In “Creativity in a Nutshell”, Margaret Boden distinguishes between “psychological” or “P” creativity and “historical” or “H” creativity: According to Mike Radford, P creativity “comes about while thinking inside the box,” the construction of new combinations of existing ideas that make sense within the context of conceptual space, [its] rules and parameters” (57-8). By contrast, H creativity is a kind of “thinking outside the box” which makes “sense while at the same time challenging the very rules, conventions or agreements that… defined the conceptuals space” (58). Unlike “P” creativity, “H” creativity “changes the history of the conceptual space” itself. Can the Beatles be said to exhibit P creativity? Discuss, by way of a detailed example or two. Can the Beatles be said to exhibit H creativity? Again, discuss by way of a detailed example or two.
Margaret Boden’s In a Nutshell defines creativity as “the ability to come up with ideas or artefacts that are new, surprising, and valuable” (Boden, 1). To further define this notion, she brands the initial classes of creativity as “psychological “P” creativity and historical “H” creativity” (Boden, 2). Ostentatiously clear requirements are named within this definition and the inevitable determination is that creativity is far more complex than simply affirming or negating the creativity of an idea, action, or artefact. Instead the vision birthed is that creativity is multidimensional and multideterminant – “We [must] ask just how creative is it and in just which way(s)?” (Boden, 2)
The Beatles, of course, were undeniably creative. In fact, if one was to describe the Beatles in one word, the response is nearly always synonymous with creative. With consideration to Boden’s differentiations between P and H creativity, it is apparent that the Beatles exhibit both classes of creativity at different moments. P creativity is exhibited when playing “folk chords with rock n’ roll tempos” (Crosby, b. 1941) and when shifting away from 45 rpms in exchange for full-length albums, while H creativity is exhibited when “preaching cosmic love in The Word ” (Kozinn) and when using Indian influences in their music.
Using Boden’s definition, the first requirement of creativity is determining whether or not something is new. Here, we reach a new level of fidelity and key distinguishing factor between P creativity and H creativity. “P-creativity involves coming up with a surprising, valuable idea that’s new to the person who comes up with it” (Boden, 2). Similarly, H-creativity involves garnering a surprising, valuable idea that is new to the person that comes up with it; however, it is also an idea that “ (so far as we know) no one else has had… before either: it is the first time in human history” (Boden, 2).
The Beatles music career kicked off with many of their songs following a standard blues and rock n’ roll chord variations. As they progressed as musicians and artists, they used their musical knowledge and influences differently to explore new sounds; the method of creative exploration is one of three three types of creativity expressed by Margaret Boden. An example of this is when they started using folk chord progressions with rock’n’roll tempos and harmonies. When discussing the new Beatles sound, Dave Crosby called the creative result “synthesis” –
…“ I thought I heard folk sort of changes with a rock’n’roll sort of beat… synthesis takes place by two disparate streams of stuff, hitherto unrelated, being mushed together… They did synthesize a new music, because rock’n’roll didn’t have that kind of chord changes and melody-to-chord relationships prior to them. It just didn’t”… (Crosby, b. 1941)
By his definition, synthesis took different, but familiar rules and ideas and combined them in a different way. Synthesis and exploration are synonymous in this context, as they both encompass the key components of P-Creativity being an idea that “worked within the confines of an existing conceptual space” (Boden,5).
P-creativity is exhibited again when the Beatles started making the transition away from the general 45 rpm “single” standard for rock’n’roll and pop music and began to embrace the creation of music a the album level instead. This was a form a P-creativity because this practice was not new or deemed impossible – the potential to do this was always there. Therefore, the Beatles worked within the general constructs of conceptual space.