Response to Blog- Perfection

Let me start out by saying that I will try to make this as clear and relevant to the point as possible. In her blog, Amy asks is perfection possible. My answer is no. To now how many views of perfection there is, you would have to count how many people there are in the world. No one is perfect, we all have our flaws and quirks that make us imperfect; that make us human. There was a time when humans were perfect; but then the entrance of sin into the world just took perfection out and then entered in flaws. Afterwards, the only perfection that I can think about reaches into my Christian views with the example of Christ. But like I said I will keep it relevant to the class.
Amy basically said what I am going to say. Perfection to one person is not perfection to another. Each person has a certain standard that they try to reach and once (if) reached this is what they call perfection. Another persons standard may be lower than that of the first person, then deeming their work as perfection even though to the first person it isn't. Then if a third person came into the picture, and this person had the highest standard which surpassed the first person and the second person, their achievements would be perfection in their eyes. Though the third person has this thing that they deem as perfect, the first to people may not see it as so, stating that person three, over did it causing what had the potential to be perfect to become not perfect.
It is a confusing topic, but perfection is in the eye of the person who set the standards; and no two standards are the same. In the concept of music, this is why people don't like the same music; they have a standard as to what music is perfect to them and what music isn't. Some people may be satisfied with a song that has a certain amount of notes, or a song played by a certain band, or even a musician that uses a particular technique. A song having met a persons standard/ expectation may be deemed as perfect to THAT person. On the other hand, another person may like a particular tempo, combined in a particular key, with a bit of complexity. This can be deemed as perfection to another. This is why all artists have to do is do what feels right to them and not worry about the audience. They need to concentrate on what the music is telling them to do, and try and reach their own personal satisfaction. So the question is answered, there is no such thing as perfection in everyday life (not touching on religion). Perfection is an individual concept, and will remain so.

My question is: Can musicians get caught up in trying to learn techniques that they forget to actually pay attention and truly listen to the music they are playing?

Music in Movies and the Emotion they portray.

In the recently read Davies chapter, the topics of music expression and emotions are explored. Within the chapter, Davies makes many interesting points, and one point that sticks to me and that I agree with is the fact that music has no emotion. Music doesn't have the characteristic of sad, angry, happy, etc...it is what we associate music with that invoke these emotions.

Whenever I listen to my mp3 player and any song comes on, I associate it with an event (past or present even future) in my life. I pair it up with a memory, or I try to associate the song with the performer and what he/she must have been going through when they wrote it. Not only this, don't think of me as crazy, but I use music to live out my fantasies. For example, the songs by 98 degrees "I DO" and "God Must Have Spent A Little More Time On You" by N'Sync makes me imagine the night my boyfriend proposes to me, or the first dance I will have with him as his wife. It is through these associations that I can put an adjective to the music.

Talking about emotions and associations, I want to talk about the topic of movies. Notice that movies cannot give a full effect without music. I mean in the past they did, when there were silent films, but now that movies have become more advanced and more technologically based, music without movies is like a night sky without stars (there is only a limited effect). I have mentioned this example before, but I am going to go back to it. Think about the movie "Psycho." It is an intense movie with a famous and intense murder scene, the shower scene. We all know the famous shrieking of the violins as the woman gets stabbed in the shower, this adds to the gruesome scene by illuminating the killing. It was actually so gruesome that in order to show it in London, they had to get rid of the shrieking violins (even though they kept the shower scene) and then it was deemed appropriate.
I also like the fact that music in movies fit the situation and can be deemed with (associated with) a particular characteristic due to what is going on in the scene. For example, slow soft music is used for a romantic scene or a scene in which someone has had their heartbroken. Intense music is used in murder scenes or action scenes, and suspenseful deep toned music is used to build up suspense in a "Whats going to happen next- oh no the killer is behind you" scene. I cannot disagree that music is used to help invoke particular emotions and reactions to things, but it doesn't hold the emotion itself. I also cannot disagree either that without music in movies; the movie would be looked at as dry and we wouldn't have the same reaction to movies without the music in them. Music is important in association, but alone individual of a medium to be paired with, it is just stoic sound.

Question: If we connect our own experiences/ memories/ associations/ etc to music than does that mean music can portray different meaning/different responses to each individual person? Can any response to music be a right/wrong one?