Music and Embodied Cognition by Arnie Cox

Author:Arnie Cox
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Publisher: Indiana University Press
Published: 2016-09-25T16:00:00+00:00

Example 6.3. The B-flat “goes to” A.

The species of paradox of music moving through music is thus fairly easily resolved, while the other is of a different nature. This paradox hinges on the unannounced switch between conceptions of musical features (1) as moving entities and (2) as locations, which also involves a switch between CHANGE IS MOTION and STATES ARE LOCATIONS. It is manifest in apparently factual propositions such as, In the normal resolution of a C7 chord, the B-flat goes to A (or the B-flat resolves to A), as represented in example 6.3.

On the face of it, in such instances we are talking about voice leading involving two “notes,” but if the B-flat and the A are thus members of the same species, we might ask if the B-flat pushes the A out of the way, or if it overlays it, melds with it, or disappears as it transforms into A. Nonmetaphorically, the B-flat and the A are of the same species, as literal sound states, but in the exemplary expression they are conceptualized as two different species: the B-flat as a moving entity, and the A as a location. The central motivation for the metaphoric conceptualization and the resulting paradox is that we have two pitch states, which motivates the sense of pitch locations, but we also have change, which motivates the sense of motion. We attribute the motion to the B-flat and allow the A to stand as a location—a location that we could subsequently reconceptualize as a moving entity that “proceeded” to G, and so on. The fluidity with which we normally gloss over this paradox might seem to indicate that this is a matter of no great significance—everyone understands what is meant, and the norms of voice leading are what matters. However, this fluidity is precisely what obscures and distorts the role of embodied cognition.

It is not simply that the motion is metaphoric. It feels like some kind of motion, and this feeling is not simply a consequence of our metaphoric conceptualization of sounds. The illusion, or fiction, that the B-flat “goes to” A is not simply a manner of speaking. Our ability to conceptualize music in this way is at once a product of the processes we have considered in this and the preceding chapters, and the means whereby we hide these very processes. In addition to any philosophical and psychological interest that this practice may bear in its own right, the more meaningful implications emerge when we try to understand the bases of emotional responses to music. The feeling of some kind of motion in this and other examples is part of a broader range of affective responses that emerge in musical experience, as I consider in chapters 8 and 9. In the meantime, let me summarize the issues involved in this particular example.

Nonmetaphorically there is a state (the B-flat in its harmonic context) and then a new state (the A in its harmonic context), but our access to these states involves mimetic participation, anticipation, and metaphoric conceptualization.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.