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Known by the Company It Keeps: Associations and the Establishment of Musical Expression

Jordan, Ryan Clifford
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1258986587

Abstract Details

2009, Doctor of Philosophy, Ohio State University, Philosophy.
I argue for an association theory of musical expression, whereby music acquires its expressive character through associations with extra-musical content. Attempts to explain how music can have expressive properties have focused almost exclusively on absolute music, the reasoning behind this being that to understand musical expression, we must eliminate as many of the outside influences as possible and examine music in its purest possible state. The resulting naturalistic theories, however, are unable to explain the richness of the expressive properties we ascribe to music. Such theories might focus on how the musical contour of a ‘happy’ piece could mimic the behavior of a happy person, but musical expressiveness is much more diverse than simply dealing with ‘happy’ and ‘sad.’ Musical contours and other natural properties of the music are simply not detailed enough to explain the lusty sexuality of Rose’s “The Stripper” or the bucolic folksiness of Smith’s “Dueling Banjos”. I argue that the best approach to developing a theory of musical expression begins with an analysis of non-absolute music. Analyzing non-absolute music, I show that musical expression is intimately tied up with associations that stem from those texts, titles, and programs. Bach’s “Toccata and Fugue in D Minor” began its life as an expressively benign 17th Century organ piece; it achieved the lead track on the album The Most Frightening Music in the Universe by repeatedly being featured in films from 1931’s Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde through (among numerous others) 1964’s 7 Faces of Dr. Lao, and 1975’s Rollerball. Nothing suggests that Bach purposefully wrote a scary organ piece (nor that anyone heard it that way). The only change in the piece during its transformation from expressively unremarkable to scary was its setting, and so, I argue, it is the deep-rooted cultural associations, not any natural properties of the absolute music, that makes “Toccata and Fugue in D minor” the quintessential scary music. The benefit of this approach is that it straightforwardly explains not only non-absolute music’s expressive properties, but also how absolute music has its expressive properties. Expression is tied up not only with whole pieces but also with musical elements such as timbre, rhythm, and melodic gestures. These musical elements are the same in both absolute and non-absolute music, so associations established with non-absolute music simply carry through to the absolute musical works. The passionate flavor of the tango, developed from a long-standing connection between it and the sultry dance, does not go away when used in an absolute piece. Rather, it remains and lends its expressive quality to the piece. Thus, we do not need to appeal to natural properties of the music to explain music’s expressiveness. All expression, even in absolute pieces, can be ultimately grounded in the associations developed by non-absolute works of similar timbral, harmonic, or rhythmic form.
Lee Brown (Advisor)
Daniel Farrell (Committee Co-Chair)
Diana Raffman (Committee Member)
Sukjae Lee (Committee Member)
Donald Hubin (Committee Member)
164 p.
Philosophy
Music; Expression;

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Jordan, R. C. (2009). Known by the Company It Keeps: Associations and the Establishment of Musical Expression [Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1258986587

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Jordan, Ryan. Known by the Company It Keeps: Associations and the Establishment of Musical Expression. 2009. Ohio State University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1258986587.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Jordan, Ryan. "Known by the Company It Keeps: Associations and the Establishment of Musical Expression." Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University, 2009. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1258986587

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

osu1258986587
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This open access ETD is published by The Ohio State University and OhioLINK.