Directing
the Music by Means of
the Instrument
Indestructibility of the Musical Statement
Freedom and
Non-Freedom of
the Interpretation
in Music
Music Creators as Wise Knowers of
the Musical Scene
The Official and
the Secret Knower
of Reality
The Technique of Conveying Truth
in Music
The music poet's deep insight into the existing human deficiencies is the reason why he has succeeded in magically producing this perfect, creative knowledge through music in his listener – regardless of the qualification of the performer.
In
the score he has instructed the musician only how to use the instrument –
in an almost mechanical manner.
The musical script he has used indeed includes the meaning, the semantics,
the musical sense, but as a script it is not at all related to the semantics
as such.
From the composer's score, therefore, the musician could glean only hints for the use of his instrument, and by implementing them in detail the musical statement resulted all by itself.
Being developed by the great poets of music, this musical script, this kind of encipherment fortunately disallowed the interpreter to seriously destroy the musical statement, or to fundamentally change it.
Given
the conventional way of writing, the mechanical reading of the musical script
rules out such risk. Likewise, due to its mechanical function, a computer
is not aware of the meaning of the data which it stores and transmits, and
there is no need for it to be so.
But still it is possible and common indeed, to transmit with its help a meaningful
message.
So, the great creators of music knew how to convey over great spans of time the knowledge contained in their sounding poetry to the listener – despite severe interpretational inadequacies.
This is not at all to say that a musician or an interpreter is not able to have such creative musical experience, too; it only means that – contrary to popular notion – while controlling the instrument as prescribed to him, he need not be able to make a deep musical experience in order to introduce a true music lover to the reality of music.
This reminds of standing before a child, wondering and becoming aware of the creative potential manifest in it, while the child's uncle, who leads it by the hand, has no sense of such wonder.
© AAR EDITION INTERNATIONAL 1982