A History of Emotion in Western Music

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Spitzer
Keyword(s):  
Intellectual History ◽  
Contemporary Music ◽  
Art Music ◽  
Historical Narrative ◽  
Western Music ◽  
Musical Structure ◽  
Basic Emotions ◽  
Western Art ◽  
History Of ◽  
Musical Emotion

This book is the first history of musical emotion in any language. Combining intellectual history, music studies, philosophy, and cognitive psychology, it unfolds a history of musical emotion across a thousand years of Western art music, from chant to pop. It affords a new way of analyzing music, revealing the relationship between emotion and musical structure. The book also provides an introduction to the latest approaches to emotion research, as well as an original theory of how musical emotion works. The book is disposed in two parts. Part I (Chapters 1–4) comprises the theoretical foundation of the book. Part II (Chapters 5–9) provides an historical narrative from medieval to contemporary music. Chapter 1 summarizes contemporary theories of emotion in general, and of musical emotion in particular, bringing together seminal philosophers and psychologists. Chapter 2 contains the core of the book’s original thesis: that five basic emotions (happiness, sadness, anger, tenderness, and fear) constitute five categories of musical emotion throughout the common-practice period. Chapter 3 outlines a variety of complex musical emotions, such as wonder, nostalgia, envy, and disgust. Chapter 4 explores the historiography of emotion, including the seminal writings of Elias, Rosenwein, and Reddy. Part II of the book (Chapters 5–9) explores a millennium of Western music in terms of shifting categories of emotion: from affections and passions through sentiments, emotions proper, to modern affect.

scholarly journals The Rules of Engagement: Richard Taruskin and the History of Western Music

2007 ◽  
pp. 21-49
Author(s):  
Harry White
Keyword(s):  
German Idealism ◽  
Art Music ◽  
Western Music ◽  
Master Narrative ◽  
Tonal Music ◽  
Western Art ◽  
Radical Critique ◽  
Musical Discourse ◽  
History Of ◽  
Anglo American

The Oxford History of Western Music (2005) is a scrutiny of the ‘literate tradition’ of music in European and North American culture from the beginnings of notation to the end of the twentieth century. Richard Taruskin’s monumental and profoundly erudite engagement with a thousand years of western art music is animated from the outset by a radical critique of German idealism and the influence which this has exerted on the formation and transmission of European and American musical thought. Taruskin takes the view that as a result of this influence, the history of music has been seriously distorted, especially in regard to the contractual intelligibility of musical discourse in relation to society. The prestige of progressivism, as this is manifested in atonal and serial composition, in primitivism and neoclassicism, has enjoyed an excessive pre-eminence which eclipses in turn the narrative clarity of tonal music in the twentieth century.In this review essay, Taruskin’s indictment of historicism as a primary agent in the perpetuation of (German and Anglo-American) musicological orthodoxy is appraised in the context of his own obligations to narrative, musical analysis and the reception history of musical works. Taruskin’s identification of an historicist ‘master-narrative’ in earlier surveys of western music is considered in relation to a new master- narrative, of Taruskin’s own making, which condemns the hegemony of musical idealism at every turn. The tension which arises between this enduring preoccupation and the author’s sustained engagement with individual musical texts tends to confirm the autonomy of the musical work, not as an object immune (or indifferent) to history, but as a nexus of social, ideological and political expression which attains to a self-standing aesthetic integrity.

Music after the Fall

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tim Rutherford-Johnson
Keyword(s):  
New Media ◽  
Contemporary Music ◽  
The United States ◽  
Art Music ◽  
Sound Art ◽  
Musical Composition ◽  
Western Art ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
The Cold War

By the start of the 21st century many of the foundations of postwar culture had disappeared: Europe had been rebuilt and, as the EU, had become one of the world’s largest economies; the United States’ claim to global dominance was threatened; and the postwar social democratic consensus was being replaced by market-led neoliberalism. Most importantly of all, the Cold War was over, and the World Wide Web had been born. Music After The Fall considers contemporary musical composition against this changed backdrop, placing it in the context of globalization, digitization, and new media. Drawing on theories from the other arts, in particular art and architecture, it expands the definition of Western art music to include forms of composition, experimental music, sound art, and crossover work from across the spectrum, inside and beyond the concert hall. Each chapter considers a wide range of composers, performers, works, and institutions are considered critically to build up a broad and rich picture of the new music ecosystem, from North American string quartets to Lebanese improvisers, from South American electroacoustic studios to pianos in the Australian outback. A new approach to the study of contemporary music is developed that relies less on taxonomies of style and technique, and more on the comparison of different responses to common themes, among them permission, fluidity, excess, and loss.

Landmarks in the Study of Improvisation

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bruno Nettl
Keyword(s):  
Middle East ◽  
Folk Music ◽  
Research Study ◽  
Art Music ◽  
Jazz Improvisation ◽  
Single Model ◽  
Oral Transmission ◽  
Western Art ◽  
Music Making ◽  
History Of

Historically, research on improvisation has been related to the discovery of non-Western musics, folk music, and jazz, and has depended on the development of recording techniques for its principal kinds of data. The concept of improvisation is not unitary, but includes many vastly different kinds of un-notated music-making, which casts some doubt on the efficacy of the term itself. In the history of Western art music, improvisation was originally ignored or seen as craft rather than art, but since ca. 1980 it has occupied increased attention. The association of improvisation with oral transmission has sometimes been misunderstood. The most successful standard research study has been the comparison of performances based on a single model, for example, raga in India, maqam and dastgah in the Middle East, or a series of chord changes or a tune in jazz. Improvisation as a concept—for example, as a metaphor of freedom—has been important in recent research.

‘The Timpani Beats Just Hit on My Heart!’ Music, Memory, and Diplomacy in the Philadelphia Orchestra's 1973 China Tour

2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 395-418
Author(s):  
BESS XINTONG LIU
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Cultural Revolution ◽  
Art Music ◽  
Western Art ◽  
History Of ◽  
Western Art Music ◽  
Historical Trajectory ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Musical Diplomacy

AbstractThis article examines the underexplored history of the 1973 Philadelphia Orchestra China tour and retheorizes twentieth-century musical diplomacy as a process of ritualization. As a case study, I consult bilingual archives and incorporate interviews with participants in this event, which brings together individual narratives and public opinions. By contextualizing this musical diplomacy in the Cold War détente and the Chinese Cultural Revolution, I argue for the complex set of relations mobilized by Western art music in 1973. This tour first created a sense of co-dependency between musicians and politicians. It also engaged Chinese audiences by revitalizing pre-Cultural Revolution sonic memories. Second, I argue that the significance of the 1973 Orchestra tour lies in the ritualization of Western art music as diplomatic etiquette, based on further contextualization of this event in the historical trajectory of Sino-US relations and within the entrenched Chinese ideology of liyue (ritual and music).

The ‘Nautch’, the Veil and the Bayadère: The Indian Dance as Musical Nexus

2019 ◽  
pp. 213-235
Author(s):  
Margaret E. Walker
Keyword(s):  
19Th Century ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Early Period ◽  
Art Music ◽  
Western Art ◽  
Artistic Production ◽  
History Of ◽  
Indian Dance ◽  
The Veil

During the early period of mercantile contact with India, the exotic spectacle of the Bayadères or Nautch Girls seized the imagination of western sojourners and inspired an abundance of artistic production back in Europe. The ‘dancing girl’ is found everywhere in late 18th- and 19th-century orientalist paintings, poetry, novels, and of course, ballets, operas and other musical compositions. Although there are substantial studies exploring musical orientalisms in western art music, little attention has been paid to the role of real-life performances in such musical creation. This chapter explores the influence of the colonial interaction with Indian dance performances over the long 19th century. It argues not only for a nuanced and historicised approach to musical encounter but also, given the centrality of the Nautch in the Indian context, for the crucial inclusion of dance in the global history of music.

scholarly journals The Music Room: Betty Freeman's Musical Soirées

2017 ◽  
Vol 14 (3) ◽  
pp. 391-409
Author(s):  
JAKE JOHNSON
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Los Angeles ◽  
Art Music ◽  
Avant Garde ◽  
Western Art ◽  
Interaction Rituals ◽  
Salon Culture ◽  
History Of ◽  
Western Art Music

AbstractFor over ten years, Los Angeles arts patron Betty Freeman (1921–2009) welcomed composers, performers, scholars, patrons, and invited guests into her home for a series of monthly musicales that were known as ‘Salotto’. In this article, I analyse Freeman's musicales within a sociological framework of gender and what Randall Collins calls ‘interaction rituals’. I contextualize these events, which took place in a space in her Beverly Hills home known as the Music Room, within a broader history of salon culture in Los Angeles in the twentieth century – a history that shaped the city's relationship with the artistic avant-garde and made Los Angeles an important amplifier for many of the most important voices in contemporary Western art music of the last sixty years.

A Brief History of Motives—Composition

2021 ◽  
pp. 25-54
Author(s):  
Brent Auerbach
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Music Composition ◽  
Historical Narrative ◽  
Western Music ◽  
Early Twentieth Century ◽  
History Of ◽  
Changing Role

Chapter 2 provides a brief history of the role of motives in Western music composition. Motive is posited as one of the several generative forces in music, alongside harmony, counterpoint, and form. Motive’s relative prominence is tracked in style periods of the last four centuries, with peak influence manifesting in the late Romantic and early twentieth-century periods. This changing role of motives is illustrated by a set of analyses of chronologically ordered pieces by Handel, Mozart, Brahms, Wagner, Holst, and Schoenberg. The musical examples, in addition to supporting the historical narrative, serve to introduce readers to the new conventions of nomenclature and rules motivic association that will be presented in detail in the methodology chapters of the book.

scholarly journals Musical Structure as Narrative in Rock

2011 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
John Fernando Encarnacao
Keyword(s):  
Rock Music ◽  
Basic Structure ◽  
Art Music ◽  
Musical Structure ◽  
Western Art ◽  
Musical Structures ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Alternative Approaches ◽  
Sense Of Home ◽  
Quest Narrative

In an attempt to take a fresh look at the analysis of form in rock music, this paper uses Susan McClary’s (2000) idea of ‘quest narrative’ in Western art music as a starting point. While much pop and rock adheres to the basic structure of the establishment of a home territory, episodes or adventures away, and then a return, my study suggests three categories of rock music form that provide alternatives to common combinations of verses, choruses and bridges through which the quest narrative is delivered. Labyrinth forms present more than the usual number of sections to confound our sense of ‘home’, and consequently of ‘quest’. Single-cell forms use repetition to suggest either a kind of stasis or to disrupt our expectations of beginning, middle and end. Immersive forms blur sectional divisions and invite more sensual and participatory responses to the recorded text. With regard to all of these alternative approaches to structure, Judy Lochhead’s (1992) concept of ‘forming’ is called upon to underline rock music forms that unfold as process, rather than map received formal constructs. Central to the argument are a couple of crucial definitions. Following Theodore Gracyk (1996), it is not songs, as such, but particular recordings that constitute rock music texts. Additionally, narrative is understood not in (direct) relation to the lyrics of a song, nor in terms of artists’ biographies or the trajectories of musical styles, but considered in terms of musical structure. It is hoped that this outline of non-narrative musical structures in rock may have applications not only to other types of music, but to other time-based art forms.

scholarly journals The Art-Religious ideas of Mahler and Schönberg

2021 ◽  
pp. 11-16
Author(s):  
Helmut Loos
Keyword(s):  
Intellectual History ◽  
Art Music ◽  
Richard Wagner ◽  
Arthur Schopenhauer ◽  
Gustav Mahler ◽  
Considerable Influence ◽  
Musical Life ◽  
Philosophy Of Life ◽  
Ludwig Feuerbach ◽  
History Of

There is no doubt in research about the exemplary role Richard Wagner played for Gustav Mahler and Arnold Schönberg. His personality was simply too dominant in musical life and in the broader intellectual history of the time to not have a considerable influence on the two composers in their formative years. The suffering idea was the art-religious rank of music, as it had been widespread since Arthur Schopenhauer, especially in artistic circles. In contrast to Wagner’s decided atheism, which invoked Ludwig Feuerbach, Mahler and Schönberg can be diagnosed with a tendency towards modern irrationalism, asfound at the time inTheosophy and Anthroposophy. Philosophy of life and esotericism formed a favourable breeding ground for the most diverse varieties of art religion, among which emphatic art music was probably the most successful with regard to establishing itself in society. Syncretism was widespread and allowed the inclusion of heterogeneous elements, including, for example, traditional Christian religions.

scholarly journals Onset asynchrony in Western art music

2021 ◽  
pp. 126-158
Author(s):  
Jonathan Dunsby ◽  
Yannis Rammos
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
Physical Nature ◽  
Claude Debussy ◽  
Art Music ◽  
Piano Pedagogy ◽  
Aesthetic Value ◽  
Western Art ◽  
History Of ◽  
Western Art Music ◽  
Onset Asynchrony

Melodic onset asynchrony, whereby the upper or some component of a musical simultaneity may strike the ear ahead of other sounds, is a common feature in the performance of Western art music. It seems to be of high aesthetic value in the history of pianism, often harnessed to the seemingly contradictory “bass lead” that prevailed in the early 20th century, though in fact the two are far from exclusive. Departing from an application of Brent Yorgason’s taxonomy of “hand-breaking” (2009) to canonical, composed examples of onset asynchrony from Beethoven, Schumann, and Liszt, we examine timbral, organological, and aesthetic continuities that underly distinct practices of asynchrony. We consider the physical nature of such normally non-notated “microtiming”, ranging in performance from a few ms of melodic onset asynchrony to about 100ms, above which it is generally agreed that even the casual listener may perceive it. A piano-roll recording by Claude Debussy, of “The Little Shepherd”, illustrates the mix of melodic onset asynchrony, bass lead, and apparent simultaneity that may be applied in a single interpretation. We then discuss the concept of “audibility” and the question of to what extent, and in what ways, the combined transients of piano attacks may interact. We consider with reference to 20th century Russian piano pedagogy why onset asynchrony seems to have been a little documented, rather than an explicit playing technique, even though certain sources, such as a 1973 treatise by Nadezhda Golubovskaya, show it to be ubiquitous and well theorised. Finally, regarding the thinking that has predominated in musical performance studies in recent decades, with its emphasis on average practices and “ordinary” listeners, we suggest that a new emphasis will be fruitful, that is, research on what is particular about the embodied creativity of expert musicians.

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