Two short student summaries of Carlsson's theory

Here are two summaries of Carlson's theory which I have literally just lifted from A2 student's blogs, hense lack of paragraphing... Scroll down for second one. Might be easy way in to the theory...

Sven E Carlsson’s Theory
Music Video artist as a “modern mythic embodiment”the music video artist is seen as embodying one, or a combination of “modern mythic characters or forces” of which there are three general. The music video artist is representing different aspects of the free floating disparate universe of music video. There are two groups of music video:performance clip - when a video shows an artist mostly dancing and singingconceptual clip - when the clip has something else during it's duration often with artistic ambitionsIn one type of performance, the performer is not a performer anymore; he or she is a materialization of the commercial exhibitionist. He or she is a monger of their own body image, selling everything to be in the spotlight – selling voice, face, lifestyle records, etc. the exhibitionist wants success and tries to evoke the charisma of stardom and sexuality.Televised bard - a singing storyteller who uses actual on screen images instead of inner, personal images.Electronic shaman - sometimes the shaman is invisible and it is only his or her voice that anchor the visuals. They often shift between multiple shapes. E.g. at one moment the electronic shaman animates dead objects, seconds later her or she is shifting through time etc.Music video is a form of audio-visual communication in which the meaning is created via carriers of information such as: music, lyrics and moving images.Music - Sometimes the musical elements shape the moving pictures.- Moments like footsteps are often synchronized with the beat, so that people in the music video seem to walk in sync to the music. Melodic phrases can also be visualized by tilting the camera vertically to match the musical phrase’s up and down travel on the scales.Lyrics- lyrics and images interact creating meaning.- New meaning is added to the banal lyrics through metaphorical language- The greater the leap between the content of the lyrics and the imagery in this metaphorical joining, the more difficult it becomes for viewers to understand and interpret the context.- The environment is made to mirror the feelings of the lead charactersThe image - the visual form is close to the musical form. - By manipulating colour, motive setting, story footage, clothing, etc the music video director creates a couple of ideas which are repeated and varied.- The concept is to rearrange visual motifs so that the work forms a whole.There are three forms of visual tradition in music videos they are: performance clip, narrative clips and art clip.Performance clip - if a music video contains mostly filmed performance then it is a performance clip, which shows the vocalist in one or more settings. There are three types; song performance, dance performance, instrumental performance.Narrative clip - a short silent movie to a musical background, a visual story that is easy to follow.Art Clip - if a music video contains no perceptible visual narrative and contains no lip-synchronized singing then it is a pure art clip. While the music video uses popular music the artistic video uses more experimental music, such as electro-acoustic- The connections between the music genre and the visual genre of music are weak. There are, however, some connections: dance music video clips are sometimes art clips. The editing technique in soft ballads is mostly mixing. The hard rock music genre usually features standard clips consisting of concert shots and inserted narrative shots.

Carlsson's Theory
During my research of music videos I have researched into Sven.E.Carlsson and his theory of music video analyis. He stated that music video is a many faceted multi-discursive phenomenon and that Music Video is a form of audio - visual communication in which meaning is created via carriers of information such as, the music, the lyrics and the moving images. Carlsson believed that music videos fall into two main groups, a performance clip and a conceptual clip. A performance clip being shows the vocalist in one or more settings. It can either be a song performance, dance performance, instrumental performance, and the conceptual clip being something else occuring during the music video. It is possible to further analyise these clips, however, by looking deeper into each particular type of perfromance. For instance in certain types of perfromances the performer is often made into a materialization of the commerical exhibitionist, this is where the performer is made into almost a sleeing item, someone that fans often aspire to be and these scenes will be extremely high in quality and have a gloss to them. Another type is the televised bard, which is a singing storyteller who uses on screen images instead of inner, personal images. The the third and final type is the elctronic shaman, sometimes the shaman is invisible and only his/her voice that anchor the visuals. They often shift between multiple shapes. Carlsson also believed that lyrics are combined with images to create meaning to the audience and that the director will come up with a few ideas for a music video,and these ideas will be repeated and varied throughout the video. Re-arranging these visual motifs is said to be the key to making the music video work. Very often another musical element within music videos is the action on screen being synchronized with the music video, for instance someone walking in time to the beat. He also goes on to talk of the audience as being the decider in how a music video is perceived. The shock asthetics in music videos can from this point of view be interpreted as a combination of the provocative modern art tradition and the culture interpretation of the teenage rebellion.