Musical Analysis and Appreciation: A Critique of "Pure Music"

BY
MICHAEL McMULLIN
An analysis of musical form may have one of two purposes. It may be intended as an aid to musical appreciation or as a contribution to the science, or art, of aesthetics. These may be mutually inclusive to a large extent, but any analysis will probably have one of them as its main bias. In the one case we are chiefly concerned with what is the effect of a given piece of music, and in the other with why and how it has that effect. If, however, the aim is to aid appreciation, the method must be based on aesthetics, and at the present day, when this subject is hardly known, no such procedure can very well avoid being at the same time an original essay in aesthetics.

The average analysis with which we are presented is admittedly nothing of the sort; it is designed only as a comparison of the work in question with some abstract academic pattern, and it achieves neither of the two purposes mentioned above. It –also- seems to be universally assumed by critics that, besides making out a work to be to in some preconceived form or other, all they have to do is list the keys and modulations through which it passes and that this somehow reveals all there is to know about it. But the listener is no wiser, and it only reveals that the critic understands nothing as to its meaning and is confusing the means with the end. The meaning is contained in the form—that is, in the whole, and form is defined methodically. "Form is melody writ large", says Tovey—correctly; but he then goes on to discuss it as harmony writ large. He makes the point that tonality is self-evident, and it follows from this that all this analysing of it is superfluous. One comes more and more to the conclusion that most of the great works of music are simply not understood, except on a very superficial level; that Beethoven's symphonies, for example, for all their popularity and dramatic and stirring qualities, still to this day are not fathomed in their real significance. To arrive at such an understanding is not easy and demands much more time and concentrated effort than merely listing the technical means of expression; and it requires intuition. So to penetrate all the major works of Beethoven alone would be a very lengthy undertaking and almost beyond the scope of one person.
It can be asked on what basis and by what standards one is to assess such significance, and it will be objected that anything but a technical analysis must be purely subjective. The whole aesthetic process is the perception of meaning, and what meaning can there be in key-changes and the like? Art is an introverted form of perception and necessarily subjective, whereas the analysis of the mere means of expression is extroverted and materialistic. Art itself is a subjective expression, not in the sense of being purely individual, but in a collective sense and in the sense that its perception presupposes a subject as well as an object. As Jung says of subjective perception: "it means more than the mere image of the object", and "introverted sensation apprehends the background of the physical world rather than its surface". It is seeing things sub specie aeternitatis, and this is especially characteristic of the artist. "The bare sense-impression develops in depth, reaching into the past and future, while extroverted sensation seizes on the momentary existence of things open to the light of day". As we live in an extroverted age and society, there is an overwhelming prejudice in favour of the superficial.
It is the "translating of music into words", we are told, that is inadmissible; but of course any analysis at all is doing this, and all knowledge and science consists of translating things into words, in order to aid awareness and perception. It is the extraordinary fuzziness and confusion of thinking in this field, usually compounded by a strongly emotional attitude, that is so striking. Tovey, for instance, in many directions a perceptive thinker on music, when dealing with what he called "Absolute Music"—a favourite subject of his—falls into absolute confusion. "The real absoluteness of music", he writes, "lies simply in its untranslatability"—and, one might add, in its incomprehensibility, to most people. His real meaning is to object to foolish "programmatic" interpretations of music and, perhaps, to "programme music", in the sense of music depicting a literary scenario or a sequence of events—though all opera does this, especially his beloved Wagner. He may be objecting to "realism" and merely descriptive art, but, not understanding the process of symbolism, he calls this "absolute purity in art".

The alternative to realism is not "absolute art", the choice not being between meaninglessness and photography.
Thinking is not usually a very differentiated function among writers on music, and we still hear repeats of that absurd dictum: "Music has no meaning outside of itself'. As I have pointed out elsewhere, this is only a confused way of saying: "It has no meaning". This has been attributed to Stravinsky and Hindemith, and if this is correct it may apply to their music. On all sides we hear praises of "the purely musical", contrasted with that diabolus in musica, the "extra-musical"; but nobody, it seems, has stopped to think what "purely musical" means, other than a mere pattern. Even a pattern cannot help having some meaning outside of itself, on one level or another, to be perceived as a pattern rather than chaos. Art, however, is the use of patterns to express a higher meaning, which in music is obviously extra-musical. Tovey uses the analogy of the taste of a peach, to show untranslatability into words, and others have used whisky for a comparison with music. They are referring here to pure sensation, whereas art is both emotional and intellectual—it is feeling and thinking, and intuition, as well as sensation. The sensation is simply the means of art. In addition, art uses a medium ok rhythmic sensation, which has nothing whatever to do with peaches or whisky. Most philosophers of the "purely musical", and certainly Tovey, allow that music expresses emotions; but emotions are just as "extra-musical" as quails, thunderstorms and so forth (though by some obscure juggling with reason Tovey manages to allow Beethoven's famous, or notorious, pastoral quail). An "absolute" emotion, without any source or object, without any reason d'etre, would be absolutely meaningless, like absolute music; but this has nothing to do with interpreting Beethoven's Hammerklavier Sonata as "the biography of Joan of Arc", emotions are subjective value-judgments, and one is not likely to get very emotional over the niceties of musical technique or to feel "triumphant" (a word that should once and for all be banned from musical criticism) about a mere return to C major. Alfred Einstein, writing on Schubert, uses the expression "purely musical", meaning in this case melodic, lyrical or in the feeling dimension, which is indeed the main emphasis of much of Schubert's instrumental music as opposed to his songs, which are primarily dramatic (often very lyrical as well) and would have to be disqualified by the purists if they had any regard for logic. Emotions have to have some application to life, even as an attitude to life envisaged under certain conditions, that itself implies an interpretation and a meaning, or is symbolic. Until this can be grasped and applied one's reaction to music may be vaguely pleasurable but lacking in depth and significance.

Tovey is at pains to discount Beethoven's inconvenient remark that he always had in mind a picture (Bild) when conceiving music, on the grounds that Bild means "idea". This could then be taken to mean that he had an idea of, say, the relation of C sharp minor to E flat or perhaps a new way of resolving a chord of the 9th. But if Tovey had been a creative artist, rather than a theoretical musician and a composer of notes, he would have known that Bild means "picture" and that Beethoven was referring to the conception of music against a simultaneously imagined—or perhaps actually seen—visual background, symbolizing the mood of the conception. Nothing is conceived in vacuo—or nothing that means anything and is not itself vacuous. This does not mean in the slightest degree that the music is a "description" of that picture, any more than Monet's Water Gardens or Cezanne's Montagne Sainte Victoire paintings are descriptions of the scenery or travel brochures. If Tovey had been able to write Elgar's cello Concerto, he would not have been thinking of problems of tonality or counterpoint. There is no doubt he could have written it technically— perhaps better; but his inability to conceive pictures would have deprived him of the imaginative and poetical qualities that are the inseparable ingredients of such works.

Tovey extols the power of "Bach's glorious chromatic harmony ... to arouse in us the sense of repentance and conviction of sin"—a very extra-musical kind of association. He is familiar with Schweitzer and Pirro on Bach's musical figure-symbolism and calls their work scholarly; but he does not think through the implications of it for all music, being content to evade the point with vague concepts such as a work of art's "digesting its materials". But a moment's thinking, clear of the fog of obstinate prejudice, reveals that the symbolism of figures exists whether or not this is made explicit by association with verbal texts and also that the champions of the "purely musical" consistently should, but do not and cannot, disqualify, all vocal music, all symphonic poems, all impressionism and the like, ultimately all music. But if music means anything, they will reply, one must not attempt to say what it is. The symbolism of figures is very basic to all higher musical forms, and one could, and should, devote a large treatise to studying it—a thing I once intended to do. Fugues are essentially concentrated studies of figures, and their in-depth understanding depends upon understanding these figures—that is, upon developing a more conscious understanding. Short pregnant figures have, as a rule, implications on a fairly obvious level that are instinctively and unconsciously understood and are well illustrated in the afore-mentioned analyses of Bach's cantatas; and a fugue has many other kinds of aesthetic effect. But there are much less obvious levels of meaning, which require a cultivated awareness, and sometimes their significance is quite unconscious, on a deep and archetypal level, sometimes depending on intellectual associations and sometimes quite cryptic or enigmatic— for example, the motif B—A—C—H and its possible variants, such as G sharp—A---F-—E. We get into a realm here that is comparable with numerology and Kabbalistic symbolism and entirely outside the imaginative range of most musical theorists. Certain figures and their derivations tend to recur in the works of Beethoven, and there are many musical works besides fugues the key to the meaning of which is the understanding of a figure—one could cite Mozart's C minor piano Concerto. In the C major Concerto, K. 503, this figure is reiterated and emphasized in the development section of the first movement in a conspicuous way (see Ex. i). This is not "purely musical", as though the notes were picked out of a hat or composed like a twelve-note row, but the figure has a meaning, even if it is not consciously articulated in words, but felt or unconsciously, even vaguely, apprehended. To refuse to think about this, or develop a deeper insight into its meaning, is to let the deeper message of music fly over one's head.

The same applies to the unfolding and metamorphoses of melody that constitute form, but the terms in which it is analysed discourage any idea of development or continuity of meaning. Often "bridge-passages" and the like are logical continuations or completions of the first melody or extensions or workings-out of it, and, in any case, such terms can arise only from a senseless and mechanical attitude to music, and they should be abolished at once in the interests of any true appreciation of art. "First and second groups" are a slight improvement, but Tovey is quite right here, and each work of art is an individual case and cannot be fitted into an abstract pattern.

It is only when the meaning of the musical symbolism, and particularly of melodic figures and the form as a whole, is understood, or divined, or felt, that the emotional content can be related to anything, or interpreted, or even its quality be truly discerned and that it, too, can make sense. Otherwise an arbitrary, preconceived and—in the most superficial sense—subjective emotional content can be imputed to the music, very often on the assumption that events in the composer's life must produce directly related effects in his music. Beethoven is particularly subject to this fallacy, and some people are always ready to see "sorrow", "grief, "despair" or "heart-break", whereas his music is singularly free from merely personal emotions, which would in any case be of no consequence to the listener but rather an embarrassment. Here the scepticism of the "pure music" school is fully justified. Sometimes one can see how certain melodies can be interpreted in this way, if desired; but they could also suggest something quite different, and critics often contradict one another flatly in this respect. A particularly striking example is the comparison of comments by Joseph de Marliave on the Adagio of the Harp Quartet, op. 74, in which he sees an "agony of grief, "bitterness and despair that beset his whole life", with those of Joseph Kennan, writing later: "a lovely piece of music, relaxed . . . Tender, and at the same time slightly remote in emotional quality . . ". (It seems to me that Kennan has got it right.) The expression of emotions for their own sake has no relevance to art, but the emotional dimension is that of evaluation of experience (the symbol) in terms of universal human significance, transcending the personal. In the end the level on, which one understands music depends entirely upon one's own level of mental and spiritual development.

Art is an expression of spiritual meaning, and its function is to aid such development—to be a revelation, or to illumine; to translate the material world and show it, in the context of a higher reality; to heighten or transform our awareness. Its function is not just to excite, soothe, express emotions, arouse sympathy, to describe, conjure up, "recollect in tranquility", nor in general to express or confirm our already existing prejudices, our egotistical and myopic view of the world and of ourselves.' Therefore the aim of analysis should be to bring out or point to the ultimate meaning or to help the listener respond to it. The ultimate meaning, like spiritual illumination, is certainly not something that can be put adequately into words, and it has to be perceived on a higher level than that of verbal concepts; these concepts, nevertheless, are the common currency and, if used correctly, can help to attune and orientate the listener and to alert his perception. Thinking is an indispensable function, whether in the creation of or response to a work of art—or in the use of language—and language can be made to correspond to perceptions, as everything corresponds, on all levels of a cosmic hierarchy.

It is just the perception of correspondences (intuition) that constitutes meaning, and that can be aided by the judicious use of words. A musical work that seems unfathomable can be made all at once intelligible and meaningful, provided that the listener is capable of experience on the required level. There is, of course, a hierarchy of levels of meaning, as of correspondences, and one can perceive a work of art on any one of these levels or on all of them—assuming that it is an integral work of art and embodies them all. But works of art also can have more or less meaning on different levels and can be reflections of greater or lesser wholes. It is defining these levels of meaning and the corresponding levels of appreciation that should be the concern of analysis.

Any fragment of music, in so far as it is artistic expression, must be an expression in three dimensions, as it were, or, put another way, a process in three simultaneous phases. If we call these dimensions or phases lyrical (melodic), dramatic and symphonic or epic (formal), we may call the corresponding effects produced emotional, immediately active or suggestive (sense-perception) and intellectual. As music will at any time be acting simultaneously in all three manners, so in appreciating it we shall be doing so emotionally, through reference to experience or suggestively, and intellectually or ideologically at the same time. Nevertheless, though in appreciating art we cannot be doing so except in three dimensions, one of the first two phases may predominate in any art form or in our manner of approach to it, and a perfect balance between them is achieved only in the highest art of classical periods. In the latter case we have an emotional and dramatic content fully present, but also fully organized, in the interests of form, which embodies the intellectual content but which cannot exist except in terms of the others. Therefore the highest development of form means also the greatest degree of integration and the most perfect balance.

Form, however simple, is always present, and between the form of a single melody and the most complex symphonic forms we have a gradation of organization in which the intellect plays an increasing part. This does not mean that there is any question of deliberate intellectual calculation; but the intellect is brought more and more into play in the organization of the larger forms. These forms also require a greater intellectual effort in apprehending them. In a plain melody the form is so simple that it can be grasped with little or no conscious effort. A melody is a form that is predominantly lyrical—that is, the emphasis is on the melodic line, which is the vehicle of emotional expression, and the form exists mainly in terms of the rhythmic rise and fall and the logical development of this, or in the emotional curve.

A melody also has a dramatic content, by which it acquires various associations. This is contained in suggestive details of melodic movement, helped perhaps by the title or words of a song—for example, spinning songs, cradle songs—and in the colouring of the voice or instrument that reproduces the melody. Different types of melody suggest different things or environments, and such associations play a part in all enjoyment of music. An unsophisticated person will enjoy only a tune that has familiar associations. Where the melodic idiom is unaccustomed and is connected with things or regions about which he knows nothing—for all idioms arise, not purely by accident, but as a reflection of particular circumstances—the music will be meaningless to him. Enjoyment depends upon the ability to imagine something with which the emotional expression of the tune is connected, and the range of possible enjoyment depends upon the extent of one's imaginative experience. Folk-music is always a lyrical expression, or an emotional interpretation, of a particular environment. That is to say, in being a poetical expression it links the environment with human life and destiny and gives it meaning in terms of human (subjective) values. When the environment is very dominant in the life of the people, and they have a long tradition, it naturally has a corresponding influence in the music, which becomes thereby all the more poetical or lyrical—witness the extraordinary beauty of the Hebridean melodies collected by Kennedy-Fraser, the songs of a people isolated in the midst of the Northern seas.

The environmental factor is partly associated with the quality of feeling expressed in melody, which one might call mood, and which is expressed in certain melodic intervals and, in general, by the character of the modes. But it is, above all, connected with melodic figures. Figures merge the melodic or emotional with the dramatic and are the means of poetic symbolization in melody. In the Hebridean song called Sea Longing both these means of expression conjure up the affective rhythm of the sea (see Ex. 2). These words mean "Heavy my sadness . . .“ and are associated with a figure suggestive of the slow swell of the sea or the lapping of waves on the shore, the rhythm of this figure persisting throughout this phrase and throughout the whole first part of the melody (12 bars), emphasizing the monotonous rhythm of the sea. In the second repeat of Ex. 2 the third bar and the fourth are varied as shown in Ex. 3, giving a still more realistic effect of waves lapping.
hi art-songs such tone-painting through figures is, of course, greatly expanded through the medium of the instrumental accompaniment, and this effects the transition to the purely dramatic realm of instrumental colouring and the enormous possibilities of development of this phase. The development of this element in Schubert's songs is what marks his greatness as a song-writer, much more than in his instrumental music, in which it is much less developed. Einstein writes of "the rustling accompaniment" throughout the song Im Walde, which one may compare with the refrain in Yeats's ballad The Madness of King Goll:

They will not hush, the leaves a-flutter round me, 
 the beech leaves old.

The refrain has the same function as Schubert's accompaniment, which, it cannot be repeated too often, is not a description but a symbolization and is dramatic, constituting the central phase of the aesthetic process. As such, instrumental symbolism of the same kind plays an increasingly important part in the development of purely instrumental music and is an essential element in all music.

Figures are the melodic form of the dramatic or symbolizing phase. A figure has not a definitive meaning: it is symbolical. But one can discuss its symbolism and reveal some of its many levels and implications, as one discusses any other symbol—for example, the Cross, Prometheus, alchemical or astrological symbols. An analysis should be designed to develop an awareness of musical symbolism and should keep in mind that the whole point of music lies in the giving of meaning to the extra-musical. We find that the more meaningful, or highly developed, the form as a whole, the more it tends to be dominated by a short figure, or the more dramatic the melodic content must tie, and it tends to become more contracted, or reduced to short figures of pregnant dramatic or symbolical content. The melody is supported by its vertical extension into harmony, it is multiplied in counterpoint, and these possibilities are enormously increased by being combined with the possibilities of orchestration. With these means of expression the formal and intellectual development may become highly complex, and the epigrammatic significance of a melodic figure or a certain instrumental implication may be the key to the idea on which the whole form is built. The form is not appreciable at a glance; it exists as a combination and succession of concise ideas, each of a definite melodic and instrumental colouring, and its understanding depends upon an analysis of these.

The famous four-note figure of Beethoven's fifth Symphony is a good example, the understanding of this figure, that so monopolizes the first movement, is to understanding the Symphony. By this I mean its deeper understanding, together with all its implications, psychological, historical and occult. One has to go much further than "Fate knocking on the door", though this meaning is true on one level; but what is "Fate", and what does this imply at that juncture, or this one? "Fate" is only a vague word to most people, and this is more than Fate; and who was Beethoven, this messenger of Fate? Later we find a still more obscure four-note giving rise to three string quartets.

It follows that a full appreciation of the higher forms depends upon being very much alive to the effects of suggestion and colouring in music—of multi-level correspondences—and upon being aware of the various means through which these are obtained. Even an elaborate musical work, however, may be enjoyed on various levels, and the appreciation of music follows the same gradation between the melodic and the formal, or between the emotional and intellectual, as the development of the art itself. In the case of educated persons, but non-musicians, the enjoyment of "classical" music on the melodic level requires only a certain familiarity with musical idiom, acquired from listening. As they acquire this, they will instinctively appreciate more and more of the suggestive effects they encounter, until they reach a stage where they obtain a maximum of instantaneous enjoyment of the music as it proceeds and where the form as a whole is felt as a satisfying rhythm but not more. Appreciation on this level is still mainly emotional, and although the dramatic content is sufficiently understood to afford pleasure and to make the melodic line comprehensible as such, a formal and technical grasp of the whole does not enter into it. One could call this appreciation on the immediate level, the immediate emotional level and immediate dramatic level, on the level of immediate enjoyment, without being conscious of significance or of the formal implication. It is undoubtedly the level on which the vast majority of music lovers enjoy their music and on which probably even those who pretend to go further listen to a great deal of music, most of the time. Music on this level is purely a relaxation, and it is certainly a great temptation to allow oneself to be carried along emotionally, phrase for phrase, without taking the trouble to examine each part in relation to its formal context or •- making the concentrated effort of imagination that is required for full understanding. For performers this tendency is dangerous, if not fatal, and many meaningless performances are due to a failure to grasp the sense of the whole. But for the listener this kind of enjoyment is excellent as far as it goes, and many might well feel content to go no further; but it is a long way from a true understanding of art and all that that implies. Sometimes music is very soothing to one's immediate mood and tunes one in to a higher level of feeling; one has a heightened sensitivity, not only to the music, but to anything one happens to be contemplating, or reading. In this way one has a spontaneous insight into the real meaning of music, though still on the immediate level, without thinking.
On the dramatic level, apart from obvious cases of tone-painting accompanying verbal texts, or clearly indicated in the title, we get into the realm of confusion and obscurity already discussed. And yet the obvious cases are so common that one would think that they would clarify the others by implication. They cannot be ignored, or dismissed as "programme music". Here the dramatic phase is dominant; instrumental colouring, and through it the symbolization of the world perceived by the senses, is the most "differentiated" function, to put it in Jungian terms. One could characterize music or composers according to Jungian typology, by the dominant dimension—or superior function, as it would now be called—and this would be classed as the "sensation" type. The melodic or predominantly lyrical would then belong to the "feeling" type, and music where the formal element is the most conspicuous, such as fugue, would be of the "thinking" type.

In the not so obvious cases—that is, of instrumental music without a title alluding to the outside world—the dramatic dimension is always present but may be more or less differentiated. This depends quite largely on the period. Many works of the twentieth century designated merely as "sonata" or "symphony" are just as much or nearly as much tone-painting as those explicitly labelled as such by the composer; but here it has to be intuited by the listener. Sometimes this is easy, but sometimes not, and here the perceptive critic may be needed. In the symphonies of Shostakovich the tone-painting is usually self-evident; but in a work like Sibelius's Sonatina for violin and piano it is exceedingly subtle and somewhat of the same order as that of Beethoven's E flat Quartet, op. 127. One might hit on the right context, or "scenario" (Bild), by chance, but when one does it is very clear and quite magical in effect. Nearly always such works are simply not understood, on any level. What we are here referring to as the "dramatic" content might also be called the "poetical" element in music; but words such as "lyrical" and "poetical" are commonly used very vaguely, without being understood in any clear sense, and these two words tend to be interchangeable. We have already defined "lyrical" as belonging to the melodic line and the expression of feeling, and so "poetical" can be taken to refer to the colouring and the associations of sense-perception—scene, associations of nature, real or imagined—that go with it. In the most typical "romantic" music the poetical tends to be prominent, with the emphasis on the "feeling" component, or the lyrical, while "impressionist" music emphasizes the perception. All art, however, has to be poetical in some degree, which is implied in the intrinsic meaning of this word as much as by Beethoven's statement about a Bild. In other words there must be a concrete image to act as a symbol and carry the meaning.
The main difficulty comes in relation to music of the Sonata period, which is generally referred to as "classical", to compound the confusion. In fact, this period is dramatic and comes after classical, on the way towards romantic; that is, it is midway between thinking (form) and feeling (melody or lyrical). This is fully perceived by Tovey, who said: "music after the time of Bach became inveterately dramatic". He also said: the essence of the Haydn-Mozart styles is even more dramatic than the operatic reforms of Gluck—in fact the dramatic power and concentration of purely instrumental music in the sonata style far transcends anything that even Wagner could put upon the stage.

Here the word "dramatic" is used in a somewhat different sense from that in which we have been using it up to now, or it acquires a different role. Instead of "sensation", it takes on the meaning of action, and contrast—or the conflict between two opposing principles. Perhaps this is the meaning it must take when coming between classical and romantic, rather than thinking and feeling—the meaning of conflict or revolution, and this is the introverted aspect of the dramatic principle, or its aspect in the historical context. This is indeed the commonly understood sense of the word. However, the emphasis on action is the link with our use of the word "dramatic" as a general term for the middle phase in the symbolic process, since it is the sensation that sets up the action: Subject Object Universal, and it is the sensory medium in art (in music, sound-waves) that is the active agent. One can also say that the confrontation between opposites is what produces awareness (sensation), and opposite electrical charges produce a spark (action). Thus this period is dramatic in a more "abstract" sense than that of the tonal dimension as such—a more theatrical sense, though it must be pointed out that the sense in which we were using it before, of tonal symbolism of experiences of the outside world, or tone-painting, also includes very dramatic effects in both senses, such as thunder and lightning (Sibelius's fourth Symphony), the breaking of great waves (The Oceanides) or the appearance of the Forest God (Tapiola); and the word "theatrical" has the implication of "scenery" as one of its associations. It can be noted that all the words borrowed from, or referring to, one of the other arts and applied to music—poetical, painting and drama—refer to this element of the active or concrete, while the word "musical" applied to poetry, or sculpture, has the same implication.

In the instrumental music of the sonata period the element of tone-painting is minimal, because thinking in general is tending to become less concrete and more rational—a reaction towards the concrete came with the symbolist and impressionist movement. The eighteenth century was a period of maximum artificiality and affectation in many respects, and a "return to nature" came, not only from Rousseau, but with the influence of oriental art. Schubert was probably the turning-point in Viennese music, although Beethoven, so extremely dramatic in one sense, was becoming increasingly so in the other. Opera, however, afforded an obvious medium in which the eighteenth century could manifest its dramatic character in both senses. One could say that the eighteenth century was dramatic in a formal way rather than in a lyrical or "poetical" way, though figure symbolism was an essential element in the dramatic interplay of themes and instruments. In any case the string quartet, the most characteristic medium of the period, does not lend itself to poetical tone-painting so much as to polyphony, with its formal implications.

On the thinking or intellectual level, corresponding to form, we are concerned of course with the meaning of the form as a whole and with the relation of its parts, and this cannot be taken in immediately but has to be contemplated in retrospect. It requires reflection. Also on this level must be included a more intellectual type of symbolism that depends upon ideas and associations of ideas. A good example of this would be the complex world of associations of Beethoven's Missa solemnis, involving theological, liturgical, scriptural and spiritual concepts as well as musical such questions as instrumentation referring to Masonic symbolism, as Mozart. In such a case we cannot do without an analysis and an elucidation, which in this instance has been excellently provided by Wilfrid Mellers Beethoven and the Voice of God. Included in this category must be the associations of particular keys, established by tradition or initiated by G major, "the key of blessedness in Bach and Beethoven" (Mellers), or A flat, with "traditionally benign associations". A careful study and analysis is no less necessary in a purely instrumental work of highly integrated formal development, which applies to late Beethoven generally or even to much middle-period Beethoven, particularly the symphonies. We have already referred to the Fifth, and a work arising from a short symbolic figure is liable to have much deeper implications than can be perceived on the surface. These may even be unconscious to the composer and may need to be referred to concepts of depth-psychology to be understood. In the Baroque formal (Classical) period—and where form is fully dominant there must necessarily be an adequate development in the other dimensions—poetical and figure symbolism tends to be more conscious, as we have seen in Bach. It goes without saying, we hope, that we are referring to a vital and creative development of form and not to "formalism" or "form" for its own sake.

A formal analysis can be useful only inasmuch as it clarifies the meaning of a work; in other words, it should be an interpretation. Knowing whether a movement is in orthodox "sonata form" or variation, rondo or other form might help us to orientate ourselves, but not very much. Schubert's Death and the Maiden Quartet might provide a good example. Alfred Einstein has helped us for a start by suggesting that the Quartet as a whole is on the theme of Death—the theme, or rhythmic figure, from the song that is developed in the slow movement, and ending in the finale with a "Dance of Death", or a "Tarantella of Death". The first movement opens with an energetic theme (a), or "group", followed by a lyrical version of it ((b)second subject?). After this, however, a third theme (c) is introduced, and this alone is elaborately developed and dominates the whole movement (see Ex. 4). There is then a recapitulation of this whole schema. This scarcely fits in with "Sonata Form"—how unfortunate! But then again, how unlike

"Sonata Form" is the first movement of Beethoven's seventh Symphony! This leaves us completely at sea. But merely to have these sections labelled as this or that ''subject", in this or that key, leaves us no wiser as to their significance. We need some guide to the meaning and context of these phrases and to how they are related to the test of the work—to the following movement's theme der Tod, for example. We can refer to the string Quintet in C written in Schubert's last year, which also very dearly anticipates death and has similar formal features in its first movement. The exceptional "beauty" of the slow movements of both works, in spite of Death, is what most immediately impresses us; the word "beauty" implies meaning, immediately but usually vaguely perceived. Einstein here quotes to good effect Lessing, who associated the idea of beauty with "rightly comprehended true religion". If alongside this, and contrasted with it, there is also a theme of despair in the last works of great artists, it is not despair at death but despair of this world, at the folly of one's fellow humans and the seeming uselessness of addressing oneself to them—or an awareness, as Albert Schweitzer wrote in his autobiography, "of having been born in a time of the spiritual downfall of humanity". The Quintet especially seems to express this—or the despair of a spirit imprisoned in an alien world of materiality. This is particularly brought out in the third movement with its contrast between a heavy dance—a worldly dance?—and the extraordinarily dark middle section, expressing a profound weariness of the world. The finale seems to be another dance of death, finishing with a dropping note on the cello giving an effect of emphatic finality.

The psychological implications of such interpretations are of course different for different people, and it may be that the case just discussed would be really significant only to a person in a position to experience something of the kind. Nor does an analysis or interpretation have to be exactly what was in the mind of the composer himself, who may have been unaware of many of the implications of his work; or these may appear in a different form to people living in a different age or environment. The act of composition is not the same as the act of receiving or interpreting. This does not mean, however, that one may impute to the music something that is not there or something quite arbitrary; but it means that one is dealing with symbols. An aesthetic interpretation does not imply that the music represents something but that something represents (it—that "Nature imitates Art" rather than the converse. A critical interpretation, moreover, should have value as a creation in itself, for, like. art, it is the expression of a Weltanschauung. History, philosophy or art criticism is always an interpretation and therefore itself an expression of a particular outlook, for a particular purpose, not an "objective" description of an absolute reality that does not exist. At present we are concerned, as Spengler wrote, with "a new kind of metaphysics, for which everything, whatever it may be, has the character of a symbol". Symbols are of the nature of archetypes, indicated thus by Jung: Contents of an archetypal character (refer to) something essentially unconscious. In the last analysis, therefore, it is impossible to say what they refer to. Every interpretation necessarily remains an "as-if". The ultimate core of meaning may be circumscribed but not described.

He refers to an "unconscious core of meaning" as characteristic of the archetype and says that an interpretation must provide "an adequate and meaningful connection between the conscious mind and the archetype". Here one could substitute the word "symbol" for "archetype", and this applies precisely to the interpretation of music.
Infinite grades of interpretation are possible, and music consists of a complex of symbols that are both created and perceived intuitively. There is a difference between intuition and imagining something that is not there; one might quote Spinoza: "He who has a true idea knows that he has a true idea and cannot doubt the truth of the thing perceived". One can also quote this passage from Schopenhauer,' which-I take from Jung: "... the idea conceived and reproduced in a work-of art ... appeals to each man only according to the measure of his own intellectual worth". Aesthetics is an analysis of the process of symbolism by which one may orientate one's perceptions and clarify one's thinking. We have distinguished three phases in this process in music and called them Lyrical, Dramatic and Symphonic. The Lyrical is subjective, in the sense of referring to the individual. It is connected with space, and the past, and death. To quote Spengler: "und zugleich fuhit es sich als einzelnes Wesen in einer endlosen, ausgedehnten Welt"; and: "enthullt sich die Weltangst als die Angst vor dem Tode, der Grenze, den Raume". Lyricism essentially expresses: "... die Feindschaft zwischen Seele und Welt"; "Deshalb wird die junge Seele sich plotzlich ihres einsamen Menschentums in mitten aller Verganglichkeit bewusst". This accounts for the melancholy feelings and minor modes of so much that is most typically lyrical and for Schubert's feeling that all music is sad, since he himself was a lyricist above all. The Dramatic is objective, in the sense of referring to the outside world as perceived by the senses, or the object of perception. We have discussed three aspects of the Dramatic: the tonal, or the immediate sound-sensation, and the effects this can have or what it can symbolize; the secondarily concrete, by association with the external world (i.e. by imaginary or indirectly experienced sense-data: memory); and drama by the conflict of opposites. In all cases it is the awareness of the individual of the immediately external. Thirdly, the Symphonic or Formal phase refers to the Universal and carries the essential element of meaning, linking the individual, through concrete experience, with the whole and thus answering the lyrical sense of isolation. One could well call these three phases thesis, antithesis and synthesis, for it is an exact correspondence. In music the formal dimension might also be considered in three aspects, the first contrapuntal (the direct synthesis of separate ideas), the second the level of indirect ideas (depending on memory associations) and the third that of the total meaning in a historical, philosophical or religious sense, and this level corresponds with the universal need, in the deepest psychological sense, for a religion. In the highest developed forms we achieve the greatest feeling of integration, which in Jungian psychology is called individuation, and a fugue of Bach has been called "a shadowed and hieroglyphical image of the whole world".

There is a school of thinking nowadays, which, in line with the popularity of Eastern philosophies, compares Western music unfavourably with Eastern, and this shows an extraordinary aesthetic naïveté as well as a seeming incapacity to appreciate Western music—in fact, it confirms our suspicion that very few people do appreciate it except at the most superficial level. In this case Eastern music will not help them, any more than Eastern philosophy, but will only encourage a Neptunian dissolution, for we are now at a different stage of evolution, which requires discrimination, and development in the thinking dimension. The cult of oriental forms is a return to the past, and in the case of music it is like comparing a Rembrandt with a cave-painting. An understanding of aesthetics would make it clear that Indian music, for example, is developed overwhelmingly in the tonal dimension, and no matter how intricate the rhythmic subtleties, or the subdivisions of the scale, it is virtually undeveloped in the thinking dimension. Its melodic, tonal and rhythmic effects are all on the level of immediate sensation and belong to an earlier, vitalistic stage of humanity, that of Shamanism and magic. While it is true that we now have to re-develop the degree of sensitivity or even spirituality that was natural to that earlier stage, it is on a different level, and when we have done to we shall be able at last to understand the music of Palestrina, Bach, Beethoven and our other native prophets, who point to the next age, not the previous one. We now have to become full individuals, which means fully defined and developed in form. In music this is possible with our infinitely greater technical and instrumental resources; but music is far ahead of collective humanity.

The Symbolic Analysis of Music

The Symbolic Analysis of Music
BY
MICHAEL McMULLIN
I
before going into a theory of musical analysis it is important to consider what is the purpose of such analysis, and what is the function and nature of musical criticism, of which analysis is a part. In the kind of analysis that is commonly found in programme notes, the listener is informed that such is the first subject, given out in the violins, that there is an episode here which plays an important part later, a fragment there, that such is the second subject, that there is a dialogue between strings and wood-wind, and that the movement is in sonata form. This is intended to help him to appreciate the work. But some of it even the listener who knows nothing of musical technique can see for himself, and he can get a great deal of enjoyment from the music without paying any attention to the rest. He would be justified in thinking that such an analysis only disturbs his pleasure; for it presents a work, which is a living, organic and expressive whole, as a series of lifeless and unrelated fragments, strung together apparently without rhyme or reason, as though the composer had picked a few themes at random and tacked them on to one another with "bridge- passages".

It is doubtful whether the knowledge-of what is the first or second subject contributes very substantially to the enjoyment of a work; but an academic dissection of form can help appreciation in so far as it places a work historically, and shows us the different forms that were used at different periods of history and how they developed. This can help to an understanding of what is expressed in the music, for the forms and styles used were appropriate to the content at each period. But an analysis should go further than this, and investigate why particular forms and styles were associated with particular periods, and what is expressed through these in individual works and how it is expressed. The interest of individual works does not lie in the extent to which they conform to a pattern, but in the conditions of the period, in how they differ from it, just as they differ in their thematic material. It is not enough to pick out the first subject, bridge-passage and second subject, but we desire to see why they are there, in what way they are related, and what is expressed as a result.

But the question of what is expressed and how it is expressed brings us from merely superficial formal analysis to aesthetic analysis, and criticism must originate here. The aesthetics of music is the study of why and by what means music produces important effects, and criticism must draw its conclusions from this. Moreover in the enjoyment of music we are aware more or less consciously of innumerable effects of suggestion and association in combination with the emotional effect. A more conscious analysis of these wilt enable as to see beyond the immediate emotional effect to the higher formal and intellectual content of music, will make the difference between an agreeable sensation of something significant but indefinite, and a clear perception of what it is that is significant, when full advantage can be taken of the experience.

Music being the most abstract and instinctive of the arts, musicians are least given to theorizing, and although theories of poetry and painting have been put forward in abundance, in music such things are almost taboo. But since music is the "purest" art, and the one which can affect us the most powerfully and plays a part, in some form, in the life of almost everybody, it should be the art on which any theory of aesthetics is based. In spite of this the aesthetics have hardly been touched upon and critics are afraid of committing themselves to anything but a mathematical formal analysis which reveals no living form or sense. We find quite a different approach however in the work of Professor Arnold Schering, particularly in the posthumously published collection of essays entitled Das Symbol in der Musik, where he opens up a line of thought of far-reaching significance.

Schering's book is a study of the associations between music and extra-musical ideas, and is based above all on the analysis of the music of Bach. That he approached the aesthetics of music through Bach is in itself important. Bach stood in the high summer of European culture, at both a central and a turning point. His is in a sense the summit of European music, the highest artistic expression of the positive and essential content of the culture. It is still classical in spirit, and is the apex of the contrapuntal technique. After Bach, who was no doubt the greatest constructive genius in music up to his time, we have the decline of the contrapuntal curve, and the beginning of the progression towards the harmonic and Romantic period. Haydn and Mozart are already autumnal and Beethoven is the dramatic and stormy genius, ushering in disruption. The aesthetic of Bach not only ceased to prevail, but was no longer understood, and his music was entirely forgotten. There followed quite different ideas on the nature of art and the function of the artist, and to-day we are still apt to be influenced by these, and to look upon all art from within our own world, as though the outlook to which we have been accustomed were absolute and pertained to all periods. The rediscovery of Bach, however, and the increasing enthusiasm for his music today, are indicative of a total change of taste, and the growth of a new aesthetic which has more in common with his methods and outlook than with much that came after him.

Approaching the study of the aesthetic methods of Bach from within his own period, Schering points out that the outlook on art was then much more matter-of-fact and rationalistic than that to which we are accustomed. The emphasis was laid, in the creation of music, on the part played by the giving of form to the idea (das Gestalten), rather than on the invention of thematic material (das Erfinden) or "inspiration". The latter was in fact systematized, and was known as the "ars inveniendi", and under this heading all kinds of rationalistic theories existed for finding a system, a "spiritual magic-wand", by -means of which music could provide itself with material from the outer world, and which sought after every possible way of supplying the connexion necessary for any music that aspires to be more than mere sound. Musical feeling was kindled in combination with the pictorial, the tone-symbolical in the narrowest sense, and anything resembling "pure" feeling, or a purely emotional revelling in sound, was foreign to the period. In the Romantic period the emphasis was placed on feeling, and the musical fantasy depended on the discovery of a warm and emotional theme. The idea was regarded as a "gift from Heaven", and there was no question of intellectual deliberation.

But although the Romantic idea of art does not recognize it, the question certainly exists of where music gets its material, with what it is connected and what it means. A very small amount of reflection on the process of composition makes it clear that music cannot arise out of nothing, that there must be at the start something to work on and an original stimulus to musical invention.

"It needs". Sobering writes, "the support of the extra-musical, and the distinction between different ages and their styles lies in this alone, that—consciously or unconsciously—this extra-musical element is sought for and found sometimes in this, sometimes in that spiritual region." He discusses the part played in Bach's vocal music by figures and tropes corresponding to those of poetry and rhetoric, by which definite visual images are evoked and used for metaphors and comparisons. These visual associations he calls "sense-pictures", and he shows the importance of a consciousness of them, touching the key to aesthetics when he introduces the word symbol. Seeing the history of European music as a continuous effort to give meaning to the material and technique of musical expression (Vergeistigung der Ausdrucksmittel), he writes "if the question be asked in what lies the giving of meaning to this material, it can be answered in a word: in its capacity to act as symbol. For since everything spiritual is by its nature abstracted from the senses, it can only be grasped indirectly: in the form of a seen or heard 'picture', which contains the 'sense' of the spiritual or intellectual. A spiritual content therefore can only be introduced into music with the help of tonal sense-pictures (Klang-Sinnbadern)".

He distinguishes four "grades" or planes of symbolic expression in music. The first of these is the movement of the line of sound, which, he says, "presents itself to the ear of the listener as a pure sensory phenomenon", and carries the emotional content.

His second grade is "that plastic, almost palpable pictorialism, which Bach and his age were unable to separate from the idea of emotion". To them, as distinct from the Romantics, an emotion was conceived in connexion with the imagination of "more or less concrete feeling-pictures, particularly visual pictures", which kindled the musical fantasy. The word, he says, was to Bach only significant in so far as it suggested a living act which could be visualized, and the word "beseech", for instance, never occurs in his text without a musical interpretation in terms of the wringing of hands or of prostration. To the word "protect" musical substance is given once the reference to the idea of a steady shielding (a sustained note), another time through the idea of an active warding-off (moving, springing semi-quavers), "for wherever the text offers pictorial expressions Bach puts into them the living breath of emotion, because picture and emotional expression are for him one and the same thing". This grade also includes conventional instrumental symbolism, and the understanding of the symbolism belonging to it often depends upon familiarity with the musical idioms of the time.

In the third grade Schering includes the symbolic use of the technical means of composition, such as the canon, the ostinato, the pedal-point, and the concerto principle. The symbolic effect in concerto form of the few, or the one, opposed to the crowd, has been dilated upon by Tovey, and is a case where the entry of an extra-musical idea is admitted. A similar effect can exist in any combination of instruments, or in the contrasting of two instruments in a duet.

Tovey also refers to the association of ideas in Mozart's violin Concerto in D, in which the orchestra is without trumpets, while the first theme played by the violin is a typical trumpet fanfare. This amounts to an ironic play upon the absence of trumpets of an almost Mallarméan subtlety, and belongs perhaps to Schering's fourth grade of symbolism, which comes into being "either through the quotation of generally known melodies, or through a play; upon sacred and mystical numbers, or through yet further-reaching logical combinations". In this way, by the association of particular melodies or particular instruments with certain ideas, symbolical connections can be established between one idea and another, or we can have a counterpoint of ideas. The association of particular styles with particular periods and surroundings can also be used for symbolical expression of this grade, and that such association plays a part in the appreciation of any music is implied in all programme notes, which usually begin by placing the music and the composer historically. We cannot listen to early polyphonic music, for example, without thinking of a cathedral and the cultural associations of its period, and the formal innovations of Beethoven lose their force unless we think of them historically; while all folk-music belongs definitely to certain peoples and regions and is inseparable from the poetical associations of these. It is on. a symbolism of this grade that the larger forms depend, for here we are on the most intellectual plane, where there is a symbolic interaction between ideas themselves.

We have therefore a gradation of layers or planes of symbolism ranging from the plane of immediately perceptible sense-effect to the reflective and formal, and becoming more intellectual as they embrace larger and more complex rhythms. Through the intellect a higher organization become possible, but the same principle of symbolic effect prevails on the most highly organized as on the simplest plane, and the complex must include the simple. In a work of art we have a simultaneous symbolism on all these planes, and more or less, elements on each plane may contribute to the effect, resulting in, as Sobering calls it, a "symbol-web", of organic complexity.

The main idea arising out of Schering’s book is that of the effect of music through sense-pictures (Sinnbilder), and of the conscious use of these by Bach. That music must have a "sense", and be more than the arrangement of notes in the abstract, and that its power to affect depends upon this, even if not consciously realized. This sense or significance of music is its interpretation of things, its expression of philosophic outlook or symbolic values. This does not mean that music must be an expression of arbitrary intellectual ideas, but of experienced reality; not that it must be representational, but that it produces its effects through the medium of suggestive action. Symbolism is the opposite of "realism". "A sense-relationship", he writes, "... is never something oncluded, but instead something open, inexhaustible, of wider meaning . . ." But if symbolism is opposed to realism, it is also opposed to the reactionary theory of "absolute" music, or "pure" forms, which, with the love of abstractions characteristic of the age, is commonly held by those who would refute realism in art, but have not thought out the question very consistently. Though the proposition of an association between music and extra-musical ideas will seem at first sight extremely controversial, and will probably be denied indignantly by many music-lovers, the latter would not, at the same time, follow up this denial to its logical conclusion and reduce their art to the status of an expressionless crossword puzzle. Rather would they be misunderstanding the idea of symbol, and confusing it with realism, or pressionism, with objective or subjective art; for it will arouse opposition from the adherents of each, being equally objective and subjective, being, in philosophy, against rationalism and irrational dogma alike, in art against romanticism, with its dose successor realism, and abstract formalism.

On the other hand, in a great deal of vocal music, particularly in songs with instrumental accompaniment, the extra-musical ideas are specified by the words, and no one would deny an association between these and the music. For instance, in Schubert's song The Trout, the figure which persists through the pianoforte accompaniment can be associated with the idea of the fish darting through the water, or with the mood and significance of the treat suggested in the poem. Here neither the music nor the words exist in order to describe a trout, but each is suggested by the idea of the trout. In the poem the trout is used as a concrete image to call up certain ideas; in the music, the trout suggests certain type of movement which can be associated directly with some of these ideas. If the words were now removed, the accompaniment would still be expressive as music, for the trout has become a type of musical movement that has a symbolic effect, and that might equally well have been suggested by a dragon-fly, or some other chance idea. But in this context it is emphasized by all the other ideas connected with the trout and developed coherently, so that it is particularly vivid and becomes part of a whole.
In the above example the definite image of the trout has been expressed in the general and symbolic terms of a musical figure, which has a certain emotional effect. To describe in words the quality of this effect we should have recourse to a comparison, for instance, the swimming of a trout. From the origin of musical expression in association with words in singing, and the transference of the expression of part of the idea to instruments in accompaniment, we can see the nature of expression in all music. The general way in which a musical phrase produces an effect, and the manner of its conception, remain the same, whether in vocal or instrumental music. The power of the symbolic depends upon the expression of the general in the particular, in terms of sense- or emotional effect. The emotional line in instrumental music is undoubtedly derived from the tones and cadences used for pulling expression into the voice; but an idea with which this is associated must be present, and a melodic phrase taken out of its context may become almost meaningless, though it is possible to a limited extent for an idea to be suggested by such a phrase alone. But instrumental music opens up a new world of sound-sensations and of suggestive possibilities, in melodic, rhythmic and contrapuntal movement, and above all in the new element of tone-colour, while instruments themselves are symbolic individually. Schering distinguishes four planes on which instruments are used for expression: In the test place, a large part of instrumental music is "spielerisch", an objective expression of the instrument, having, like play, no purpose beyond itself. Secondly, instruments may play a song-tune, originally associated with words, but this is not in their character, for the tune has not been conceived independently of the words, nor in terms of the particular qualities of instruments: or, thirdly, they may reproduce the expressions of poetic speech; here they must give up part of their possibilities, but this inarticulate attempt at speech, which we find in some of Beethoven's adagios, is itself symbolical. On the fourth and highest plane, however, instruments are used for their own peculiar powers, "in the service of an idea, of a relationship, not spoken, but only thought". The full possibilities for putting meaning into the medium of expression are utilized, whether in terms of separate instruments with particular capabilities and associations or in terms of their different qualities of sound, used as symbolic colours in orchestration. Instrumental music is the real sphere of the symbolical, where ideas are expressed only in their most generalized and relative aspect, purely in terms of effect felt. The particular is completely symbolized, and only here are complete sense-pictures possible. It should now be dear that by a "sense-picture" is meant a picture in terms of general sensations, and not an objective description or representation.

In a description, or analysis, we can indicate relationships but we cannot convey an actual experience, that is, a sensation in terms of rhythmic sounds, colour or form. This sensation is a new experience in itself; it is not a translation of an outer experience, but an expression through such. It originates in, and must be referred to outer experience or the concrete, but not necessarily to one particular concrete. In purely instrumental music the exact origin of the idea does not matter, unless the whole organization of a work depends on the conception of a definite setting, as in a symphonic poem. The music is developed as types of symbolic effect, in the interests of a more generalized and larger form and more intellectualized ideas, with the logic of, "eines inneres Geschehens", according to the realities of internal experience, and the associations used may come from many different sources and may be referable to one image or another of similar effect. Coherence, or form, depends on the relationship of these associations and ideas, and its attainment requires in instrumental music a higher intellectual power and a greater and more deliberate sense of the symbolic than in setting a text, where the form and set of associations are given. A symbolic effect, since it always contains a wider meaning, is capable of interpretation in many different terms, provided that these terms 'stand in the right relation to one another; but it may be doubted whether the composer himself must not keep in mind a definite picture, a definite set of relationships and associations, in order to achieve an organic unity in the whole. Beethoven himself wrote: "I always have a picture in mind, according to which I work", and he thought of himself as a tone-poet. Such a picture would provide a consistent symbolism and a means of logical relation and development between one part and another, though at the same time the picture would be used consciously fm such elements in it as served a symbolical purpose and not for its detail, as if a scene were being described for its own sake. Without a conscious method of symbolism of this sort we should be in danger either of mere description or of a meaningless succession of musical effects without any particular "raison d'etre" as a whole, and this is a criticism that is frequently applicable. It is often said of a piece of music that it "does not mean anything", and this does not apply only to its emotional content, for if we are to feel sad, or excited, we have to think of something to feel sad or excited about, and there must be some further reason why we should so feel about it. The concrete image stimulates the feeling because it symbolizes certain relationships, and by attaching feeling to it we make it embody a meaning. On the other hand a theoretical "meaning" is not implied, but the active effect, by which atone the "truth" of the idea is judged. All art affects us through the senses, and therefore this meaning, or the intellectual content, can be expressed only through sense-pictures. Art is a double symbolic action, that of the direct sense-effect of the sound or other medium in the present, and the sense-effect through associations in the intellect. Its origin is imitative, and it cannot get away from the reference to some concrete idea any more than it can from the physical sense-effect of its material. The meaning, or effect, of the details most depend upon sense-relationships which can be referred to experience, and the unity of the whole depends upon the existence of a symbolic idea which embraces these.

A great composer, an artist by nature, is naturally conscious of the symbolic effect of things and of his art, while many lesser artists, and some periods of history, are distinguished by a limited or incomplete consciousness in this respect, or occasionally by a total misconception of aesthetics and the method of art. If we cannot see the universal in the particular we cannot "understand" the particular, and if we do not apply this principle to art, and are not susceptible to its language, we cannot understand art. To arrive at a general principle it is necessary to set out from a particular ease, and to under- stand a 'general principle it is necessary to imagine particular manifestations of it. Tire Mane applies in art, which is ultimately concerned with general principles, but which must express these through concrete embodiment.

There are some compositions in which this process is clearly illustrated in its essentials, and the symbolical use of a concrete image, specified in the title, is self-evident. These are tone-poems, of the kind that are not programme music, and a particularly good example is Debussy's Nocturne for orchestra, "Nuages". Here it is necessary to think of a procession of clouds, and Debussy expresses a certain aspect of things through these, using them as symbols of the cold and impersonal universe. The music is in no way inferior from being openly concerned with clouds than if it were merely called "Nocturne", bat on the contrary it is made clear that it is full of meaning. In this case toe conception is concentrated around one idea, that of clouds, and depends upon the particular associations of these. If Debussy had decided to write a sym- phony using the same theme, he would probably have brought in many other ideas, and would not have called it "Nuages"; but the origin of the theme would have been the same. The other ideas would have had similar origin, but they would be parts of a more general idea represented by the whole. As a general principle this idea could be widely applied, and the terms in which the details are imagined would depend upon this application of the whole. The original theme, though suggested by clouds, might here be used to convey simply a feeling of height, or space, for instance, or of inexorable motion, aad the endless procession of all things, without the idea of clouds in particular being developed any further than this.

It is important however to be conscious of the symbolism of all musical expression if we are not to pass over a great deal of what is contained in great works and fail to penetrate into their meaning beyond the surface. We are apt to take the form, orchestration and succession of themes for granted, and refer them to abstract patterns without thinking any further. In the finale of Sibelius' second Symphony, for example, we have the usual first and second subjects, but if we consider the movement only as an example of conventional sonata form, it is not very striking, and perhaps rather badly balanced. The first theme is reminiscent of Tchaikovsky, and we might ascribe it to the influence of that composer on Sibelius, or to fagging inspiration. It is triumphant, but flamboyant and rather commonplace. The second subject begins with a surging in the 'cellos and violas, and a strange figure appears over this in the wood-wind. This is totally different from the first subject in every possible way, and seems to have no relation to it. This strange theme is repeated many times, and eventually overwhelms everything else and virtually dominates the movement in the final climax.

If this new theme is dismissed merely as a second subject and explained on the grounds of a need for contrast, it remains meaningless. But if, nevertheless, we feel something more in the movement, if the effect of the music gives us a vague sense of something significant, we might try to define what this is, and stop to consider a reason for the relations of these particular first and second subjects. Why, for instance, the peculiar nature of the new theme? Way does it, the second subject, grow to such importance at the end? And why the Tchaikovskian theme at the beginning?

Let us suppose that the surging figure in the 'cellos and violas is an essential part of the second subject, and not simply a "figure of accompaniment", and let us suppose that this makes one think of forests, of a kind of force suggested by the forests; or, if you like, anything to which the idea of a surging, simply, can be applied. But to imagine a surging we must think of some image, of something concrete which does surge, and here forests are suggested by association with Finland. Any such image will be symbolical, and not thought of for its own sake. We do not think of it finally as forests—it can be interpreted differently, for the forests themselves are symbolical. Over these a motive appears, as though arising out of them, a strange and new force, or a very old one, strong and with unescapable persistence. Mr. Cecil Gray, writing of the first symphony, points out that the principal subjects are Russian in character, while the subsidiary ones are distinctively Finnish, and suggests that the "atmosphere of storm and conflict which pervades the entire work ... presents a symbolical picture of Finnish insurrection against Russian tyranny and oppression." The finale of the second symphony might be interpreted in the same way. The Finnish second subject is this time more insistent and inevitable, and represents a deeper force in contrast to the flamboyant triumph and outward pomp of the first theme. If we accept Mr. Gray's interpretation, this contrast of Russian and Finnish is in its turn symbolical of history. These two kinds of force, interpret them how we will, stand in a certain relationship, the whole power of which is that it is symbolic. But we must imagine them in terms of a concrete symbolic idea, otherwise they are abstract, meaningless, and not powerfully appreciable as a sense-picture.

A symbolic analysis should be designed to open out a world of relationships, and accommodate our minds to the realities of musical experience. The terms which we use will have to be as general as possible, so long as they express these relationships. But if they do not hit off exactly the right relationship, though this should always be the aim, they may nevertheless be of value in revealing a certain amount. The aim of such analysis is to make us more fully conscious of all that is contained in music, and that is very largely overlooked, in the same way that a painter reveals unsuspected aspects of things that we have under our noses every day, but do not otherwise see. The critic must search for the imagery which best expresses the conditions in the music, and he interprets the music in terms of this as the ballet-dancer interprets it in terms of figures and movements, being in this sense to a certain extent an artist. The language or imagery he uses must be regarded in the proper light, simply as convenient devices, excellently defined by J. W. Dunne:

"Analytical devices are merely instruments for rendering manifest differences and relations which, without such assistance, would remain concealed. But unless these are already there, waiting to be brought to light, the analytical device can exhibit nothing new. It is true that such contrivances may describe phenomena in a language of their own—as the mercury column in a thermometer indicates degrees of temperature in terms of divisions of height, or as the mathematician represents variables in terms of x and y—but that does not affect the question."

It is useless therefore to say, as Mr. Heseltine did, that "Music cannot be translated into terms of anything other than itself", for this is a truism that applies to everything equally, but is not a valid reason for abolishing speech. The erroneous idea of "pure" or "abstract" music is responsible for the prevailing prejudice against any but a stereotyped academic analysis of music, and is caused by an inadequate understanding of aesthetics. In so far as it aims at refuting "programme" music, it is based upon correct judgment; but it goes to the other extreme and, in reaction against the completely objective, describes music as completely subjective, or pure abstraction. "Pure" music would be of no more value than "pare" poetry in the sense of poetry in words of no meaning. The poetry of Mallarmé was pure in the sense of dealing in pure ideas, or sensory allusions of a purely symbolic character, and to present a pure idea, such as whiteness, as a symbol of sterility or absence, he started from the imagination of a definite white object, such as the sheet of paper in front of him. Programme music, and much more so, verse which relates a story, portrays a succession of events, not of pure ideas in a symbolic relationship. But if music contains no ideas, it is either completely physical, and therefore not an art, or it is entirely senseless.

We can greatly enjoy music without giving any thought to analysing it, and in doing so we are enjoying it on the emotional plane, in terms of the direct sense-impact. As there are planes of symbolism and rhythm, so there are planes of appreciation, and in listening to a symphony on this plane we enjoy only each part as it occurs in a general emotional line. The fact of such enjoyment invites investigation and leads, when we see the reason for it, to a much more complete enjoyment; we reach important conclusions which can be applied on higher planes, to embrace whole complex forms; and we become conscious of the symbolic significance of many details in their relations to the whole. The "Study of Symbols" embarked upon by Schering shows the way to a much more discerning and useful method of musical analysis which, in turn, affects thought in general. Our habits of intellectual abstraction cause us to overtook a great deal in all spheres of life, and in music "what we are accustomed to lose", he writes, "is sharpness of the sense for the physiological charms of music, for example for rhythms, tonal distinctions, dynamics and tone-colouring". The subjectivity which came to prevail in the “disenchanted modern world" resulted in the worship of the personality of the artist or composer, whose works were regarded primarily as individual expressions, and this saved thinking and being clear over the "causes which lead to emotion. The ability to think in symbols was lost, and was replaced by a distinctly impoverished theory of art, a one-sided teaching of feeling". This subjective shift of balance to the emotional side of music was Romanticism, a feeling for the isolated moment for its own sake, for the individual only, where a great many of the most effective possibilities of musical expression were ignored. It coincided with the replacement of contrapuntal by harmonic thought, with the loss of form, and resulted in music of limited application and profundity, which very quickly wears out, music in two dimensions only, as it were, of which a great deal has already become dated. Today the balance is being restored, and there is emerging in music a new sense of the strange power of the symbolical; the work of Arnold Schering is significant as the first step towards a conscious method of analysis in keeping with this.

Music and Meaning

Music and Meaning
BY
MICHAEL McMULLIN

There are two aspects to the question of meaning in music, one of them involving the specifically musical ways of expressing meaning, the technical analysis of the process of musical symbolism; the other involves a discussion of the meanings expressed, of meaning in general and the role of music in this context in Western civilization. I have gone into the first of these aspects in a previous essay, "The Three Dimensions of Music" (unpublished), at least to the extent of defining the nature of symbolism, of a symbolic analysis and, in a general way/the various kinds of interpenetrating meanings and levels of symbolism in music. An introductory essay on this subject was published in The Music Review of February, 1947 under the title "The Symbolic Analysis of Music". My present endeavour is to call attention to the second aspect.

DAS SYMBOL: The concept of symbol is fundamental to any discussion of meaning, and so it must be said here that the sense in which I am using the word "meaning" is that of symbolic significance—that is, in the sense of seeing in the particular manifestation an expression of a greater whole. This inclusive- ness can expand in ever-widening circles, like the ripples from a stone dropped into water, until eventually the whole cosmos is implied. This is the universe in a grain of sand, or: "As above, so below". Each part is a whole in itself and, at the same time, a part and a reflection (a microcosm) of a greater whole. This is the philosophy now called "holism" but it is also symbolism. And, what is more, it accords with the principle of correspondences, which is the basis of astrology and much ancient wisdom. Thus, meaning is not a matter of rationalistic concepts or material values, but of awareness of relationships and correspondences, depending on sensation, feeling and intuition in equal proportions to thinking. Here we are dealing with perceptions and not with opinions.
We are focusing our attention on wholeness and relatedness, as well as on distinctness—first we have to have differentiation and then integration of the separate entities into a greater whole, so that "integration" becomes a keyword. We no longer see the world as a collection of unrelated fragments—that is, as meaningless. There is nevertheless a strong reluctance prevalent today among those conditioned by past prejudices to see connections between things; they prefer to have everything in separate pigeon-holes, filed and indexed and, above all, disposed of and requiring no further thought. This suits what Jung called "the levelling platitudes of the so-called scientific view of the world, and the destruction of the instinctual and emotional forces which results from it". "The whole of reality is replaced by words", which are separative. Therefore there are no standards of value, no means of comparing concepts with nature. Art, on the other hand, deals in whole reality and provides such a contact and a basis of values. It might be argued that the evaluation of perceptions is arbitrary. Some people—most people today, probably—like to see the commonplace in everything. This is the "reductionist" mentality; the ideal is to reduce everything to "nothing but", as Jung pointed out. The highest expressions of the spirit are "nothing but" repressed sexuality, the fear of death or looking forward to the next meal, and the whole universe is "nothing but" a random assemblage, or disassemblage, of atoms, electrons or something else. Others prefer to see the wonderful in everything, or the whole in everything, and a totality of order and meaning. Is there a qualitative difference between these two points of view? What you see depends upon your level of development. The minds of commonplace people are inevitably rooted in the commonplace, and it does not occur to them that Bach, Beethoven and other great artists move on another mental and spiritual level. One can deal only with what is within one's own experience, and the lesser cannot comprehend the greater. "One cannot talk of the ocean to a frog in a well." Art, on this higher level, is an esoteric language, addressed only to initiates or, at most, to seekers on the path. Particularly is this so in music, where special powers of insight and receptivity have to be consciously developed and matured.

I am concerned only with music in Western culture, where it occupies a unique place and is of a different order from that of any other. It is, as Spengler pointed out, the dominant and most characteristic art of our culture, that which, more than'" any other, embodies its essential Weltanschauung. Further, music has reached with us a far higher level of development than it has done in any other culture—and of music alone of the arts can this be said. There is absolutely no comparison between the complexity and sophistication, the immense and varied resources and the technical mastery over them, of Western music and those of any other culture. It is true that this development is overwhelmingly intellectual, and in the order of the "aesthetical" as opposed to the "magical" (Rudhyar), or "telluric" (Keyserling) element of Oriental music. Different dimensions are emphasized. But our music is also a vehicle for the expression of a correspondingly vaster, more grandiose and higher order of mental and spiritual concepts. The development of polyphony gives the potentiality for an entirely new level of expression and of a more powerful expression than that of any other an. This has been fully realized, and music has been the source of the highest spiritual expression throughout our culture. One can say that the voice of God has come to the West not through organized religion but through music, and that music's great "bodhisattvas", or avatars have been the messengers of a higher reality. This can be directly experienced in their music, but one never hears of music in this context, or not of Western music. Present Westerners in general are unaware of and indifferent to their priceless musical heritage, or those seeking a "spiritual" music go in search of any kind of exotic music but never their own, while those who concern themselves with music insist for the most part in regarding it as having no relation to anything in life—unless merely to the composer's personal mundane or physiological concerns or perhaps to his personal intellectual problem of how to modulate from C to F minor in three moves.

Awareness of music on a spiritual plane, however, has to be cultivated, like any other kind of spiritual awareness. But for us Westerners, at this stage of evolution, music is an obvious and eminently available gateway to a higher level of experience, and a means of meditation. An insight into this experience can be had through psychedelics; Aldous Huxley has given one description. But it can also be had sometimes as an unexpected and spontaneous revelation, provided one is open to significance in music. Part of this awareness is a new and intense responsiveness—resonance--to the actual sound-vibrations, the "tone" itself as a physical and qualitative sensation. This is the "magical" element that Rudhyar points out as the main dimension in Oriental music; but it is present in our music too, though unrecognized by theorists. Composers, however, are very much aware of it, and it is one of the three indispensable dimensions in all and any music and also the basis of symbolic effect. This intense consciousness of the tone is also a very important factor for the performer if he is to make the music come alive. This factor is of course developed in combinations of tones, as tone-colour in instrumentation, and was even a very important and conscious element in early vocal polyphony.

Meaning, in this higher sense, is something directly perceived and selfevident once one is open to this dimension and is not "translatable" into words—or there is no need to translate it. For example, in listening to the great choruses in Bach's B minor Mass one is obviously in the Himalayas of music and of the spirit. Perhaps this is what is meant by the champions of "pure" music. But there are innumerable layers of meaning, and at less rarefied altitudes it helps to analyse them and to be able to point to them. Such an analysis, it must be remembered, is not a "translation" but "a finger pointing at the moon". It may help in understanding the music; but perhaps it helps more in understanding everything else, by comparing concepts with music. By doing this systematically we arrive at a new and non-rationalist method of thinking.

There is a type of meaning that resides purely in what one might call quality of feeling. A good example is the "second subject"—actually the main subject—of the first movement of Schubert's string Quintet in C. The movement is focused on this theme, which is the only real melodic subject in it, and on the peculiar quality of feeling it contains. It seems a very simple melody, and one might say it is very appealing, a lovely tune, sad or happy according to taste, and leave it at that, as usually one must. But to understand its essential quality, and therefore its message, is not at all easy. Of course it is contrasted with the introductory and almost despairing passages that precede it ("first subject" etc.), and this puts it in context. Then one has to put oneself in a state of complete openness and, at the same time, of concentration, and it may take many hearings and much contemplation to capture its essence, which is very elusive. It is an intimate message of one soul to another—or of collective humanity. Of course here again its quality cannot be rendered in words, but if we can point to some of the impressions we get it might help others to appreciate it—or it might not. At any rate, we can deny that it is merely "aesthetical", or no more than a vaguely pleasurable experience, or a mere foil to the "first subject", and we can say that it has spiritual significance, with some intensity. There is no need to say anything of the extraordinary beauty of the second movement, which may be self-evident enough to allow the use of this very unspecific word.

In this example we are almost exclusively concerned with the dimension of feeling, which is the least analysable in words. Much more can be said in the context of the other two dimensions, those of sense-perception and thinking. These three correspond to Jung's three basic psychological functions, and in "The Three Dimensions of Music" I have denned them as "Lyrical", "Dramatic" and "Symphonic" (or "Epic"), on the most general level. In the process of symbolism they correspond to the Individual, the particular object (sensation), and the world in general or the cosmos. The central phase of the process—the particular perception or sensation—could be called the "symbol" and sets up the relationship: subject object cosmos. But "symbol" is more the entire process. In music, the corresponding dimensions are melodic (pitch rhythm), tonal (instrumental) and form. All are rhythmic, and "harmony" is either an extension or counterpoint of pitch rhythm or of tonal rhythm (harmonics). In the dimension of feeling (the individual's response) we are concerned with evaluation. In that of sensation we are concerned with the objective or concrete experience, but on successive levels, from that of the sound, via all kinds of correspondences involving the other senses, to that of any part of the perceived environment (nature), while in thinking we relate ourselves to the universe, in our philosophical or religious function or Weltanschauung, and express our evolutionary status and our historical environment, in the most general sense embodied in musical forms. All the dimensions interpenetrate and exist, in greater or lesser degree, in any artistic expression. In "classical" art the proportion is balanced. The three dimensions or functions correspond to the elements Water (feeling), Earth (sensation) and Air (thinking). Intuition, Jung's fourth function (Fire), applies in the apprehension of the set of relationships—the symbolic field—and its significance ("inspiration"). This requires a supra-ordinary state of awareness or consciousness a focus and concentration on the part of the composer and a mental capacity on the part of the listener to resonate in a commensurable manner. This is usually limited in the case of non-artists.

In the concrete dimension it is a matter of apprehending the elements of environment that correspond to and are the starting-point of the musical expression and that themselves are symbolic. The meaning then is the individual's (feeling) perception of these and their further significance. Where words are associated with music such correspondences are usually obvious, and both Albert Schweitzer and Arnold Sobering have gone into this question in much detail with reference to melodic figures in the cantatas of Bach. Here analysis can help a great deal. No music exists in a vacuum, and the very word "meaning" refers to its relevance to the world we live in. Certain kinds of music emphasize, in one way or another, this concrete or dramatic dimension more than others, and, just as in Oriental music this is so on the level of actual sound-sensation, in our music it can be so on more complex levels of association of an indirect kind, especially in conjunction with the use of orchestral colouring or instrumental colouring, often involving harmonic colouring (chords here have not primarily a pitch function but that of blending the tonal qualities of instruments). One has only to think of Debussy. Here the term "symbolist" art is very relevant and refers to the emphasis of this dimension; it applies pre-eminently to French music of that period, as well as to poetry, and is much more suitable than "impressionist" for the painting as well. In other cases, or other periods, it is not so obvious and often needs pointing out, if we are to appreciate the context and to understand the meaning; the allusions of the music, and their significance, must otherwise be at least partly lost. For instance, the avenues of cypresses of the Villa d'Este are used as symbols by Liszt, as rows of dark standing sentinels, representing the past, threatening in a way, everything Saturnine. One could use astrological symbols in such a context, because these are archetypal and apply on an infinite number of levels. The cypresses are obviously referred to in the music, where they are given a feeling significance, and not merely in the title. In symphonic poems the same dimension is often emphasized to an even greater extent, and besides Debussy we can look at a work like Tapiola of Sibelius, capturing the brooding atmosphere and antiquity of the Finnish forests. The forest god, Tapio, is again closely related to the archetype Saturn, in its aspect of time and antiquity, especially, and its very strong "telluric" quality.

Exactly the same principles often apply in other kinds of composition where it is not generally, if at all, recognized, or stated by the composer, by way of title or otherwise. This is particularly so in the music of Sibelius, especially in his later symphonies, where the formal element is at the same time very highly developed—and developed in a very interesting way. The seventh Symphony, for example, is unquestionably oceanic in context, as is the third, while the fifth has very strong affinities with Tapiola and forests. The only time I have seen this recognized is in a reminiscence by Compton Mackenzie of crossing the sea to the Hebrides, when he felt a close association between the seventh Symphony and this oceanic environment. Without a recognition of this, however, a good part of the meaning must be lost, because a whole world of associations is missing, though the work can, of course, still be appreciated on other levels. The tenth Symphony of Shostakovich is another case in point, and to me it is a tone poem of the Russian steppes and forests—actually having many affinities with Tapiola; take away these associations, and the colour is gone: one merely has a reproduction in black and white.

Often the associations are not at all obvious, as in the foregoing examples, and the meaning, the context, is as difficult to come at as the exact spiritual quality of a melody. Sometimes one comes upon it accidentally, it seems. This happened to me once when I happened to be reading the Chinese poet Wang Wei and at the same time listening to the French Suites of Bach, when I understood that each was talking about exactly the same things. I reflected that each belonged to the classical period of his culture and that they had an almost identical outlook and relation to the world. A similar coincidence was that of Bartók's Sonata for two pianos and percussion with Baudelaire. The Bartók took me a long time to understand, until I heard them as nocturnes looking out over an industrial city and saw them as a reaction to negative environment, much as the poetry of Baudelaire, even though they do not coincide exactly in time. A very good case of pointing musical significance on this principle is the description of the great organ fugues of Bach by Sacheverell Sitwell in his book Splendours and Miseries, in a chapter entitled "Fugue". Here he uses an intuitive imagination to shed a great deal of light on the music and enhance one's appreciation in a way that no pedantic (and frequently erroneous) formal analysis could do.

A further level of environment is that of the state of civilization as a whole and the over-all human predicament. This merges into the philosophical dimension but often involves at the same time, very markedly, the dramatic one. We have seen it in the case of Bartók, and it is even more conspicuous in much of Shostakovich, as in his eighth and fifteenth Symphonies. It is foreshadowed in Mahler, with his monumental Farewells to European culture; Shostakovich gives us a preview of death and annihilation, ending with an invocation of the Valkyries and a dance of skeletons. In this way he is much more contemporary than those who think he should have been writing electronic "music". In the fifteenth Symphony in particular he is seen as a master of the grotesque and the macabre, which alternate in the movements, and exactly reflect the contemporary scene. In other places—the finale of the sixth Symphony—we have a Lumpenmarsch which, far from being a jolly piece of fun, "trivial but enjoyable", reminds us of Bruegel's peasants, belonging to some nightmare, or of a typical modem parade of the insane. Since the Politburo, too, see no meaning in music, such things could be openly stated and pass for a description of "a toy shop" and, inevitably, "the triumphant spirit of man". If one takes meaning into account one has the only final yardstick with which to evaluate modem art: what is it saying, and what is its relevance? Or is it merely itself a psychological symptom of the prevailing state of chaos and neurosis? Scarcely anyone understands any form of art, and most follow along with the lastest fashion or whatever is the going "opinion". What is acclaimed in its time is frequently worthless, and what is accepted from the past is as frequently congealed into some formula of permanent misconception, as in the case of Hamlet.
* * *
In the third dimension, that of form, we have to consider meaning on a higher level, transcending both the individual and the present (the concrete)— the level of the higher mind, the philosophical dimension. This is the dimension that has been so overwhelmingly developed in Western music, both horizontal and vertically (polyphony), so that it has been accused of "formalism" and abstraction. Rudhyar, contrasting form with substance (the tonal dimension), points out that Western music tends to consist of arrangements of "notes", on paper, rather than "tones", or living sounds. This is certainly true in the minds of theorists, and no doubt of many musicians who look on, say, playing the piano in much the same way as acquiring dexterity on a typewriter, combined with the panache of a juggling act. It is absolutely true of the course taken by the European mind generally in the development of an abstract rationalism and technology, divorced from life and real values. But art, though often reflecting the resultant situation, is not part of this regress but is a channel for the expression of higher values. The great composers have certainly not been the exponents of formalism but positive guides for human development, teachers and pioneers, among the avant-garde of collective humanity. Their message, though embodied in the cultural forms of their times, is concerned with universal values and is timeless.

Polyphonic music is above all a development in the formal dimension. In a single melodic line there is of course form too, in so far as it has meaning, just as there is tone-colour once it is sung or played and not on paper; but the expression is preponderantly lyrical/emotional and/or "magical" (tonal). But once it is combined with another melody the balance is shifted towards the formal/intellectual. There is an extra sphere or level of meaning in the interrelationship between the voices, or melodies, and this increases, potentially at any rate, in geometric proportion with the number of parts. One could say the expression is three-dimensional instead of two, because the third dimension is now so much more conspicuous or extended. Naturally the form extends horizontally as well as vertically, and the horizontal aspect is vastly elaborated in the developed polyphonic forms. In the simple forms, such as canon, one is at once presented with something very much more intellectually stimulating than a single melodic line. Why this is so is not so easy to explain; but, on the other hand, it is not much in need of explanation; the symbolism is basic and largely unconscious. One could say, on the whole, that one is confronted with an integration of independent voices, or with unity in diversity; and of course many other levels of symbolism could be discovered by a detailed analysis. Such become correspondingly complex in a developed form like fugue. Spengler has pointed out the correspondence of polyphonic music generally with the "soul" of the Faustian culture, with the feeling for infinite space and with the intersecting vaults of the Gothic cathedral in the spatial heights of the dimly lit interior.

The high point of the polyphonic period was the high point of European culture, its "high summer" and classical period, in the proper sense of the words. This could be taken to cover, broadly, both the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries and so to include the baroque, where the keyboard has become the dominant medium and influences style, even in vocal and choral music. Fugue is the most powerful and integrated form yet developed, and the great organ fugues of Bach are probably on the largest scale of any single integrated “movements” in music. The complete integration is the most outstanding characteristic, being a union of distinct individualities. Marked by the rhythmic recurrence of the fugue subject, the form exhibits the endless metamorphosis, transformation and combinations of this subject and comes nearer than any other form to correspond with life itself. The various fugal techniques, such as inversion, diminution and augmentation, and "tonal" answer, are very fundamental to musical expression and are the basis of thematic transformation, which is to reappear as a vital principle of musical form and development. The nature of a fugue subject, characteristically a short, very strongly marked motif, of a pregnant, symbolic kind, is also basic to the most highly developed musical forms, and this kind of motif or theme is to recur constantly, especially in the works of maturity of the great composers. It is always associated with increasingly integrated forms and with an increasing development of polyphony, and the reappearance of these factors in such works speaks for itself. They are features of maturity, both of the culture and of individuals.

Sonata form, on the other hand, parallels the increasing development of rationalism, separate individualism (with an emphasis on the separate) and Aristotelian logic, and its main characteristic is obviously to focus on duality, or dualism. It is a movement influenced by the "Renaissance"—that is, the adoption of Greco-Roman thought-forms, and away from the Gothic, or the innermost self of Western culture. Based on the contrast of two opposing themes, which are never reconciled, it does away with integration on principle, so that it becomes a heresy to suggest that a movement is monothematic or to infer, or deliberately to insert, any connection between the different movements of a work. Theorists of today cling to sonata form like an immutable dogma, even for modern works, as though music could not exist without it—as though musical form has for some reason to remain, finally and for good, stuck in the eighteenth century.

In the Romantic period the tendency towards separation goes much further, and the emphasis on a drawn-out melodic line supported by a harmonic background of chords corresponds to the emphasis on the individual and to the "feeling" dimension again. In the succeeding era this individual becomes progressively more alienated, and the music shows increasing dissociation, coming to look like the representation of a psycho-analyst's case-book. There are, however, other currents with a different emphasis, notably that of Liszt, succeeded by the symbolists, reaffirming in different terms the "tonal" or objective dimension of music, and this becomes combined with a reaffirmation of the formal dimension and thematic integration in Sibelius.

The most characteristic medium of the sonata period was the string quartet, which in itself is a rather integrated medium and still carries with it polyphonic implications, though there is a strong tendency for dominance by the first violin and a mainly supportive role for the three other instruments. The other very prominent medium of the period is the concerto for solo instrument against the orchestra, and the romantic and individualistic implications of this are plain enough. We find the dominant style, even in writing for the piano, to be that of bowed stringed instruments, with such features as rapidly repeated chords, unsuited to keyboard instruments. Haydn, more than anyone, is intimately associated with the string quartet, as is Mozart, in his profoundest works—which include the string quintets. It is perfectly in keeping with the period that the most profound and far-reaching works of Beethoven, which are also the most highly developed formally, are the string quartets. The last quartets of Beethoven are particularly interesting with regard to every aspect of the formal dimension, and they are indeed one of the focal points of the whole of Western music. Coming at the end of the sonata period proper, which preceded the Romantic era, they transcend it altogether and constitute a phenomenon that does not belong in that context—or in any particular context unless that of a future we have not yet reached. Or their context is universal and epochal—that of a message to humanity at large at the end of the Piscean Age.

In an article in The Music Review (February, 1963) Deryck Cooke demonstrated very clearly the thematic unity of the last quartets and their basis on one or two key motifs. This fact is of profound significance, as is the nature of the motifs. It is interesting that, as he points out, one of the motifs, opening the Quartet, op. 127, is the subject of the extraordinary fugue of the finale of the piano Sonata, op. no. 110. Cooke has given us an excellent thematic analysis of op. 127, showing that it is monothemalic and that the whole Quartet is derived from this motif, that is, from the opening introductory chords. Otherwise, at first sight, or even at many other sights, it is hard to understand the relation of this chordal introduction to what follows. Here I am concerned particularly with the three following quartets, which form a triune, a unity in themselves, based on, or deriving from, what Cooke calls the dark minor motif, G#-A-F-E. He finds a hint of this motif also in op. 127. All these quartets are enigmatical; they are quite opaque to the ordinary standards of evaluation. Where the formal implications are resisted or taken as something eccentric, no start can be made to understanding them, since these are inherent in the music itself, part of the expression, and not merely a question of theories of analysis. Beethoven was not a professor of music, idly experimenting with "scholastic formalism" or struggling with "the problem of the finale" and throwing in this or that movement as a joke. One would sometimes suppose that he was a rather wayward student causing raised eyebrows in some of our pedagogues and never quite succeeding in sorting himself out. Joseph Kerman, for example, has given us a valuable and very detailed analysis of the quartets and, in many places, throws a great deal of light upon them. We can be grateful for it; but he continues to resist the idea of thematic unity, in spite of Deryck Cooke, to whom he refers, and only grudgingly admits that the "dark minor motive" does occur here and there in the group of three. He insists on seeing sonata form even in the fugue of op. 131, as though it were impossible to relinquish this last lifeline to the known and accepted. One could see "sonata form" in anything by dividing the notes into "first groups" and "second groups", conceding that the development is missing, or rudimentary, and so on. Here it is contrary to everything about the works; but it is consistent with a resistance to any suggestion that there might be some meaning in them. The movements are analysed as though they were haphazard or randomly thrown together with no particular meaning or relevance to the rest of the Quartet— let alone quartets.

The formal principle underlying these quartets is thematic transformation, and this carries many implications that give it much more in common with fugue than with the sonata. Kerman admits this principle in some of the movements; but it applies to all of them. The quartets are monothematic; this is apparent from listening to the C# minor and, with careful attention, to the A minor. By carefully analysing the notes, as Deryck Cooke has done, it is clear with all of them. Beyond this, all three are essentially monothematic as a whole, giving a development of this idea on a scale comparable only with Bach's Art of Fugue.

There is also an interrelationship between specific movements in different quartets. The third movement of the B Quartet (Andante) was to me in- comprehensible for a long time until I saw it as a different facet—different mood—of the first movement of the A minor (see Ex. i), The second theme of this movement of the A minor Quartet is so obviously identical with fig. (a), except in note-values, that there is no sense in calling it a "second subject": it is just the first theme seen in another light, or from another viewpoint. Or it is an evolution of feeling-values. It is not a different character in a drama, as one understands a sonata second subject to be. It is true that it is in F, instead of A minor, and if one uses key-analysis to point to another level of symbolic relationships it is perfectly valid; here for example, the emphasis of the 6th of the scale has a decided significance in relation to the other quartets. This kind of significance is susceptible to further development of symbolism in ways hitherto undreamt-of. On the other hand, the way in which key- analysis is often used has little meaning except as a lesson to students in text- book modulation. In discerning thematic relationships key does not enter much into it, and a motif is identifiable, in any key, as a fugue subject. An exact notational comparison is also not necessary. Deryck Cooke has pointed out how fugal methods of thematic transformation, such as inversion, augmentation and diminution, apply here, and he has defined another one, which he calls "interversion", meaning "the switching around of notes in a phrase". There is also an intuitive comparison by which a correspondence is felt, independently of note-comparisons on paper. This is sometimes a question of the emphasis of certain notes in a phrase, or of intervals {e.g., a semitone progression at a focal point or points). It can depend on a certain type of leap, or the mere fact of a leap in a certain place, of varying interval, provided it is a leap; or the length of notes in relation to their place in the sequence. For example, the second theme of the C minor finale corresponds with the fugue subject, not only by interversion, but by emphasis on B and the characteristic drop of a minor 3rd (see Ex. 2). In C of Ex. 2 the germinal four-note motif of all three quartets can be compared with A and B. The degree of the scale makes no difference, for purely thematic comparison. C is the germinal motif; it is a kind of seed, which is metamorphosed in all three quartets—a process of organic growth. This motif has to be pregnant with meaning; it must have a hidden meaning, even an occult meaning. D(B-A-C-H) has a certain suggestive relationship to it which may be highly significant.

It is interesting that thematic transformation of this kind is, in exactly the same way, the key to the mature works of Sibelius. This is obvious in a case like Tapiola, but it seems to have been overlooked in the symphonies, which are solemnly analysed as being in "sonata form". Many very interesting aspects of transformation can be seen in the first movement of no. 5, while it has been noted by Cecil Gray that the entire seventh Symphony is evolved from the basic progressions of the modal full close, in the scale of C, embodied in the opening woodwind motif.

The logic of thematic transformation and fugal metamorphosis may perhaps be compared with the intellectual logic of correspondences. In the holistic world-view everything is related to everything else, not causally or rationalistically, but synchronistically, by correspondences and through a hierarchy of levels. Thus a germinal, motivic theme is an archetype that can be interpreted on a multitude of levels. The logic of correspondences is symbolic logic and is non-Aristotelian; aesthetics can be interpreted only in a non-Aristotelian system. This kind of thinking belongs to the future, to a different level of perception, and this has a bearing on the meaning of the quartets we have been considering. Their meaning is also to be interpreted as a psychological and Spiritual signpost to the future. Their message is becoming relevant now much more than was the case in the time they were written, when they could not be appreciated. 1 think that Joseph Kerman has given some very useful pointers, for example, when he associates the idea of "integration" with the C minor Quartet, for the same theme of integration is of vital psychological importance to humanity at present. But to find the Presto "childlike", and to see in it a "rustic dance", is to descend to the belittling and the ridiculous; one cannot imagine a dance less rustic than this. I should say a cosmic dance, or the dance of Shiva, and that Wagner, in the passages he quotes, came much nearer to understanding its context. I believe that the whole Quartet embodies a spiritual message that is scarcely intelligible to us, that it is transpersonal and transcendent and that to appreciate it requires profound contemplation of each phase of the work—that is, a feeling-contemplation and not only an intellectual one. One has to associate it with one's innermost experiences, "mit innigste Empfindung". The Heiliger Dankgesang is an experience from another world, from a higher plane of existence. To say that this is "tragic", or to see "optimism" or "pessimism" as subjects of these works, is surely meaningless—qu'est-ce que cela veut dire?—while to see them as expressing Beethoven's personal anxiety about death is perfectly reductionist and Freudian. One must have a higher conception of art than that. To find the right symbols, or universal archetypes, to express the over-all meaning of these quartets, one would have to resort to astrology, and I believe that, in fact, the three quartets can be related to a configuration in Beethoven's horoscope that is extremely remarkable and the significance of which is transcendence—in the B Quartet, death and regeneration. I have taken up this theme in its astrological context else- where.1
' In an article shortly to be published in Astrology.

REFERENCES
1 The great philosopher Dane Rudhyar was originally a composer and became also the principal founder of modern psychological astrology. I refer here to his book Culture, Crisis and Creativity, published by the American Theosophical Publishing House (1977).
2 The Beethoven Quartets by Joseph Kennan (O.L'.P., 1067/78).