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I develop Schopenhauerian musical formalism. First, I present a Schopenhauerian account of music with a background of his metaphysical framework. Then, I define meaningfulness as an analog to a Kantian notion of purposiveness and argue that, in light of Schopenhauer, music is meaningful as a direct manifestation of the universal will. Given the ineffable nature of what music points to, its form lacks any representation of meaning. Music is therefore the mere form of meaningfulness, and it is precisely this mere form that gives rise to the infinite possibilities to ascribe it with a variety of musical meaning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Music, alongside ritual, plays an important role in Confucian moral education. Among all the Confucians, Xunzi gives music the most radical ability to transform people, and this is striking given his pessimistic view of human nature. Though he set the standard for Chinese aesthetics for millennia, there is no systematic account that brings together Xunzi's various commitments: that only music from virtuous previous dynasties are morally conducive, that music can bring about lasting character change, that even those uninterested in moral cultivation can benefit from music, and that the junzi ("gentleman") and the xiaoren ("petty man") derive joy in different ways while listening to music. In this article, I explain why currently existing accounts cannot capture all the commitments, and I turn to analytic aesthetics to provide a new Dual-Process Model of Xunzi's philosophy of music. Jenefer Robinson's discussions of "the Jazzercise effect" and emotional misattribution will be key in the new account. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, I raise a simple but surprisingly vexing question: What makes heavy metal heavy ? We commonly describe music as "heavy," whether as criticism or praise. But what does "heavy" mean? How is it applied as an aesthetic term? Drawing on sociological and musicological studies of heavy metal, as well as recent work on the aesthetics of rock music, I discuss the relevant musical properties of heaviness. The modest aim of this article, however, is to show the difficulty, if not impossibility, of this seemingly straightforward task. I first address the difficulties of identifying the defining features, or "Gestalt," of heavy metal that would allow us to treat heaviness as a genre concept. Next, I discuss both the merits and the limits of analyzing heaviness in terms of an aesthetics of "noise" in rock music developed in recent philosophy of music. In the remaining sections, I consider other nonaesthetic features relevant to aesthetic judgments of heaviness and show that the term 'heavy' is conceptually inarticulable, if not irreducible. This, I conclude, has partly to do with the radically different, sometimes incompatible, musical properties present in the perception of musical heaviness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In his article "The Ontology of Musical Versions: Introducing the Hypothesis of Nested Types," Nemesio Puy raises a hypothesis that continuity of the purpose is both a necessary and a sufficient condition for musical work's identity. Puy's hypothesis is relevant to two topics in cognitive psychology and experimental philosophy. The first topic is the prevalence of teleological reasoning about various objects and its influence on persistence and categorization judgments. The second one is the importance of an artist's intention in the categorization of artworks. We tested the teleological hypothesis across three studies. Vignettes in these three studies describe a musical work being changed in some of these aspects: (1) purpose either changed or retained; (2) score either changed or retained; (3) change is made either by the same or a different composer. The results suggest that teleological considerations impact judgments on the persistence of musical works, but this impact appears to be relatively weak. The results also suggest that persistence judgments strongly depend on whether acoustical properties were changed, while whether the change was made by the original composer seems to be relatively unimportant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article points out some elements that can help to understand the difficulty of analyzing popular music in Brazil with the forms of analysis commonly used by classical aesthetics and philosophy of music. In addition, it indicates some possible paths for the development of a critique of national musical material. To this end, this article retrieves some fundamental questions about the history of popular music in Brazil: its triple origin (African, European and Amerindian), the influence of capitalism in the first decades of the twentieth century, the concept of 'popular', its connection with early lyric poetry and its multiple forms of expression. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay is about how artists, listeners and critics claim to hear life in a sound and how this suggestive, but hazily defined, provocation connects vast cultural circuits of production, technology and capital. I argue that claims to life in a sound also belie an anachronistic return to an early modern understanding of sound as particulate matter and suggest a technoscientific discourse in which sound and data are described in terms of one another. With a close engagement with microsounds – from Gilles Deleuze to computer music specialist Curtis Roads – this essay queries what sonic particulates are presumed to be when they are mapped onto Spinoza's corpora simplicissima but processed through analogy synthesis or digital tools. In part, this essay tries to speak to a persistent separation of sonic materiality and auditory culture, in music and sound studies in which life in a sound cannot be thought apart from how life is subject to different kinds of extractions. With a return to Spinoza's physics, this essay also retakes the often sloganized "no one knows what a body can do" to emphasize an ethical recomposition of the text in which to "know" must be as open-ended as "body" is typically emphasized to be. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author replies to Julian Dodd's comments on his article "Historically Uniformed Views of Historically Informed Performance." Topics discussed include the misrepresentation of historically informed performance practice by analytic philosophy of music, the different approaches to performance which include the historically authentic and historically informed, and the realization of the artistic value of a work through performance in historical style. Also discussed are the analysis of early music movement and the contemporary style of performance.

The following text covers the studies of Aesthetics and Metaphysics. Its fundamental purpose is to expose the approaches and similarities of philosophical and musical terms between German thinkers-musicians Arthur Schopenhauer, Richard Wagner and Friedrich Nietzsche. All three contributed with fundamental ideas to the philosophy of music that changed the way of thinking, understand and interpret Philosophy itself as well as the musical phenomena, proposing new points of view stressed on an artistic-ontological reflection, which has been influential on the field since the beginning of the 20th century until present days. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A correction is presented to the article "A Dual-Process of Xunzi's Philosophy of Music" by Hannah H. Kim, which appeared in the 2023 issue of the magazine.

The article presents an interview with philosopher and musician Michael Krausz who discusses his experience of teaching philosophy at Bryn Mawr College in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and Oxford University in Oxford, England. He also discusses his study in music philosophy and experiencing his Jewish identity in Kenya. He mentions his discussions with philosophers including Alexander Nehamas, Stanley Cavell, and Bert Dreyfus.

The article discusses philosopher Michael Krausz's autobiography on the philosophical questions he encountered in his life. Aspects of his life including Jewish identity, musical and artistic projects, and intellectual development is also discussed. Topics include engaging in Hindu and Buddhist philosophy, his career as an orchestral conductor, and how music broaden his view of philosophy.

The article focuses on the coupling of music and philosophy that traverses Western thought from Plato to deconstruction that Italian philosopher Giorgio Agamben invokes when, in the appendix to the "What Is Philosophy" he claims philosophy is only possible as a reformation of music. Topics discussed include Agamben's reading of Plato's famous banishing of the poets from the city, a reflection on the idea of music, and ways to think about the indignity of the metaphysical concept.

This article examines Haas's politically programmatic work in vain in relation to a later essay wherein Haas disavows politically motivated composition. The first section investigates Haas's allegation that in vain’s ideological failure is due to its politically inappropriate semantic richness. Yet multiple interpretive passes through the piece show that in vain fails to be ideologically straightforward only because of a deeper ethical commitment to an aesthetics of defamiliarization. In the second section, I show how the basic political narrative is complicated by the estranging effect of darkness; in the third section, I align Haas's aesthetics with a post-Spectral ethics, and consider how the narrative meaning of overtone chords is complicated by their potential for challenging preconceived categories of listening. The final section returns to the essay and its blind spot for this deeper ethical aesthetics that obscures in vain’s ideological clarity, speculating that Haas's omission betrays hidden anxieties about the modernist ethical project. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Discourse surrounding spectral music frequently makes reference to nature and related language. Practitioners, theorists, and musicologists have discussed different aspects and perspectives on the idea of nature in the relation to this music and it is not always clear that these terms are used in the same way. This article examines the different meanings of ‘nature’ applied to various concepts and techniques in spectral music, the extent to which these descriptors may be misleading, and the cultural context and possible motivations for the use of this kind of rhetoric. Through a discussion of the derivation structure in spectral music, a focus on human perception, metaphorical references to nature, the rhetoric surrounding the harmonic series and instrumental (re)synthesis, and finally mimetic references to nature in music using spectral techniques (including a discussion of the music of François-Bernard Mâche), the article endeavours to provide a thorough survey of the subject. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Following the aesthetics of pure continuity in the late 1970s, Grisey moved on to compose for unpitched percussion in Tempus ex Machina, focusing on pure rhythm. Shortly afterwards he elaborated on his theory of temporality in a talk and article of the same title; one decade later, he included Tempus as the first movement of Le Noir de l’Étoile. Grisey insisted on the significance of the perception of musical time, of the skin of time – as opposed to its skeleton or flesh. This article puts forward an interpretation of Grisey's thinking of temporality, drawing on concepts from French philosophy. It further provides an analysis of two sections of Le Noir, tracing these concepts in the structuring of musical time, with a view to providing a possible direction towards a re-definition of spectral time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the summer message from Kevin Pearson, President of the Organization of American Kodály Educators (OAKE). Pearson reflects on the transformative power of Kodály philosophy training, emphasizing the inclusivity of joy in music-making. He encourages educators to share this joy, fostering community and removing barriers to music education for all students.

The article discusses updates from Kodály music education chapters in the Midwestern Division. MKMEA plans an in-person fall conference in Saint Louis, Missouri, while Chicago Area Kodály Educators (CAKE) in Chicago, Illinois, engages with local programs and hosts hybrid workshops. Plains States Kodály Organization (PSKOR) emphasizes the balance of musical training and philosophy. Tri-City Kodály Educators (TRIKE) in Tri-City explores Hawaiian music and anticipates upcoming workshops.

ABSTRACT Philosophers since Plato, at least some philosophers, have, from time to time, seen music as an appropriate object of philosophical scrutiny. And, of course, in the nineteenth century, Schopenhauer and Nietzsche elevated music to a level of philosophical importance never reached before that time. But the marriage of music to philosophy ended in divorce at the close of the nineteenth century, and, as well, there occurred a sharp decline in the philosophical study of the arts tout court. However, with the rise of interest in aesthetics and the philosophy of art, in the late 1960s, it was inevitable that philosophy and music should again enter into matrimony. And it is that remarriage, during the past thirty-five or so years, that I explore in the present article. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The three papers published here are revised, slightly expanded versions of talks presented as a panel, "Hearing As Hearing-As," on two occasions: the Third Annual Meeting of the Royal Musical Association Music and Philosophy Study Group (Kings College London, 18 July 2013) and the Philosophy and Music Interest Group meeting during the Thirty-Sixth Annual Meeting of the Society for Music Theory (1 November 2014). They explore the applicability to music, specifically music analysis, of ideas of Ludwig Wittgenstein, introduced with the discussion of "seeing-as" in what was once called Part II of the Philosophical Investigations and has now been retitled "Philosophy of Psychology--A Fragment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The oration preserved in Papyrus Hibeh I 13 consists in a harsh attack on some self-appointed harmonikoi. Although the importance of the speech for the knowledge of ancient Greek musical culture has been widely recognised, the role of this polemic in ancient philosophy, and in the interplay between music and philosophy, should be more properly defined. By attempting to reconstruct the intellectual context from which the Hibeh speech emerges, the paper argues that the text is a significant part of the debate on the notion of τέχνη in the fifth and fourth centuries BC and should be considered together with other evidence at the intersection between technical content and rhetorical strategies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the hybridisation of musical elements, particularly between those that foreground the use of technology across popular and art music. In its original form, the paper was presented to a conference Embracing rhythm … welcoming abstraction ( … on the zones of influence and hybridity between electroacoustic, acousmatique music, techno, and IDM) held at Salford University in November 2013, and was an intended overview of the topic. In this context, ‘ … zones of influence and hybridity’ between different repertoires that are generally understood to occupy different registral strata are viewed primarily as a form of environmental adaptation, expressed through the evolution of musical language. The paper also considers the motivations for attempting to reconcile, through creative practice, the conflicting meanings and aesthetic frameworks signified by different iconic musical materials and idiomatic compositional procedures. In examining these motivations and practices it draws on Barthes’ essay musica practica, to explore the significance to the creative artist of the network of relationships that link the different musics we compose or produce to the music that we might listen to or perform, or have encountered during academic training. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article explains Wittgenstein's distinction between good, bad, and vacuous modern music which he introduced in a diary entry from January 27, 1931. I situate Wittgenstein's discussion in the context of Oswald Spengler's ideas concerning the decline of Western culture, which informed Wittgenstein's philosophical progress during his middle period, and I argue that the music theory of Heinrich Schenker, and Wittgenstein's critique thereof, served as an immediate link between Spengler's cultural pessimism and Wittgenstein's threefold distinction. I conclude that Wittgenstein's distinction between bad and vacuous modern music is analogous to Schenker's distinction between the compositional fallacies of the progressive and the reactionary composers of his time. Concomitantly, Wittgenstein's philosophically problematic notion of good modern music transcended the conceptual framework of both Schenker and Spengler. In this context, I examine Wittgenstein's remarks on Gustav Mahler as well as his remark on the music of the future as monophony, which, I conclude, should be understood ultimately as an ellipsis of his much later view of musical meaning and intelligibility. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article offers a critical, feminist, and interdisciplinary account of the question of listening in Jean-Luc Nancy's 2002 text, À l'écoute. Nancy's text is at once an auditory counterpart to his larger philosophical project; an articulation of the specifically sonorous subject; and a more expressly musicological contribution to his other work on the literary and visual arts. While Nancy's -- among others' -- attempts at steering philosophy away from or beyond a visual bias proliferate, considerably less commentary has been devoted to the way in which inherited ideas about aesthetic 'objects' -- in this case music-- already inhabit certain conceptions of the senses. By paying close attention to the characterization and inclusion of music in the corps sonore, and by tracing the genealogies of Nancy's thought on music (and sound), this article will finally offer a rereading of Nancy's oto-iconographical reading of Titian's Venus and Cupid with an Organist; one that highlights the ethical and political dimensions of Nancy's position. I shall argue that problematic and preconceived notions about the supposed nature of music abound in Nancy's philosophy of listening, revealing a metaphysical (sono)tropism that is all too familiar. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is concerned with the metaphysics of created repeatable objects, such as musical works and literary fictions. In section 2 we lay out what we take to be intuitive and plausible desiderata for any theory of created repeatable objects. In sections 3 and 4 we proceed with an extended disjunctive syllogism. Created repeatable objects are either concrete universals, concrete particulars, abstract universals, or abstract particulars. We show how accounts that take them to be either one of the latter three fail egregiously. Therefore, we must take them to be concrete universals. In section 5 we offer a brief account of the metaphysical nature of concrete universals and then show how concrete universals can account for the desiderata while avoiding the objections presented against alternative theories. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although much has been written about Nietzsche's views on education over the years, and much has also been written about Dionysus, the god of wine and ecstasy, very little attention has been given to the meaning of, and need for, a Dionysian education. This two-part article is an attempt to begin that project. In Part One, drawing Nietzsche's articulation of the Dionysian, Apollonian, and anti-Dionysian into the orbit of broader scholarship on Dionysus, the author invited readers to think about what a Dionysian education might look like in a modern-day school setting, why such an education would be valuable, as well as some of the barriers to implementing such an education and the enjoyment of its fruits. Here in Part Two, the author considers some of the ideas current among philosophy of music scholars concerning 'the Dionysian' in rock music. By analyzing and clarifying these views with reference to research conducted in Part One, the author proceeds in Part Two to investigate what combined role rock music and philosophy might play in the high school classroom where a Dionysian education is fostered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Peter Kivy has become convinced that it is impossible for pure, instrumental music to be profound. This is because he takes works of such music to be incapable of meeting what he claims to be two necessary conditions for artistic profundity: that the work denotes something profound, and that the work expresses profound propositions about its profound denotatum. The negative part of this paper argues as follows. Although works of pure, instrumental music do, indeed, fail to meet these conditions, the said conditions are not themselves necessary for artistic profundity. In fact, each is a misinterpretation of a distinct, genuinely necessary condition for a work’s being profound: respectively, that the work has a profound subject matter, and that the work handles its profound subject matter in such a way as to elicit a deeper understanding of it (or a fuller grasp of its significance) in the suitably situated and prepared appreciator. The positive part of the paper elaborates these genuinely necessary conditions for artistic profundity and then argues that, once they have been disentangled from Kivy’s misconstruals of them, it becomes evident that they can be met by pieces of pure, instrumental music. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The question of the relation between the written and oral media of communication finds its application not only in linguistics, but also in philosophy, sociology, ethnology and other areas. Other possibilities for applying this theory in musicology were noted some fifty years ago, but when it comes to church music, such issues have not yet been subject to wider examination. This text considers the musicological implications of orality, literacy and "secondary literacy" in the collection of Serbian church chant transcribed and published by Stevan Stojanovic Mokranjac. Psychodynamic elements of the oral-written/ literal paradigm, with a special emphasis on the latter, are analyzed, with the aim of defining a different context for the understanding of Mokranjac's specific approach to chanting tradition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A letter to the editor is presented in response to the article "Music Education as/for Artistic Citizenship" by David Elliott in the September 2013 issue.

At present, instrumental music education, defined in this paper as the teaching and learning of music through wind bands and symphony orchestras of Western origin, appears embattled. Among the many criticisms made against instrumental music education, critics claim that bands and orchestras exemplify an authoritarian model of teaching that does not foster democracy. In this paper, I propose a theoretical framework by which instrumental music education may be conceived democratically. Since educational bands and orchestras have achieved global ubiquity, I theorize broadly for both the East and the West and draw on ancient Chinese philosophy and American pragmatism as sources of inspiration to construct the theory. This theory comprises a quintet of themes that emerge from a comparative analysis of key philosophical texts by Confucian and pragmatist philosophers, namely, the people, participation, equality, cooperation, and conflict. This paper aims to address critical issues in instrumental music education with respect to democracy, complement extant music education philosophies, and serve as a first step towards a transcultural philosophy of music education relevant to the interconnected world in which we live. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is an invited response to a one published by David Elliott in The Music Educator in 2012 in which music teachers were enjoined to encourage children to use music's expressive power as a political tool in pursuit of social justice. While in agreement with him that this can be an appropriate use of music, there is a curious avoidance of controversy in Elliott's article that might frustrate that end in that nothing is said about whether students should be prompted to critically examine sacred myths, such as the American Dream or historical narratives, and pedagogical practices that might limit their understanding of social problems. Much of my response is given to consideration of some of the possible reasons for Elliott's avoidance of controversy, including an over-emphasis on 'doing' or 'making' music that might leave little curricular time for the kinds of study and controversy and debate that are essential to understanding social (in)justice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although much has been written about Nietzsche's views on education over the years and much has also been written about Dionysus the god of wine and ecstasy, very little attention has been given to the meaning of, and need for, a Dionysian education. This article is an attempt to begin that project. Drawing Nietzsche's articulation of the Dionysian, Apollonian, and anti-Dionysian into the orbit of broader scholarship on Dionysus, the author invites readers to think about what a Dionysian education might look like in a modern-day school setting, why such an education would be valuable, as well as some of the barriers to implementing such an education and the enjoyment of its fruits. Part One of this larger inquiry is followed by Part Two in a later issue, where we consider what role rock music and philosophy might play in the high school classroom where a Dionysian education is fostered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this essay, a quintet of values in doing philosophy of music education are examined: the need for a broad view, a personal perspective, a constructive vision, a relevant plan, and the courage to speak about important issues in music education. The following questions frame the analysis of each, in turn: What do these values mean? What importance do they hold today? How can they be expressed practically in the life and work of philosophers and those interested in the philosophy of music education? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Are there qualities of sound and the experience of listening that educators can extrapolate to inform the philosophy and practice of music education? In this essay, I imagine a music education where sound-how it behaves and how we experience it-serves not only as the subject of study, but generates the framework of the pedagogy. A sonic music education is not automatic because ocularcentrism privileges the vision and influences the listening and educational experiences, often in unrecognized ways. I explore two qualities of sounds: they are, first, impermanent and continually changing and, second, diffuse-seemingly inside and outside our bodies. These qualities contrast with the visual experience, which makes objects appear permanent, fixed, and separate from our bodies. Pedagogies based on sound might present truth as impermanent and their aims as multidirectional and might employ social constructivist epistemologies and democratic education. A music education based on sounds may be a corrective to ocularcentric banking pedagogies where knowledge is fixed and progress is unidirectionally measured. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses various reports within the issue on topics including the contributions of philosophers to music education, social change through music and criticism of contemporary bands and wind ensembles.

Copyright of RAST Musicology Journal / Rast Muzikoloji Dergisi is the property of RAST Musicology Journal and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of RAST Musicology Journal / Rast Muzikoloji Dergisi is the property of RAST Musicology Journal and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Martin Luther’s appreciation for music as a practical instrument to promote the message of the Reformation by the creation of vernacular hymnody and specifically Lutheran liturgical music has dominated studies of Luther and his music. His systematic understanding of music, on the other hand, has been consistently neglected. This article argues that more than twenty years into his Reformation the philosophical basis of his music theory remained very much indebted to Johannes de Muris’s influential Musica speculativa and later humanist interpretations. Consideration of this relation sheds light on Luther’s understanding of music as a quadrivial art form and the queen of philosophical learning. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

I argue that the difficulty Kant encounters in evaluating music in the third Critique is caused by his problematic attempt to separate sound (the physical phenomenon) from meaning. Analogously, Wordsworth attempts in the Preface to divide metrical pleasure and the feeling derived from the semantic meaning of poems. In both cases, this separation can be overcome by a radical, Romantic understanding of musicality, whereby music not only participates in meaning but becomes its grounds. While this remains latent in Kant, Wordsworth's 'Tintern Abbey' can assert the centrality of listening to thinking, which has important implications for his poetics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]