Talk:Pachelbel's Canon

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Pachelbel's Canon in popular culture

What about the use of Pachelbel's Canon as a central theme in Kanon? It is easily verifiable, and is, I believe, reasonably significant.Darkfeline (talk) 03:25, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

An edit removed the long list of places where the Canon can allegedly be found. This was the correct decision, since it had become messy and full of non-notable and unverified examples. I re-added the reference to Rob Paravonian's Pachelbel Rant because it is funny and popular, but it is beyond the scope of the article to argue about all of the songs that it contains. Likewise, it is beyond the scope of the article to list every record, film etc that uses the Canon or a similar chord sequence. However, the reference to the film Ordinary People was re-added because it seemed to meet the criterion of notability. This is a section that needs common-sense editing to prevent it from becoming bloated, and a few notable references should not do any harm.--Ianmacm 16:05, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure that was the best decision; a more helpful one would have been to actually validate the listings and remove the ones that are invalid. Now there's no list at all, and a useful aspect of the article (one of few, probably) is completely missing. Deleting the entire section just because of a suspicion that a few (or even most) of the entries were illegitimate is pretty severe. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.163.165.236 (talk) 10:11, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

The section deletion had nothing to do with the legitimacy of its entries. These pop culture sections have become a bit of a joke. Do you have any idea how long it would be if it were to be included? Dozens and dozens of movies. I just heard it in Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay. The list would take over the whole article. There's been a push to remove these sections from all classical music articles. DavidRF (talk) 16:26, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

The article as it appeared in May 2007 can be found here. The consensus at the time was that the list had run out of control and that many of the entries were unverified and non-notable. The idea of "in popular culture" sections is not always a bad one, and for example there is nothing much wrong with pointing out that the Canon is used as the main theme of the Oscar-winning film Ordinary People. However, the past track record of this section shows that there is a tendency for any list about the Canon in popular culture to become bloated and unmanageable, which is why the article does not go down this road any more. Incidentally, thanks to DavidRF for the cartoon at [1]. It is very funny, so take a look if you have not already done so. --♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 20:01, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

It's a shame it was removed, this article used to be a great source of information and references not just to the canon in popular culture but a list of songs based on it or with similar chords/structures. Some of which I didn't notice (and I consider myself a canon aficionado). It also served as a shining example of how classical music, especially one piece, has influenced so much of what has followed and I would often direct people to it to show how classical music gets everywhere. Why these sections couldn't have been made into seperate articles and listed in the 'See Also' section is beyond me, a wealth of information and labour of love for (many) people has been discarded because it may stray too far from the main subject of the article or go against Wikipedia ever changing rules of style, a trend that seems to be sweeping over Wikipedia. Mike (talk) 16:08, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

I think the chord progression's ubiquity deserves at least a mention, even if no examples are given (perhaps it would be adequate to cite an outside reference which provides such examples). Incidentally, does anyone know if there are any examples of pieces using this progression which predate the Canon? 82.24.183.21 (talk) 14:52, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

I've asked the editors at Talk:Chord_progression if there is any way we can get their input on the harmonic progression. They have a lot of different progressions list in that article (as well as Template:Chord progressions). I have no idea how "important" the progression Pachelbel's Canon is relative to the ones listed there. DavidRF (talk) 18:31, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

With regards to your incidental question. The use of a ground bass was quite common in the baroque era. I don't know of any that use the exact progression off the top of my head, but I do know that the "Fantazia: Three parts on a ground, Z731" by Henry Purcell uses one that's quite similar. It uses a shorter six note progression consisting of notes 1,2,3,4,7 and 8 of the progression in Pachelbel's Canon. DavidRF (talk) 18:35, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Audio of the Canon & Gigue

Per a suggestion from one of the other page editors, I added a digital realization I made of the Canon and Gigue to the Media section. Given the recent demise of a couple of the old media links, I hope this is a useful addition to the article. JCHall (talk) 06:31, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Different Renditions

I think some discussion of the different renditions (different arrangements, composers, etc.) might be useful for readers to have. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Kngspook (talk • contribs) 02:25, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Different Arrangements

I think we need some examples of the different instruments that have played this song before. For example, I am in a guitar ensemble and we are doing an arrangement for four guitars (one on chords (basso continuo), three on the violin parts). That's one example, and I've seen many other examples in (of all places) iTunes. Democraticmacguitarist (talk) 10:41, 3 May 2009 (UTC)

I think it would be appropriate to detail specific notable arrangements, but I don't think it should be done by instrumentation. Plenty of instruments can play the same musical range as those in the original arrangement; so just transposing it to another instrument is no significant feat, and has been done too many times to be worth enumerating without secondary sources. -Verdatum (talk) 15:23, 4 May 2009 (UTC)