What Makes It Sound Like Christmas?

In so many cases, when we’re wondering “what makes it sound ____?” where ____ is Christmas, or metal, or Irish, or whatever, the answer lies not so much in the harmonies, but the timbres. Timbre is probably the most immediate aspect of our musical experience. Why shortchange it in our analyses?

’80s-inspired music

LASER by Igor Fuentes. https://flic.kr/p/fwv1K5

How do we make something sound ’80s? When today’s millennials—who were only infants or children in the ’80s—recreate an ’80s sound, how does it compare to an authentically ’80s sound? What elements of the ’70s or the ’90s get misremembered as an ’80s phenomenon? All these questions are discussed in the the latest Pop Unmuted episode.

Analyzing timbre

I’ve removed this post, which was from 2016 (!), because my approach to timbre has evolved a lot. Readers should check out my MTO article instead, which was published in 2020. You can find more publications (all of which was published later than this blog post) on my Research page.