[lit-ideas] Persuasion Redux and Merry Christmas
- From: Eric Yost <mr.eric.yost@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Tue, 25 Dec 2007 02:20:06 -0500
"[T]he interpretation ... uses its own system of a priori events
built on persuasion"
WO: I find to be either unintelligible or self-contradictory. Events are
not proper objects of attributions of a priori status since they are all
empirical and hence contingent. That which is apriori renders events and
states of affairs possible as objects of empirical inquiry.
EY: Remember we were talking about music here.
The "a priori" (deductive reasoning from general principle to necessary
effect) is the interpreted score -- often the product of much thought
and rehearsal, from general principle (absolute score) to necessary
effect (the decision to interpret the musical architecture and phrasing
in a certain way) -- which finds its "event" in the particular musical
performance itself.
It "builds on persuasion" because a masterful interpretation (a)
persuades you of its truth in such a way that it is difficult to imagine
the piece played in any other way, (b) creates its musical persuasion
through an inner musical rhetoric (on the part of the interpreter) which
is analogous to a syllogism and is every bit as strict and rigorous; is
in fact, composed of thousands of syllogistic choices by the performer,
and (c) is capable of convincing the listener that this performance
embodies the voice of the composer, source of the pure musical score.
This effect is most apparent in classical music, because that music is
often founded on an absolute score (post-metronome), but I see no reason
why it should be limited to classical music. To come away from a
performance of Schumann convinced that "this is what Schumann intended,"
is not radically different from hearing a jazz pianist "make Art Tatum
live again."
Wishing WO a Merry Christmas a little early,
Eric
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