Importance of Words to Music, a lyrical and melodic inquiry! Options

[trunks_girl26]

I resisted the urge to put this in Issues, even though it tends to be rather culturally relevant. Mods feel free to move this if they would like.

I just finished having a rather intense discussion with another forumite *cough*pwm*cough* which started as one about the limitations (or lack thereof) a choir has with music, as opposed to an orchestra and branched into one concerning the importance of words to music in general.

He tends to be of the opinion that words aren't as important as melody, while I feel that words can be as powerful, if not more, than the melody.

So, I put it to you, good Matazonians:

How important are words to music?
If words have no importance, would it be possible to take the same melody, put it to radically different phrases, and not not drastically change its meaning?
Does culture play a part in how important words are to music, if so how?

[pgrmdave]

Ummm, doesn't it heavily depend on the specific song in question? A lot of pop music has rather unimportant music, but the message is in the lyrics, even more so for rap, where there doesn't need to be music, and more so for poetry (which is a form of rap, or rather, rap is a form of it). I think that there are some songs and artists whose music is poetry (Pink Floyd!) and both the lyrics and the music go too hand-in-hand to consider either more important.

That doesn't mean that I find lyrics more important, but that I think that they can be equally important, depending on the song in question. In general, there is more music without lyrics or in a language I don't understand, and in those songs, I find the music more important.

[Wookiee]

think that there are some songs and artists whose music is poetry (Pink Floyd!)

If I want in depth heavy lyrical content that needs listening too, then i'll go... NIN.

... yeah?

so I stand by my original statement that you cant really compare them.

Well, I did. So you can.

[bryden42]

think that there are some songs and artists whose music is poetry (Pink Floyd!)

If I want in depth heavy lyrical content that needs listening too, then i'll go... NIN.

... yeah?

so I stand by my original statement that you cant really compare them.

Well, I did. So you can.

So your not down with NN?