Joseph Harris

To what extent does the construction of musical narrative depend on who exactly is reading it?

The subjective problem is central to the understanding of narrative structure in music. Whether it is possible to substantiate a universal interpretation within the western classical listening traditionlet alone across cultureshas been a problem for modern musicologists. This question is difficult to approach from the subjective side however. Whether an individual will associate a narrative with a musical performance will depend on familiarity with certain theories, the individual mode of listening, whether they have been primed by a programme or descriptive title, familiarity with the historical context of the repertoire and so forth. Needless to say navigating the vast number of possibilities within these variables, and building a positive and comprehensive theory of who will perceive any kind of narrative in any specific piece would be a vast undertaking. The question can however be considered negatively, the discussion would be incomplete without considering when the reading is not dependent on listener perception, but objective musical features. Fortunately both of these aspects of narrative music have been the focus of some criticism recently. Various studies of narrative in music will be drawn upon, in order to consider the necessary subjective and objective criteria that enable such readings, and how much they do rely on the listener, or reader. Recent definitions of narrative music by Nattiez, Abbate and Newcomb have discussed how narrative, as a clearly defined literary term, is made manifest in certain music. All of these theories either directly or indirectly invoke a listener response as an important component. Newcomb considers narrative in Schumanns Second Symphony (1846), as it would have been heard contemporary listeners and critics.1 As scholars point out, although the symphonic tonepoem begins with Liszt as part of his Wagnerian tendency, narrative interpretations of earlier instrumental music falls out of favour as Wagner leaves his unavoidable mark on music criticism.2 Newcomb is alarmed by the disparity between the indifferent modern evaluation of Schumanns symphony and the contemporary reviews, which heap praise upon his bold and effective music.3 Examinations of literature shows a change in opinion between the 19th and 20th centuries, making clear that a modern listener will be less open to the narrative interpretation he suggests. Newcombs listener is strongly grounded in the literary conventions of the time, and how this literature can interact with musical form. Audiences would have been comfortable with interpreting the symphony in the vein of an individualist novel, particularly the Bildungsroman archetype. Although the music does not depict specific events mimetically or even representationally, the music is read as the internal drama of an imagined protagonist, or even the listener himself. Certain apt analogies between the symphonic and literary forms lend themselves to this individualist interpretation. Bildungsroman literature typically chronicles the life of an individual, as he struggles through adolescence to adulthood. These teleological tales have a strong focus on the internal psychological growth and development of the romantic individual. Newcombs account of the finale of Schumanns Second Symphony describes the narrative content as similarly internal to the listener, a series of discontinuous affective states, heightened by unexpected structural interruptions. The archetypal narrative form interpreted in Schumanns finale is the transition from suffering to an optimistic, often triumphal state. Such a pattern is Anthony Newcomb, Once More Between Absolute and Program Music: Schumanns Second Symphony, 19th-Century Music, Vol. 7, No. 3, Essays for Joseph Kerman, (1983) 233-250 2 ibid. and Matthew Pritchard, The moral background of the work of art: character in German musical aesthetics, 1780-1850, forthcoming in Eighteenth Century Music, 9:1 (2012) 3 Newcomb, 235
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seen in Beethovens 5th symphony finale, and later in Mahlers first and second symphonies, amongst countless others which will be familiar. These kinds of associative narrative readings then are open to any listener with an acquaintance with literary forms, and who can interpret the series of affective states in the music as an individual, or external narrative. It is briefly worth considering the objective means by which these narrative impressions are achieved in the music. Newcomb describes two processes in the music by which narrative is inferred by the listener. Firstly the larger scale interaction of different affective states, expressed or represented in abstract form within the score. Both the succession of scherzo by the dramatic finale, and the surprising inconsistency of character and tonality within this final movement (for which the movement is often criticised) are part of this. Secondly the characteristic transformations of the musical themes in this final movement, alongside the quotation of themes from Beethoven create a continuity that can be interpreted as narrative. These are the kind of large-scale reductive analyses that could be represented in Schenkerian diagrams, or a paradigmatic analysis after Reti. Analyses such as these seem to be specially chosen from the available interpretative schemes to substantiate the analogous literary readings discussed above. However they exist independently of the listener, and are only interpreted as such when considered by a listener who is inclined to do so. Abbates discussion of interdisciplinary theories of musical narrative is more negative than that of Newcomb, as she considers the apparent limitations and shortcomings.4 Abbate and Nattiez agree that although music can represent the dynamic features of narrative, the content of these narratives will never be specified in purely musical terms.5 This detail is important, as it limits the kind of narrative that is possible and the specificity with which it can be represented in music. Abbate is perhaps more selective about what she chooses to call a narrative, and whether even a prescriptive work such as Dukas LApprenti Sorcier can truly portray a sequence of events in any meaningful way. Abbates theory takes after Barthes who sees narrative as two dimensional, consisting of both the representation and all backward or forward reference. Her main problem is stated emphatically: does music have a past tense?. Backward references such as roger went to yellow three are not semantically possible in musical terms. Abbate does suggest forms of temporal reference however. These references take musical elements as historically grounded referent symbols. For instance, the C major 7th fanfare discussed refers to all past fanfare music, as well as any music that makes rhetorical use of the dominant 7th preparation. In addition, if we are to consider the 21st century listener, any associations in music history following the piece can be taken into account. The dependency is then upon who, the individuals well of historic association, and the awareness of any such references in the musical context. Does music have a past tense? is the question that intends to explicate the limited way in which music may narrate. Abbate prefers to indicate ways in which music cannot be analogous to narrator, implicitly providing a negative definition of what may be possible. It is not indicated which specific features of music may be responsible for associations, rather all music consists of a web of associations which may be narrative or not. For instance the Dominant 7th chord described may be interpreted as narrative, teleological, or a purely abstract musical content. If all musical features, or a specific selection of them can imply narrative reference, then it is almost entirely dependant on who is willing to read them in this way.

Carolyn Abbate, What the Sorcerer Said, 19th-Century Music, Vol. 12, No. 3, (1989), 221-230 5 ibid. and Jean-Jacques Nattiez and Katharine Ellis, Can One Speak of Narrativity in Music?, Journal of the Royal Musical Association, (1990), 240-257
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Nattiez approach to the issue of narrative is the most rigorous and scientific.6 Firstly he is most specific in his definition of what narrative/narration must consist of. He sets narrative apart from any other linguistic or semiological analogy. Stories only exist where existents and events occur; events are distinguishable in linear time. In music, although the lack of specificity is apparent, there is precedent in literature for certain information to be left implicit, allowing for listener invention and free association. A story is constructed by selective cognizance, either by causally linking real life or historical occurrences, or by considering a musical performance in this framework. Nattiez considers three aspects of music that can represent narrative: spatiotemporal, kinetic and affective. Again this reflects what is demonstrated by Abbate and Newcomb, that the willing listener can interpret certain structural elements in order to resemble a simple narrative. His structural points are substantiated however with an interesting experiment, involving schoolchildren between the ages of 11-14. Children listened to Dukas Sorcerers Apprentice and were asked to write down what story the music was telling. The reconstructed narratives were then cross-compared to see what common elements were shared, and to what extent they derived from the music. Although the use of children is aimed at producing a universally applicable result, the experimental method is slightly problematic. Firstly children in this age group need to be considered carefully; it is too easy to treat children as a blank slate, with minimal acculturation, and none of the bias that may be present in adult subjects. However this is not the case, by the age of ten years most infants will have developed to a near adult level of cognitive ability, and will have been exposed to large amounts of music, in various contexts that could influence results.7 Secondly, asking a child to remember and recall musical content after two hearings of the piece could easily be the cause of the rather simplistic results observed. Finally, prompting the infant to produce a narrative may produce some highly artificial responses, particularly from children who have difficulty interpreting the specific musical cues in this way. It would be interesting to see how they might respond to a work with distinctly non-narrative aspects, the mathematical serialism of Hauer for instance. These are among the reasons why Nattiez article is not particularly aimed at serious scientific discourse. Subjects of the childrens reproduced narrative varied from war stories to tales of animals. Certain common structures were observed however, namely a large scale ternarycalm, chase and calm. Again Nattiez ideal listener is not just a child, but also any individual willing to bring such an interpretation. It is his scientific predisposition towards objective material that provides all of the results. Nattiez draws a number of conclusions from the responses particularly about the type of material that will be read, and what the listener will ignore. For instance the initial and final sections are ignored, as are final chords. There is little chance of a listener perceiving a cadential chord or interjection as analogous to speech or narration, as Abbate implies. The important materials for perceived narrative are changes in affect, or character, as discussed in Newcomb. He cannot demonstrate the viability of the thematic scheme proffered by Newcomb, and specifically states that for the children thematic identification does not occur, bracketing out any possible Wagnerian approaches. Amongst the literary analogies cited by Nattiez, the most apt is Calvinos If on a winters night traveller, narrative continuity consists of the formal aspects, discontinuity, interruptions of the flow. This provides the outline while the content remains unclear. Musical structure can and does demonstrate these features. Again it is shown that the musical features that can influence a narrative reading are only a small essence of the musical whole.

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Nattiez and Ellis, Can One Speak of Narrativity in Music? Deutsch, D. (ed), The Psychology of Music (Second Edition), London: Academic Press, (1999)

In all of the cases discussed, the objective musical features behind the listeners narrative interpretation have been shown to be simplistic compared to features valued by modern analysis. In Nattiez experiment, the children ages 11-14 respond to the most basic of objective features in the sorcerers apprentice; the large scale ternary, and tempo differences. A majority of the musical detail, tonality and melodic character, has only the subtlest effect on their narrative interpretation. The same is true of Newcombs ideal listener, whose narrative derives from change in affect, and formal excursion. The indication is that for music to be conducive to narrative interpretation, it need only consist of the minimum affective material. This is best exemplified in modern film scores, which may be structurally self-sufficient, but only retain an essence of the narrative content that they support. Stravinskys firebird has a beginning, middle, and spectacular end. This essay has described theoretically the theoretical listeners who can construct such a musical narrative, alongside the simplistic configurations of affective material required to encourage such narrative readings. If it is examined from the opposite side however, who is doing the reading may not be so crucial to these narrative readings, which can be considered by both 11-14 year olds, 19th century concert goers, and modern audiences alike. This is a somewhat unsatisfactory answer for music theorists and aestheticians however, who would be correct to complain that this theory reduces any elegant or meaningful analysis of the content to a rather pedestrian description, for the sake of a near-universally applicable picture of musical-narrative. Thankfully narrative aspects of music only act as an appendage to the larger aesthetic notion of musical interpretation.

Bibliography:

Anthony Newcomb, Once More Between Absolute and Program Music: Schumanns Second Symphony, 19th-Century Music, Vol. 7, No. 3, Essays for Joseph Kerman, (1983) 233-250 Matthew Pritchard, The moral background of the work of art: character in German musical aesthetics, 1780-1850, forthcoming in Eighteenth Century Music, 9:1 (2012) Carolyn Abbate, What the Sorcerer Said, 19th-Century Music, Vol. 12, No. 3, (1989), 221230 Jean-Jacques Nattiez and Katharine Ellis, Can One Speak of Narrativity in Music?, Journal of the Royal Musical Association, (1990), 240-257 Deutsch, D. (ed), The Psychology of Music (Second Edition), London: Academic Press, (1999) Roger Scruton. "Programme music." In Grove Music Online. Oxford Music Online, http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/subscriber/article/grove/music/22394 (accessed November 10, 2011).