to tell you what I said<<
No, but it's nice of you to try to figure it out.
Whether or not I'm a poet, I don't know. I'm just trying to save myself a couple of thousand keystrokes, so I'm writing shorthand. That said, you did get part of it. But, for example, what has been more thoroughly studied than the diatonic scale and its permutations in music? The way we think about, hear and compose music in our tradition has been thoroughly shaped by the theoretical understanding of our system of its tonality. While there is, "no doubt," that the diatonic scale was originally simply "heard," that event, if it ever was, is long ago and far away. Our system of notation takes into account the steps of the scale and attempts to reconcile it with the "ergonomics" of sight (the five-line staff) and a system of absolute intervals (half-steps) which has been derived theoretically from the eight tones that compose the scale which we hear as an aesthetic unity. This, in a simple way, is a part of the frame. All cultural transmission exists in such frames. But I do not mean to say that such frames merely form the background or "horizon" of transmission. There is an active interplay between what we call the theoretical and what we call the creative. I do not mean to suggest that there is no distinction between these, whatsoever, only to cast doubt on the the notion of "creativity," which, as it is commonly used, I find to be an offensive term. Anyway, it's always nice to have something to drink to.
