Walter Benjamin and Music in the Age of Digital Reproduction

In “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction,” Walter Benjamin cites the example of music in the benefits and limitations of mechanically reproduced art. Benjamin writes:

"Secondly, technical reproduction can put the copy of the original in situations which would be out of reach for the original itself. Above all, it enables the original to meet the beholder halfway, be it in the form of a photograph or a phonograph record. The cathedral leaves its locale to be received in the studio of a lover of art; the choral production, performed in an auditorium or in the open air, resounds in the drawing room" (1169).

I find the example of music—which Benjamin does not really expand much more upon—of significant interest in our current era of digital audio. Early in the article, in discussing the loss of “aura,” Benjamin describes the loss of authenticity in reproductions of art as also being a loss of historical testimony. In Benjamin’s example of the choral performance, the phonograph recording, which recreates the performance aurally in a drawing room, is a loss of historic testimony in that the “authenticity” of attending the show—observing the singers, observing the instrumentation of the musicians, and perhaps even observing the temperature of the room—is lost in the reproduction of sound. This is further compounded by the limitations of the recording equipment (especially in the 1930s), which, even today, cannot adequately record the true manner in which a person would listen to a choral performance in an auditorium. To use another example, today we can listen to a Leadbelly (a.k.a. Huddie Ledbetter) performance on compact disc, but we lose the aura of the moment (especially given the archaic recording equipment of the time, and the further loss of audio quality through digital mastering). We can sympathize with the emotions of Leadbelly’s voice and guitar, but we lose the intimacy of listening to his performance live, especially if the recording is one of the numerous made by Alan Lomax who archived some songs while Leadbelly was in a prison chain gang. We, the contemporary listener, can listen to “Midnight Special” in the comfort of our homes, but we cannot experience the significance of the song—composed (not by Leadbelly) about a train that symbolized freedom for prisoners in Sugarland Prison in Texas—as did listeners at the original performance. (This loss of aura in the song can also be seen as the breaking of art from ritual in that the original performances of the song once served a communal purpose for the prisoners. Question: how does Benjamin’s theory work in relation to the recording of the song by Creedence Clearwater Revival?)

Later in the article, using the art of film as an example, Benjamin describes the manipulation of mechanical devices to create the illusionary nature of art. I find this example striking in that audio recordings today are of such perfection that its live replication is nearly impossible. For example, the early Beatles albums were mostly live recordings in a studio, which suited their raucous live style of the time. As the Beatles progressed, however, the recording process involved more overdubbing until the record BECAME the performance (the Beatles stopped touring in 1966). Does Sgt. Pepper’s loss of aura diminish its significance as a brilliant record? I don’t think it does, but I’m sure it pales in comparison to having actually attended a Beatles performance. To use a more contemporary example, what happens when a performer uses prerecorded sounds onstage? When one watches an Ashlee Simpson (or Madonna, or any bad pop star really) performance, is the performance inauthentic because Simpson dances to a live recording of her manipulated vocal track instead of actually singing? I would say it does.

I can ramble on and on about this, so I think I will sum it all up with a discussion of music in the age of ipods and mp3s. What does the abundance of music downloads do to the art of music? To use recording technology as an example, I prefer to listen to records when I am in the house (although cds have a clearer sound, records sound better), but I must be in my room to listen. I could never afford to purchase the music I’ve downloaded from the Internet on vinyl, nor could I even find most of it in record form. Records are nice, but mp3s are much more convenient. Unlike records, mp3s are reproduced by digital means, which is quick, exact, and able to spread rapidly around the world. What will the over saturation of digital audio bring for the future of music? According to Benjamin, the quantity of art leads to more participation by the masses. (Avid readers became writers with the invention of the printing press, for example.) In the mid seventies, avid music fans, using two turn tables and a mixer, repeated the best bits of funk records at block parties, and poof, hip hop was created. What’s next?