On Representational Music V. A. Howard Noûs, Vol. 6, No. 1. (Mar., 1972), pp. 41-53. Stable URL: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0029-4624%28197203%296%3A1%3C41%3AORM%3E2.0.CO%3B2-K Noûs is currently published by Blackwell Publishing.
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http://www.jstor.org Wed Aug 1 00:09:37 2007
SEVENTH SYMPOSIUM
On Representational Music
HARVARD PROJECT
ZERO,and
THE UNIVERSITY OF WESTERN ONTARIO
Commentators: ANNETTEBARNES
LEEBROWN
AMHERST COLLEGE OHIO STATE
UNIVERSITY
1. The Visual and the Musical1 Often the question whether music can be representational is broached as implying that music as an auditory event could become visual by synesthesis or substitute for a visual symbol. If, as Goodman argues, "Nothing is intrinsically a representation" ; but rather, "status as a representation is relative to a symbol system." ([2], p. 226), then it is misleading to ask whether music can usurp the function of pictures or even whether it is "by nature" nonrepresentational. T h e appropriate question is whether music can belong to a representational system as pictures more typically do. However, being a picture is neither necessary nor sufficient to being a representation as amply attested by non-representational styles of painting. "Objects and events, visual and nonvisual, can be represented by either visual or nonvisual symbols." ([2], p. 231) So it seems there is more to representation than meets the eye and may include what meets the ear in some musical contexts. It is the primary purpose of this paper to sketch the special conditions This paper was improved by the comments of Messrs. Nelson Goodman and T. Graham Roupas. I am grateful to the Canada Council for a grant in support of the research.
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of auditory representation in so-called "pictorial" music while distinguishing musical representation from other programmatic symbol relations, particularly expression, description, and naming with which it is easily confused. One source of confusion is an ambiguous, common use of the word 'represents' roughly synonymous with 'symbolizes', 'stands for', or 'refers to' where the latter encompass many different symbol relations including pictorial representation. We shall be limited to consideration of the musical analogues of pictorial representation or depiction. T h e relative musical merits of attempts to use music to represent objects and events are not at issue. The technical notion of a representational system is Goodman's as described in Languages of Art and covers visual and auditory as well as other kinds of symbols. While this restricted sense of representation is suggested and in part controlled by ordinary uses of the word in aesthetic contexts, it does not correspond to all its aesthetic or derivative meanings anymore than such meanings correspond to each other. Pictorial representation, for instance, has little to do with parliamentary representation but more with musical or gestural representation. The terms 'expression', 'representation', and 'description' identify specific symbol relations found in both the visual and musical arts. I will argue that music can and often does meet the necessary and sufficient conditions of representation as well as of description and expression.
2. Onomatopoeia and Representation A natural place to begin an inquiry into musical representation is onomatopoeic sounds such as bird twitters, canon shots, water swirlings, drum rolls, wind howls, and the like. Examples such as these might tempt one to conclude that only those parts of music which are imitative replicas of "natural" sounds are representational. This would be a mistake; for, as I hope to show, onomatopoeia, though imitative, is often non-representational, while musical representation can be either imitative or not. There may be good reasons for avoiding or at least qualifying talk of imitation, but they can wait. I n the meantime, let me strike a comparison with Goodman's analysis of our ordinary use of the verb 'represents' as applied to pictures. (See [2], pp. 21-31) Goodman holds that to say something "represents" or is a "picture of" something else is ambiguous between saying what, if
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anything, the picture denotes and what kind of picture it is; that is, between (1) X is a picture of (i.e., denotes) Y; and (2) X is a Y-picture (or representation). I n sense (I), 'represents' or 'picture of' behaves as a dyadic predicate indicating what things are labelled by the picture. I n sense (2), 'represents' becomes a monadic predicate referring not to objects or events denoted by the picture but rather to how the picture itself is to be classified regardless of whether there is or ever was anything in the world corresponding to it. T h e difference is between the pictorial labelling of things and the labelling of pictorial things. Implicitly, we mark this distinction every time we notice a departure from the standard case where (1) and (2) hold simultaneously: where X is a picture of (denotes) Y, and X is a Y-picture (e.g., a Churchill-picture denoting Churchill). Picture X may well denote Y without being a Y-picture as in caricature or abstract symbolism (e.g., Christ represented by a fish), or, in the case of fictional beings, X may be a Y-picture without denoting anything. Onomatopoeia in musical works is the analogue of the standard case in pictorial representation. Roughly put,
(3) Passage S denotes R, and S is an R-sound (e.g., canon shots, church bells, etc.). This simply means that the work-sound exemplifies some of the same literal properties as some other sound which it denotes. Provisionally, this is all that is intended by saying that onomatopoeic work-sounds represent imitatively. All other instances of musical representation fall into the category of non-imitative worksounds where
(4) Passage S denotes R, and S is not an R-sound. Eventually, we shall have to distinguish other sorts of denoting but non-imitative passages-what I call musical names and descriptions-from representational ones. Just now, I should like to say a bit more about onomatopoeia and imitation.
3. Onomatopoeia and Imitation An important difference between onomatopoeia and the standard case of pictorial representation is in the kind and degree
of imitation. Onomatopoeic sounds in musical compositions are frequently thought to be replicas of other sounds, whereas a manpicture could hardly be a man-replica even if we are able to attach some significance to "looks exactly like a man". Further, a sound in onomatopoeia, if used denotatively, is a self-denoting label; that is, it denotes all sounds having the properties it exemplifies including itself. (See [2], pp. 61n and 81) I n this way, a bang-sound may become a surrogate for the predicate 'bang' by labelling other bang-sounds. By contrast, a man-picture of Trudeau denotes him but not itself. While I have spoken of onomatopoeia as imitative sound, imitation is no reliable criterion either of a sound being onomatopoeic or representational. Goodman observes that "The variability of exemplification is amusingly attested . . . by some linguistic curiosities: it seems that French dogs bark 'gnaf-gnaf' rather than 'bow-bow'; [one might add 'woof-woof' in English] that German cats purr 'schnurr-schnurr,' French cats 'ron-ron'; and in France a drip-drip is a plouf-plouf." ([2], p. 61n) Certainly there is as much variability among church bell sounds and bird twitter sounds as among onomatopoeic words in language. The fact that a sound is treated as onomatopoeic is at least as likely an explanation of its resemblance to other sounds which it denotes as its being a soundreplica of them. Furthermore, we do not usually think of successive toots of a train whistle or gull screeches as symbolizing, signifying, or denoting each other anymore than do exact replicas of coins or pieces of furniture. Similarity between two things in some or every respect does not imply that one denotes the other. (See [2], pp. 3-6; also [3], p. 19.) On the one hand, sounds dissimilar in many respects are treated as onomatopoeic, and on the other, there are sound-replicas which are not onomatopoeic. So even if onomatopoeic sounds were not as variable as they are, similarity or imitation would not explain the onomatopoeic labelling of one sound by another. Accordingly, neither can imitation explain any subset of musical denotation including representation. I t is noteworthy too that Goodman's examples of onomatopoeia above are all linguistic and therefore by definition non-representational; that is, they consist of verbal inscriptions belonging to systems that are syntactically disjoint and articulate. I hasten to add that I am not arguing that onomatopoeia is non-imitative, but rather that imitation is no explanation of onomatopoeic reference in representational or linguistic systems. Instead, it seems that the resemblances we discover between sounds can often be attributed to their being
ON REPRESENTATIONAL MUSIC
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used onomatopoeically as much as to similarities antecedently perceived.
4. Scoring and Representing Towards the end of Languages of Art, Goodman caps his rejection of imitation as the basis of pictorial representation with these condensed remarks on musical denoting. One quite incidental consequence [of the analysis of pictorial representation] concerns representation in music. Here no more than in painting does representation require imitation. But if a performance of a work defined by a standard score denotes at all, it still does not represent; for as a performance of such a work it belongs to an articulate set. The same sound-event, taken as belonging to a dense set of auditory symbols, may represent. Thus electronic music without any notation or language properly so-called may be representational, while music under standard notation, if denotative at all, is descriptive. This is a minor curiosity, especially since denotation plays so small a role in music. ([2], p. 232)
I am inclined to believe that denotation plays a larger role in programme music and especially opera than Goodman's last sentence might suggest, but that is incidental. Two kinds of musical denoting are distinguished here: representation in a system that is syntactically dense, and description in one that is syntactically disjoint and articulate. For the moment, it is sufficient to mark the difference by whether the durations of pitches and silences of a performance are assignable to and identified by a score in standard notation. If pitches and durations are so notated, then score and performance are mutually recoverable: score from performance and conversely. (121, p. 178) I n neither representation nor description is the music uniquely recoverable from the objects or events denoted (e.g., a waterfall, battle, etc.), so that both are semantically non-disjoint, dense, or inarticulate. Thus, while musical representation shares certain symbol features in common with pictorial systems, musical description shares others in common with linguistic systems. Usually, pictorial systems are both syntactically and semantically dense, whereas linguistic systems are syntactically disjoint, articulate, and tend to be semantically dense. I t might appear from this that the mere existence of an appropriate score could mark the difference among denoting passages between those which represent and those which describe. However, that would be an arbitrary and nominal difference at best. I t is not just the presence or absence of a score that marks
the difference between the representational and the descriptive but rather scoreability. I t must be clear what are the characters and inscriptions of a notational scheme that make for duplication of the performance sounds. Performances which can be duplicated via such a scheme would also be said to belong to an articulate set whether or not they have ever been actually scored. But saying this is not enough either; for it is precisely in the context of discussions of conventionally scored programme music that one most frequently encounters talk of "musical painting", "representation", or "pictorial music". T o exclude these cases would be to eliminate the paradigms of musical representation, at least as reflected in the parlance of music theory and criticism. I n other words, an analysis of representational music should allow for it being so under standard notation. This appears to contradict Goodman's claims above, but I believe the contradiction can be eliminated by marshalling a distinction and eliciting an assumption. T h e distinction is one Goodman carefully draws earlier between a score and a notation. Notationality refers to the conjunction of five properties of a system: syntactic disjointness and articulateness, unambiguity, and semantic disjointness and articulateness. ([2], pp. 130-141 and 148-157) Any system lacking even one of these features thus far fails of notationality. Theoretically and practically, it is these five characteristics of a notational system that make possible the mutual recoverability of score and performance. I n fact, many modern scoring methods fall short of strict notationality (usually through violation of syntactic or semantic articulateness), and not even standard music notation is entirely "notational" inasmuch as it incorporates ambiguous symbols, some linguistic and some not. ([2], pp. 183-185) Various expression marks and verbal instructions regarding tempo, attack, and dynamics are ambiguous. I t is by virtue of just these nonnotational features of the music that a given passage may represent something. This is because the sound-compliants of these ambiguous elements of the score, when themselves taken as symbols, turn out to be both syntactically and semantically undifferentiated. Suppose, for instance, a few bars of stereotypical "galloping music" of the deedle-dum, deedle-dum, deedle-dum-dum-durn variety, duly written out in standard notation. Suppose further that the music indicates the approach or recession of a rider,2 A rider? Of what? A horse, camel, or ostrich ? Though ancillary clues as to what specific objects are denoted can be gleaned from context or accompanying titles, it may be thought that such questions constitute a peculiar threat to the
ON REPRESENTATIONAL MUSIC
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each instant of sound indicating a relative location by an increase or decrease of volume. Depending upon the dynamics, the rider could be represented either as approaching and then receding or receding and approaching again, e.g., '< >' or '>
