Re: I don't see Singing playing any role in TG - Edit 1
Before modification by DomA at 08/03/2012 02:11:48 PM
For 3 reasons, one there is no Song, the Tinkers break off from the Aiel "...to find a place where we can be safe, and sing again.” Over the course of 3000 years it becomes a grand quest for the Song. 2, Singing was a Talent, LTT asks Ishy, "Have you the Voice, stranger? It will soon be time for the Singing." And they have no way of testing for this Talent. 3, no one knows any of the songs that were sung by the Aiel in the AoL. Not to mention Tinkers likely wouldn't have even a small amount of Talent for Singing due to interbreeding with the rest of the world, just as Taren Ferry didn't have any channelers.
The Aiel don't interbreed... The Tinkers have the Way of the Leaf, the Aiel have the pure blood of the Da'shain. Between the two stand Rand and Aviendha, and quite possibly Perrin who has Gaul (a future clan chief if the WO have their way) and ties to Rahen and the Tinkers. That he/Gaul/Rahen contribute to the reunion of the Aiel and Tinkers could very well be what the viewing of Perrin standing among flowering trees is all about (flowering is the harbinger of the Trees bearing fruits...).
Aviendha has seen what the future holds if the Aiel don't abandon the warrior way post TG. She's not bloody likely to do nothing about that! Rand has seen the gathering of the Tuatha'an in Ebou Dar, the Tuatha'an have even returned to a life where rather than standing aside uselessly they live among the people and provide service (mundane and perhaps eventually spiritual) and now he has LTT's knowledge Rand knows all there is to know about the Da'shain Aiel, and about Singing. Apparently, LTT or his wife prized Singing a lot, and everyone with the Talent was welcome in his house... And there's also Elayne's AOL library, and her "i-pod". Plenty of possibilities, and the "devices" in place to make it happen fast.
At the beginning of TOM, Rand suddenly turned into a kind of human Nym, plants suddenly thriving where he walked... the fourth Age verses presented the Dragon has someone who made things grow.
It's all coming together... you have to be blind not to figure out Singing one way or another with be a feature of the series's ending.
As for Singing during the LB itself, as I said I'm totally undecided if this is something Jordan put in for TG or only for after. The "Guide" long ago alluded to the fact there may be more to the Singing Talent than the Crop Songs. We know the Da'shain songs appeased the minds of a mad channeler for a while, it suggests it has a powerful effect on people. It could go either way.
The fact the Tuatha'an have twisted everything and turned the old songs of the Da'shain into a single mythical Song that would miraculously bring a new Golden Age is irrelevant. Rand knows better, any Wise One or Clan Chief know better. They all knew what the Da'shain really were, Rand most of all - and we still don't know the details why the Da'shain were called The Children of the Dragon. It's all a matter of the Tinkers and Aiel coming back together (which has started subtly happening long ago in the background.. hundreds of Aiel asked the Tuatha'an who had taken refuge in the Waste to be taken in and learn the Way of the Leaf back in TFOH...), which we can surmise from Aviendha's visions is interconnected with bringing the Seanchan, now the Tinkers' protectors (and ironically, the Aiel's most bitter enemy), to the Light's "alliance".