The Normativity of Musical Works: A Philosophical Inquiry

Alessandro Arbo

ISBN 10: 9004462767 / ISBN 13: 9789004462762

Published by Brill Mär 2021, 2021

About this Item

Neuware - What do we mean when we talk about the identity of a musical work and what does such an identity involve What in fact are the properties that make it something worth protecting and preserving These issues are not only of legal relevance; they are central to a philosophical discipline that has seen considerable advances over the last few decades: musical ontology. Taking into account its main theoretical models, this essay argues that an understanding of the ontological status of musical works should acknowledge the irreducible ambivalence of music as an 'art of the trace' and as a 'performative art.' It advocates a theory of the musical work as a 'social object' and, more specifically, as a sound artefact that functions aesthetically and which is based on a trace informed by a normative value. Such a normativity is further explored in relation to three primary ways of conceiving and fixing the trace: orality, notation and phonography.

Seller Inventory # 9789004462762

Bibliographic Details

• Title: The Normativity of Musical Works: A Philosophical Inquiry
• Publisher: Brill Mär 2021
• Publication Date: 2021
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 9004462767
• ISBN 13: 9789004462762
• Binding: Taschenbuch
• Condition: Neu
• Dimensions: 233W x 153H x 10D millimeters 233 millimeters width by 153 millimeters height by 10 millimeters depth
• Weight: 222 grams

About this title

Synopsis

What do we mean when we talk about the identity of a musical work and what does such an identity involve? What in fact are the properties that make it something worth protecting and preserving? These issues are not only of legal relevance; they are central to a philosophical discipline that has seen considerable advances over the last few decades: musical ontology. Taking into account its main theoretical models, this essay argues that an understanding of the ontological status of musical works should acknowledge the irreducible ambivalence of music as an “art of the trace” and as a “performative art.” It advocates a theory of the musical work as a “social object” and, more specifically, as a sound artefact that functions aesthetically and which is based on a trace informed by a normative value. Such a normativity is further explored in relation to three primary ways of conceiving and fixing the trace: orality, notation and phonography.

About the Author

Alessandro Arbo, Ph.D. (1997), Turin University (I) is Professor of Music at the University of Strasbourg. He has published monographs and many articles on the aesthetics and philosophy of music, including Entendre comme. Wittgenstein et l’esthétique musicale (Hermann, 2013).