Dotoar

Let's get academic for a while, shall we?

So there's this space shuttle on its way to the outer hoods of the universe, carrying with it chunks of information constituting an ark of cultural artifacts to educate the fortunate frenger of Alpha Centauri about mankind. Among these is a titanium disc engraved with ten clusters, five on each side, which when spun through a needle will greet this fortunate frenger with neatly arranged tonal and rythmic structures. Our frenger will thus be acquainted with what seems to be an important cultural phenomenom here on Earth, and he will most certainly build his understanding on this phenomenom entirely on these ten clusters of tonal arrangements. He has to; these are the only artefacts of the kind to be found on the shuttle so obviously the earthlings must have been taken good and meticulous care of picking out the ten different chunks of aural information in order to provide a thorough, albeit compromised, picture of its cultural impact on planet Earth.

Now, the selection process may or may not have been commenced by a certain group of amateur scientists on a virtual forum called Music Banter on which they gathered around the task through the force of their vast collective batch of knowledge. On their part the task was simple: Show this potential frenger what music is, nothing less, nothing more. Yet it was hard since there was no room for personal taste or anything, something that was otherwise a crucial part of their virtual interaction around list-type objectives (and naturally, everyone tried to pass on their own personal favourites in the process). Their collective result would be narrowed down to exactly ten tracks, all of which were mirroring not only music itself but human culture on a whole to which music was an inseparable part and none of which was to be taken out of account in the evaluation process of the alien frenger. Regarding the inhabitants he was representing, it certainly had to be taken for granted that whatever was on that titanium disc would be crucial in their understanding of our culture, so there could be no room for free interpretation regarding the overall image of mankind. We could definitely not risk an intergalactic war sprung from even the slightest grain of misinterpretation.

In short: The titanium disc had to contain ten of the most representative musical pieces ever composed and performed in order to provide an adequate picture of what music is all about.

Now, what would this track selection look like? Remember: Kill your darlings! No "all time greatest" or anything here, no personal favourites. Only the most crucial musical artefacts for someone who never ever heard of music in any form whatsoever.

(I'll refrain from coming up with any candidates right now and leave it up to you, to begin with).

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