NEW MUSIC Reports: Towards a new lexicon “Simplexity”

IMAGE: BIG VIEW ROAD, Lost in Idaho, on the way to CRATERS OF THE MOON. THE SIMPLEXITY CYCLE. Simplexity is a composite of simple = one-plex or one-fold, and complex, many-plex or many-fold; Its composite nature calls attention to the fact that, like sound and silence, simple and complex are not opposites, but complementaries, like the North and South poles of a magnet. In other words, both in the world of Nature and with human perception, they are indivisible. Simplexity, if we take movement as primary, solves the problem that has paralyzed musical thinking for 100 years. One doesn't think in terms of tonality or dissonance, but in terms of movement, say, from simple to complex (or composite) sounds, and back. Like vowel to consonant, or like striking a bell, the sound moves from rough nonlinear turbulent complexity to the smooth laminar simplicity of whole number ratios 100 200 300 400 etc. of natural sustained sound. Also, it may help clarify theoretical thinking if we add the concept of complicatedness. COMPLICATEDNESS is unnecessary difficulty. COMPLICATEDNESS is never a part of Nature. WHY? Because it wastes energy. Complicatedness is simply an uniquely human failure of design that makes things like sounds, symphonies, poems, or political systems, whatever- that are either unknowingly or deliberately DIFFICULT. COMPLEXITY, in contrast, is always GOOD, is always a feature of richness and blessed diversity.