"However, in modern conceptual frameworks there is a more sophisticated view. I would say that the act of music exists in several worlds simultaneously"
About this Quote
Fripp is sneaking a manifesto into a mild, professorial sentence. “Modern conceptual frameworks” sounds like a disclaimer for the skeptics: he’s not talking about mystical vibes, he’s talking about models - systems thinking, perception, attention, the way meaning is manufactured. Then he slips in the real provocation: music isn’t an object, it’s an act. That single shift demotes the recording, the score, even the “song” itself, and promotes the event: bodies in a room, a mind in headphones, a player making micro-decisions under pressure.
“Several worlds simultaneously” is where Fripp’s longtime preoccupations snap into focus. In his universe, music operates at once as craft (technique, discipline), as social contract (audience/performer power dynamics), as economics (touring, intellectual property, the industry’s churn), and as something closer to spiritual practice (attention, presence, ego management). It’s a polite way of insisting that the reductive view - music as content, product, or self-expression - is inadequate.
The context matters: Fripp comes out of progressive rock, a scene obsessed with complexity and structure, but also out of decades of grappling with what technology does to performance. Tape loops, studio precision, live improvisation, then the digital era’s frictionless reproduction: each creates a different “world” with different rules of value. The subtext is both generous and slightly combative. If you only hear one layer - entertainment, nostalgia, virtuosity - you’re missing the point. Fripp isn’t asking you to like the music; he’s asking you to take the act seriously.
“Several worlds simultaneously” is where Fripp’s longtime preoccupations snap into focus. In his universe, music operates at once as craft (technique, discipline), as social contract (audience/performer power dynamics), as economics (touring, intellectual property, the industry’s churn), and as something closer to spiritual practice (attention, presence, ego management). It’s a polite way of insisting that the reductive view - music as content, product, or self-expression - is inadequate.
The context matters: Fripp comes out of progressive rock, a scene obsessed with complexity and structure, but also out of decades of grappling with what technology does to performance. Tape loops, studio precision, live improvisation, then the digital era’s frictionless reproduction: each creates a different “world” with different rules of value. The subtext is both generous and slightly combative. If you only hear one layer - entertainment, nostalgia, virtuosity - you’re missing the point. Fripp isn’t asking you to like the music; he’s asking you to take the act seriously.
Quote Details
| Topic | Music |
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