Streams of logic

I've always thought that a maths proof and writing a song were around the same thing. There is logical progression, every line must flow smoothly from 1 line to the next. If there is a logical inconsistency, the whole thing falls apart. The nicest bits are when there's a leap of logic, such as when you're introducing a new idea in a proof and things go forward almost by magic, or when you're modulating to a new key or springing some other musical surprise.

There are differences, of course. In maths, something's either right or wrong. In music, there is a continuum between a good phrase and a bad phrase to put into the music. In maths anything is OK as long as you solve the problem. In music, you don't even know what is the problem to solve. It must make musical sense, but even that is ill defined, and also 1 man's meat is another man's poison. Actually there are problems to solve in music. Like when you write a section in music called a bridge that connects 2 parts of a song together it's called a bridge. Then you know that things must flow through both ends of the bridge smoothly.

Why are music and maths so similar? I once thought about what maths really means, when I got to higher levels and it became more abstract and not only about numbers anymore. We had funny little monsters like groups and rings, function spaces, even things like properties. It was then that I reckoned that maths is really about patterns and logic. Well music is also about patterns and logic. More patterns, actually.

People will inevitably get offended when I suggest that there's nothing more to music than a stream of numbers. Well nowadays even the great works of art can be digitised, and after that, it's just a stream of numbers in your jpeg file. So why shouldn't I say that notes are streams of numbers? There is this persistent insistence that maths does not have anything to do with the human soul. No, the organ most associated with your emotions - the heart - is also the most rhythmic and also the most mathematical of all your organs. (Except when you're humping somebody, that's also rhythmic. Aha - sex, one of your most emotional activities, is also rhythmic.) Yes it is possible to say that maths can be divorced from your human emotions, but you can't divorce unless you were married all along.

Is music a linear medium, then? Does it follow a linear narrative? I don't know. Sometimes it can be circular. It is a very unusual form of art in the sense that a lot of elements are juxtaposed, and interact with each other, when you have counterpoint and all that stuff, but I guess in a way it is merely more extreme than other stuff like painting where you can have a lot of stuff layered on top of each other, or novels when you're trying to keep track of 4 or 5 plot lines in your head simultaneously.

In soundtracks and operas, some snippets of tunes (we call them motifs and themes) can be used to call up certain situations in order to achieve emotional effects. It is a weaker form of a flashback in a linear narrative, although it also reminds one of more simple allusions. Like in "Lust Caution", near the end of the show they showed a short flashback of Tang Wei wandering around lost on a stage, while her comrades, pulling the strings from the circle seats, call out to her.