this many possible unique measures, which is a smaller number than we
had before, but, to put it in perspective, this is how many seconds old the universe is. Yerricde's calculation is even more specific.
He stayed within one octave, but instead of looking at a complete measure, he only considered
the number of unique combinations of 8 notes. He also assumed that typical melodies, as
we know them today, only contain about three different types of note length. For instance, quarter, eighth and sixteenth or whole, half and quarter.

To be sure, that will most likely not always
be true. Musical tastes hundreds, thousands of years from now will most assuredly be different,
but given melodies as we know them today, across 8 notes, over 12 intervals, there are
about 79 billion possible combinations. We're getting relatively small here. I mean,
under this definition of melody, 100 songwriters creating a brand new 8-note melody every second
would exhaust every possible melody within only 248 years.

But it's still a huge number, way bigger than
the total number of songs that have been written that we know about. So, you can quite safely
say that, no, we will never run out of new music. But here's the rub. If that's the case,
why are there so many commonalities between songs? Even across hundreds of years, how
come so many songs kind of sound the same? I mean, if we have more possibilities than
we could ever exhaust, why is "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star," the "Alphabet Song," and "Baa,
Baa, Black Sheep," all the same melody? "My Country Tis of Thee," and "God Save the
Queen," interestingly enough, are the same song.

"Love Me Tender," is exactly the same as the
old American Civil War song "Aura Lea." And a seemingly uncountable number of songs
merely sound like other songs. The Spongebob Squarepants theme has a very similar cadence
to "Blow the Man Down." Soundsjustlike.Com is a great resource for
exploring this further. It'll show you two songs and how they sort of sound alike. And when it comes to musical chords,
it's almost as if there's no variety at all, as was famously shown by The Axis of Awesome's
"4 Chords." I've linked it in the description, it's worth a watch if you haven't seen it
already.

These guys sing more than 40 different songs using the same four chords... Even though the number of possible different
melodies is gigantic, us humans tend to gravitate towards certain patterns that we like more
than others and we are influenced by what came before us. Kirby Ferguson has a fantastic
series looking into this called "Everything is a Remix." I've also linked that down in
the description. The commonalities he shows are pretty crazy.

Well, even when it comes to lyrics, to writing,
even though, mathematically, there are more possibilities than we could ever exhaust,
we have gravitated towards a few. In fact, there's a form of poetic meter that is so
common it's called "Common Meter." I've composed a verse using it to explain what it is. Line one contains eight syllables. The next
contains just six.

For emphasis: iambic stress. That's it, no other tricks. Here is a list of songs that are written in common
meter, also known as "Balad Meter." The commonness of common meter is the reason you can sing
the Pokemon theme song to the tune of Gilligan's Island. Or House of the Rising Sun.

Or Amazing
Grace. You could also use almost any of Emily Dickinson's poetry. Sure, they're different
melodies, but their lyrics are written in the same meter. There's a great video on YouTube that I've
linked below in the description that uses captions to let you see just how these all
fit together.

Oh, and don't forget one of the greatest compositions
taking advantage of common meter's commonness: Stairway to Gilligan's Island. And you know what? Our brains may also be
keeping us from enjoying the entire mathematical space of available songs. For instance,
research has shown that the way a song compresses, using software, can help us predict how enjoyable
it will be. Too simple, too easy to compress, like, say, a rising scale, and the song doesn't
challenge us - it's boring.

But too complicated, say, white noise, and the file won't compress
very much at all, and, likewise, we don't seem to enjoy it. There's a magic zone where
a file is compressible by a computer, and also happens to be enjoyable by us. So, interestingly, even though mathematically
speaking, there are so many possible unique melodies that we can safely say, there will
always be room for new music, we don't seem to be wired to care. We enjoy certain patterns
and melodies and calculating how many there could be is a lot less interesting than how
connected and similar all the ones that we enjoy are.

It's as if we have more space than
we need, more space than we could ever hope to see all of, or visit all of, or know all
of, but no matter what new place we go, in a general sense, new, popular music will always
remind us a bit of home. And as always, thanks for watching. Fantastic, you're still here. If you want
to hear music from people like you, from Vsaucers, go check out WeSauce.

You can submit music,
animation, short films, anything that you're making and putting on YouTube to us and we'll
feature it on WeSauce. It's like a trailer for what Vsaucers are doing. Speaking of which, Jake Chudnow, who does
all of the music in these videos, has a brand new song out over on his channel,
which I highly suggest you go give a listen..

Video Game Music - How to Create a Timeless Theme - Extra Credits

[ "Penguin Cap" by CarboHydroM] What happened to music in video games?
Where did all those iconic tunes go? That question gets asked pretty often, so I guess it's high time we talk about it. So, music and games. Where did all those great theme songs go?
They were so memorable, like this one: [ "Overworld" by Koji Kondo] Or this one: [ "Title Theme" by Masato Nakamura] Or this one: [ "Dr. Wily Stage" by Ogeretsu Kun, Manami Matsumae, Yoshihiro Sakaguchi] Or this one: [ "Prelude" by Nobuo Uematsu] We know them all by heart, and for some reason, most of them come from games made in the 80s.

Why is that? Perhaps music was just better in the 80s. Well... Hmm. Oh, okay.

Perhaps not. Well, there's got to be some explanation. What changed? Certainly, sound quality has gotten better and music budgets are bigger. We've got access to entire symphonies now.

[ "God of War Overture" by Gerard Marino] We've got pop stars singing big theme songs. [ "Simple and Clean" by Hikaru Utada] And game musicians have got high-tech gear to work with now. So how come game music got worse? Trick question: it didn't. Like I said, sound quality is way better and today's game composers have far more resources to work with, but at the same time, modern game music has become a lot less memorable.

Why? Well, because of all the big expensive toys they have access to now. All the symphonies and quality gear have moved us away from that powerful element the old eighties chiptunes had to rely on: simplicity. [ "Stage 1" by Kinuyo Yamashita] Back in the 8-bit era, very few games could process more than three tones at once. For those of you unfamiliar with music terminology, three distinct tones are exactly enough to play a chord and nothing else.

This means that the old-school game composers couldn't write a tune with complex, multi-layered melodies moving over big chord sections with a separate bassline. They had to write entire soundtracks using single notes or individual chords. That was it. [ "Brinstar" by Hirokazu "Hip" Tanaka] This was a severe limitation, but it also ended up being a strength: those musicians were forced to focus exclusively on the melody line.

A strong melody is what makes a song memorable. It's what makes a song stick in your head and keeps you humming that song years after you last heard it. You know what makes John Williams such an incredible composer? The man is a genius at creating strong, memorable melodies. Like this one: [ "Main Title" by John Williams] And, of course, this one: [ "The Raiders March" by John Williams] And all of these: [ "Journey to the Island" by John Williams] [ "Home Alone Main Title" by John Williams] [ "Lumos (Hedwig's Theme)" by John Williams] You know every single one of those, don't you?
That's what a good melody can do.

Why do melodies stick in our mind this way? In part, it's because the human voice can only produce one tone at a time. Well, okay. Well, that's not strictly true, but it's functionally true for like, 99% of us. So when a person tries to wrap their mind around a song, most of us think of it in terms of single tones.

This focus on single tones or single chords, uncluttered by lots of competing tonal movement, is at the root of most iconic music. It's true from the "Imperial March" to Pachelbel's "Canon in D." From "Smells like Teen Spirit" to "Changes." Tupac's "Changes," Not, not David Bowie's. Well... No, you know what? David Bowie's, too.

And this is also true of some of the most recognizable modern video game music. Take the Halo theme: [ "Halo" by Martin O'Donnell and Michael Salvatori] I know you know that one. Everybody does. Listen to the male chorus here: [ "Halo" by Martin O'Donnell and Michael Salvatori] Strong, easily hummable melody, right? Now listen to everything the strings are doing.

[ "Halo" by Martin O'Donnell and Michael Salvatori] There's a lot of layers in there, but they're all delivering strong, hummable melodies, and that kick-ass percussion sure doesn't hurt anything. [ "Halo" by Martin O'Donnell and Michael Salvatori] Awesome thing. Does this mean we should turn back to our old ways? Should we do away with the new tech and the fancy symphonies? Of course not. That would be utterly ridiculous.

After how far game music has come, are you kidding? We've got a swarm of talented people working in game music now. Most of the old 8-bit veterans are still working, lots of new talent has come on board, and we've even got high-profile composers like Hans Zimmer and Danny Elfman writing music for video games now. That is awesome. And today's technology allows music to be far more flexible than it used to be.

Back in the day, games like Mega Man would just have a single theme playing for the entire level. And that was okay, because Mega Man was basically doing the same thing the whole time: jumping, shooting, and running to the right. But today? Sound and music programmers can crossfade between tracks, add and remove layers at will, and have the music constantly change to match the dynamics of the action on screen. [ "Tanker Incident" by Norihiko Hibino] And the music from long-running franchises like Mario, Zelda, and Final Fantasy have all benefited from leaving their 8-bit roots by adding extra layers and depth to the arrangements, while always staying true to the simple melodies at their core.

Sure, the original tunes are still great as ever, but would you honestly rather go back to the era of this: [ "Opening Theme" by Nobuo Uematsu] When we've got this: [ "Ending Theme" by Nobuo Uematsu] I mean, think of Metal Gear.
We started with music like this: [ "Jungle" by Iku Mizutani, Shigehiro Takenouchi, Motoaki Furukawa] All well and good, and great for its time, but... Would you honestly rather cling to that when we've got friggin Harry Gregson-Williams writing gold like this: [ "Metal Gear Solid Main Theme" by Harry Gregson-Williams] Besides, we've come to realize that sometimes, the most effective music in a video game are the tracks without the memorable melodies. Sometimes the best game music is the kind that functions only to reinforce the game itself. Artists like Akira Yamaoka have spent years studying the way that games and music interact, writing music that might not be all that iconic or even that good when listened to on its own.

But play that track in the game, in the environment for which it was intended, and it takes the experience to a new heights. It subtly brings the player's immersion to a whole new level. This is an incredible thing. This is exactly what a game musician should be capable of doing.

Okay, I'm seriously gonna wrap this up, or I'm going to have gone babbling about video game music all day. In the end, there's a place for both iconic theme songs and immersion building mood music. They're by no means exclusive. But if you want to kick off a new franchise with a tune that'll keep players humming, then be sure that music is grounded in the old-school simplicity of yesteryear, and then build from there.

A memorable tune can build a strong impression. A great game is a great game, but a great game with an awesome theme song? [ "Still Alive" by Jonathan Coulton] That's going to stick with people. [ "Still Alive" by Jonathan Coulton] See you next week. [ "Still Alive" by Jonathan Coulton].

video game christmas music

*THUNK* aw heck yeah major's mask but which key is the any key The spirit of christmas is waning from the world! Fight to restore joy! (At the part I'm just gonna put in the lyrics of the songs in case you want to sing along, have fun) Should auld aquaintance be forgot and never brought to mind? Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
and auld lang syne? OHSHI- Deck the halls with boughs of holly! FA LA LA LA LA  LA LA LA LA. Tis the season to be jolly! FA LA LA LA LA  LA LA LA LA. Fill the meadcup, Drain the barrel
(apparently the original lyrics) FA LA LA LA LA  LA LA LA LA. Traul the ancient Yuletide carol! FA LA LA LA LA  LA LA LA LA.

(Jingling intensifies) (shit's about to get religious up in this peice) (real talk: water themes are extremely under appreciated due to the garbanzo nature of water levels) (nice try tonkus) Gloooo ooooOOOOoooo ooooOOOOOoooo ooooooria in excelsius deo (latin, my dudes) (nobody can say for sure) On the first day of christmas, my true love gave to me, A hookshot to climb a tall tree. On the next day of christmas, my true love gave to me, A boomerang that comes right back to me On the next day of christmas, my true love game to me A bottle of honest whiskey
(LOOK VODKA DOESN'T RHYME) On the next day of christmas, my true love game to me A partridge in a pear tree.
(The classic) On the next day of christmas, my true love game to me Listen, now, to a tale of heartbreak and sorrow. *CLONG* (the opening notes to gerudo valley) Oh come, all ye faithful, joyful and triumphant! Oh come ye, Oh co-ome ye to Be-ethleham JINGLE BELLS. JINGLE BOMBS.

GUNSHOTS ALL THE WAY. OH WHAT FUN. TO STEAL A CAR. AND ALWAYS GET AWAY.

Special thanks to: Seth, for being your, my, and everybody's boy. The Internet, for sourcing these lyrics And most importantly, You. Thanks for playing! (OH GOD, CHRISTMAS OVERLOAD) (THE JOLLY, THE JOY) (IT IS TOO MUCH) (also buy the album) 3 Heart Peices, 2 Rupees Red and a (CHRISTMAS OVERLOAD INTENSIFIES) (ALL THINGS FALL) (FALL TO RUIN) (FALL TO CHAOS) (EVEN IN CHRISTMAS) (EVEN IN THE TIME OF GIVING) (NONE CAN RESIST) (seriously though merry christmas all) (or hannukah) (or kwanza) (or winter solstice) (or festivus) (y'know, for the rest of us) (also happy new year) (and chinese new year) (and to the rest of you, watching at the other times of year).

Transforming Noise Into MusicJackson JhinTEDxUND

Translator: Ines Azabou
Reviewer: Queenie Lee Finding insperation is not the hardest part
of composing music. Musical ideas are all around us, but sifting through them to find something
that's going to be appealing not only to yourself
but also to other people is the real challenge. Hi, my name is Jackson Jhin, I am a composer
and electronic music producer. And what if I could show you
what makes popular music popular? So here is the end result
of a well-known piece: Pachelbel's Canon in D.

(Music) Now, even if you don't know
the title of this song, this chord progression is used
throughout contemporary music and is heard in weddings, graduations,
and throughout our culture. But how exactly did Pachelbel know
this would be so appealing? Well, he had commissions, audiences, and audiences that gave him applause
as sources of affirmation. But he would also stress the importance
of classical music theory, which states that
very certain harmonies, chords, and all these types of progressions are crucially important
to making appealing music. But if we look on the other side
of the world, for example, some cultures don't even use
the same 12 semitones per octave, much less the same harmonies or scales, so then what is it that defines music? What if you were born
on an island with no society? Then what would music sound like to you? So, on this island, we find a coconut.

(Pangs) It sounds like this. Pretty basic noise,
not inherently musical or special. But let's make it
a little bit more special. What if we find two sticks? It sounds like this.

(Tapping) Now, if I were to play this sound
over and over for an hour, how many of you would consider this music, or better yet, how many of you
would just go ahead and kick me off? (Laughter) Kick me off the island. But we find more sticks, and then now we can change
a variable to add more interest: pitch. Now we get something
that sounds like this. (Music) A lot more interesting.

So now what I'm going to do
is play this over - (Music) now this is a lot more
interesting than the coconut, but what we are going to do
is bring the coconut back in. Now what you have
is the stable rhythm of the coconut (Laughter) but a very interesting counterpoint
of the sticks on top. And lastly, to bring this
to our final step of musicality, imagine that we are in a cave. (Reverberating sound) And now what you have is the interaction
of the sound and the cave; the echo creating something predictable
that will always happen but yet inherently interesting.

So by raise of hands, how many of you'd consider
that more musical than just the coconut we started out with? Awesome, it looks like
almost everyone. Great. So then, what is it that defines music? Music is fundamentally the balance between predictability and variability. Now this is important because you
need your music to be intriguing, you want it to be interesting, but, at the same time,
if it is not predictable, if you can't anticipate
what's going to happen next, it's too chaotic.

So I'll show you what I mean. We take out one of these,
and all we have is predictability. A famous modern composer, Philip Glass, is known for using very repetitive music that sounds just like this, very predictable without much variation. So let me play a little bit for you.

(Music) on and on and on. This piece is an hour
and eight minutes long. (Laughter) That's crazy. And on the other extreme, let's take out predictability,
and what do we get.

We get complete variability with no anticipation
of what's going to happen next. Another modern composer, John Cage, is famous for playing
very avant-garde music without much anticipation
of what could happen next, and in this particular piece, he uses a feather to stroke
and amplify cactus. I'll show you what I mean.
It sounds like this. (Music) So imagine that for an hour
and eight minutes.

(Laughter) Now, I don't personally enjoy John Cage's
cactus experiments, but some people do. Some people are
on either end of the spectrum that can like very predictable music
or very variable music. (Laughter) But for the most of us, we need it to be balanced
between predictability and variability. So what's an example of this? Well, actually, Pachelbel's Canon in D
is a great example.

What we have here (Music) is a piece that is balanced very well, with each chord sharing at least one note
with the chord proceeding it, a very steady tempo and chord progression, with a very interesting
counterpoint on top - What does this all mean? Translation: it's well balanced
and it's appealing. So, what we are going to do
is see if we can take that out, take the intentional
predictability and variability and see what happens then. So what I have done is cut this up
into eight arbitrary slices, and with the help of the audience - Could I please have a number
between one and eight? Right here. Seven.

Okay! A different number, please! Seven, four ... Between one and eight! (Laughter) Seven, four, two -
seven, four, two, three - seven, four, two, three, six. We have seven, four, two, three, six. Now, what I am going to do
is play this Philip Glass style.

(Music) Over and over ... And what we have is something
that sounds totally different, and honestly pretty bad. So, with the help from the audience, we have just destroyed one
of the most appealing pieces of music. (Laughter) But that is easy,
anyone can deconstruct music, you just have to take things
out until nothing is left, but what if we could transform noise
into music, using these same principles.

So this next sound I have - (Beeping) I can already see
by the looks on and groans that this may sound like something more that you try to hit in the morning
to shut off rather than music. But what if we change a variable
to make this more interesting. So let's change pitch. So instead of this ...

(Beeping) we change pitch and we get this ... (Music) A lot more interesting, right? And then next, we are going
to change the rhythm and see if we can make this
even more musical. We get this. (Music) So, how many of you think
that last part is more appealing than just the alarm clock itself? (Laughter) I would rather wake up to this as well.

But what does all this mean? Some people do have preferences
on either end of the spectrum, and our preferences
can fall anywhere in between. Some people may like
more predictable music, some people might like more variation; however, the majority of us
need this fundamental balance of predictability and variability
to find music appealing. Every day, when we listen to music, we use very strict frameworks,
like genre, culture, and era, to tell us exactly what music
is going to be appealing and what instruments
and sounds to listen for, but the next time you listen to something
that doesn't catch you immediately or isn't appealing at first, don't press skip, give it a chance, focus on the balance
of predictability and variability. Thank you.

(Applause).

The Sound of Music (55) Movie CLIP - So Long, Farewell (1965) HD

So long, farewell auf wiedersehen, good night. I hate to go and leave this pretty sight. (Music Playing) So long, farewell auf wiedersehen, adieu. Adieu, adieu, to you and you and you.

(Music playing) So long, farewell au revoir, auf wiedersehen. I'd like to stay And taste my first champagne YES? NO. (Laughs) So long, farewell auf wiedersehen, goodbye I leave and heave a sigh and say goodbye Goodbye. I'm glad to go I cannot tell a lie.

I fleet, I float I fleety flee, I fly. The sun has gone to bed, and so must I. So long, farewell auf wiedersehen, goodbye Goodbye. Goodbye.

Goodbye..