Date: |
Tue, 5 Jun 2001 18:07:39 EDT |
Subject: |
|
From: |
|
Parts/Attachments: |
|
|
Steve Schwartz writes:
>If music were a language (and I mean human music, not what birds do),
>then it must have a grammar, which is simply a description of how
>language means. This leads to all kinds of trouble in the case of
>music, particularly with avant-garde and even not-so-avant-garde music.
This leaves me feling a little uneasy. Why? Just pondering the meaning of
the word "grammar" suggests an affinity to the ways of music. Grammar, a
branch of linguistics, deals with the inflexion of language, its phonetic
system, and with the arrangement of words in a sentence. Music deals with
notation, inflexion of sound, and the arrangement of orderly passages.
Following this spoor, avant garde music, then, could be found to be a
dialect of orthodox classical music.
Denis Fodor
|
|
|