Ferrara, Chapter 3 "Husserl's Phenomenology"

Ferrara, Chapter 3 "Husserl's Phenomenology"

Summary

Edmund Husserl was a 19th century philosopher who sought to provide a method for verifiable examination of the 'immediate, conscious' experience. By scrutinizing, or becoming aware of, consciousness, one's essential characteristics can be explored... a purification of the character, if you will. The method seeks the 'rigor' of science to examine the basics of knowledge, during which one suspends belief in theories and concepts, to directly perceive what is given.

Husserl's early phenomenology (1896-1905) was in partial response to psychologism. Psychologism was a popular 19th century philosophical stance which centered man's 'subjective mind' in study, and reduced all operations in life to psychological laws. Husserl contended that science must move "back to the things themselves", and abandon philosophical prejudices and abstractions. His focus is on things of consciousness, not of consciousness.

Later, the philosopher suggests by achieving self-awareness for oneself, one is now aware of what is non-self. Therefore, the subject makes meaning possible through being conscious.

In Husserl's method, he describes temporality in terms of Internal Time Consciousness. An analogy to a comet is used, where the tail, in comparison to music, is a retained melody, or past (retention). The present is the head of the comet. The future, or anticipation where the comet or melody may be heading, is protention. Husserl prioritizes the present, as both the past and future are developed from it.

A central tactic of phenomenological method is phenomenological reduction, of which there are two stages. The first is transcendental reduction. The 'natural attitude', or our faith in the appearance and existence of things, is systematically suspended. Sparing consciousness makes inspection possible. The second stage, eidetic reduction, is to "discover universal knowledge about the intentional structure  of [transcendental reduction]", or rather, move to the essence of an object.

In Crisis, a situation in which Husserl asserts the west is in due to failed objectivism, the author develops his sense of community. There is a symbiotic relationship between the individual and his/her world.  One informs the other, and vice-versa.

Reaction

20th century composers reacted against the tonal language which solidified and peaked in the century before; Debussy devoted his career to escaping the shadow of Wagner. Such reaction to predecessors occurs in all art forms, at all converging times, and apparently in philosophy. Debussy is to Wagner as Phenomenology is to Psychologism, both seek to separate themselves from their history, but subject their methods to the techniques of the past, by way of organizational forms and a general attempt at greatness.

Husserl's method seems smart, and when applied to music, seems to be a nice, and natural outgrowth of formal analysis. Music is sound, and sound happens, thus sound in time. What is disconcerting is Husserl's lack of comprehensiveness and conviction. He never successfully balanced idealism and realism, and towards the end of his career, he regressed towards psychologism. Why??

Formal Analysis of a Recorded Work

Formal Analysis of a Recorded Work

Up for observation is "A Day in the Life" by The Beatles. I will begin with a study of it's structure, and then a dissection of certain production aspects not commonly discussed. The graphs you will see were created for another class, but the discussion is entirely original.

The overall form of "A Day in the Life" is ABA, or ternary form. John Lennon composed the A section, and asked Paul to write a B section. Paul's section was an unfinished song fragment, conceived independent of "A Day in the Life" (The Beatles Anthology). The duo decided it was of interesting contrast and included it. The A section is in G major/E minor (it's rather ambiguous), and, following a 10 bar orchestral swell, lands on E major for the B section. The song's meter is 4/4, with a few one-measure instances of 2/4. The A section can be subdivided into AAAB, then C - bridge, DD (B section), E (2nd  bridge), AB (return of A section), and the coda out (F?).

Outside of musical transciption lies an area not often explored academically, the production techniques of a recorded work. A most fundamental understanding comes from a sound source(s) versus time graph, shown below:

Using a method defined by William Moylan, sound sources (instruments, or set of instruments) are graphed according to their presence in a recorded work. The data extrapolated is interesting in and of itself, arrangement-wise and beyond, but can also lead into other examinations, such as stereo location of sources versus time. 

While not obvious in a casual or passive listening session, stereo location quite often changes during a recorded work. Moylan points out in his book "Understanding and Crafting the Mix" that such changes most often occur at structural points, not during a section of music. Below is a multi-tiered graph of the stereo location of sources versus time in "A Day in the Life":

Time runs along the Y-Axis, and along the X-Axis is Left, Center and Right. Sources are distinguished by color, and width (in this graph, the height of the shape). Width refers to the horizontal space a source occupies in the stereo image. Outside of the loudspeakers exists a 15 degree extension of the image, where sources seems to appear in sometimes.

Only two of the eight sources remain in the same space throughout the song, the drums and McCartney's vocals. Lennon's vocal throughout the second and third verse moves from more right in the image to all the way left at the entrance of the first bridge. A similar, quick shift in stereo location happens in the bridges with the orchestral overdub. The orchestra begins positioned on one side, and throughout the bridges, moves gradually in the opposite direction, and eventually takes up the entire image before it quickly exits. Other sources, like the acoustic guitar and shaker flip from the left to right side from the end of the third verse, to the return of the A section (verse 4).

Meta-critique

Structure, sources versus time, and stereo location are all very interesting. They are, however, only pieces to the puzzle. These "facts" are devoid of any intent or effect the music has on us. What does it mean to the listener that Lennon's vocal moves throughout the stereo image? It could be an artistic decision; it's an interesting sonic effect. It could also be a technical workaround. The REDD consoles at Abbey Road had a limited number of stereo panning channels (2, if I remember correctly- courtesy of Recording the Beatles), so the mix engineer might be preparing for an overdub to enter- like the orchestral dub in the bridge.

A complete understanding of a work requires multiple methods of analysis, which support and augment each other. Syntax relates and informs sound-in-time, and vice versa; the same goes with referential meaning.

A critique of my graphs is that my notation can be imprecise at times. For instance, in the sound sources versus time graph, the dotted lines I drew for the ride cymbal don't precisely account for each hit, in each measure. The markings give you an impression of when the cymbal is hit. Such detail isn't particularly necessary in the graph, but it's non-correspondence may be misleading to some.

Gebauer/Wulf, “Mimesis”

Gebauer/Wulf, "Mimesis"

Summary

There are three dimensions to the historically complex concept of mimesis, in pre-Platonic times. They are imitation, representation and expression. These applied to the whole world, including the "extraaesthetic". Plato and Aristotle defined them in the context of literature, art and music. 

Plato wrote in Republic that mimesis is most important in education. Through emulation of models, a young person assimilates themself to a standard, "proper" way of being. Later, in the third book of the Republic, Plato further defines mimesis' role in education (found under 'Similarity,  Imitation, Education' in the article). The author writes "[s]ince young people learn essentially through imitation... [they] should be shielded from everything that might interfere with their ability to fulfill tasks later entrusted to them by the state" (p. 33). Plato advocated a sort of censorship, where youth could only be exposed to good, wholesome values (through writing, music). Death and the underworld would not educate future "guardians" (students) in "courage, gallantry, and strength," (p. 33). Interestingly, Plato further defines some musical scales (dorian, phyrigian), instruments (lyre, cithara) and some rhythms unsuitable for his idealized state.

With respect to the arts, Plato defined mimesis, or imitation as the capacity to produce images. Plato's continuance appearance as mimesis is continued later in the article under 'Appearance and Illusion'.  A painter is likened to God, in that they both produce phenomena. "Painters and poets... are more similar to God than to the craftsman," Plato relates. "Artistic representation is ... the appearance of something phenomenal," (p. 38).

Else, in relation to dance, emphasizes three distinctions to mimesis, being:

1. Miming- direct representation

2. Imitation - a general sense of a person by another

3. Replication - image or effigy of person or thing

The authors define the origin of mimos (mime), is which mimesis is derived from. It first appears in Sicily, designating a "recitation... delived by one person" (p. 28). The mime depicted life "as-is" the article suggests, and there characterizations tended to be more universal than individual.

Gebauer and Wulf end with a cautious message to the artist. S/he must be conscious of the "gap" between the model and image, and not get too caught up in the "phenomenal being of things".

Response

Eeek. What? 

The author, from the get-go, seems to forget to define his purpose in writing the article, or to offer a fundamental definition of mimesis. The article doesn't have a real sense of propulsion or coherency between paragraphs and thoughts. It's as if Gebauer and Wulf were brainstorming. I found the the vocabulary and structure unneccesarily dense and unclear, as if to obscure the content for reasons unknown- maybe in an attempt to sound super intellectual.

A portion I found particularly interesting was Plato's idea that an ideal state must include censored art (poetry and music) in order to maintain sound character in youth. Good material, that which promoted strength, courage, decency, was promoted. Controversial and non-idealized material was too poor an influence on young people and they couldn't handle it, Plato argued. Greek gods could not be portrayed as weak, and images of the underworld were forbidden. To some extent, this seems to parallel the conserative parties of today's politics, with warning labels and rating systems, in the name of "public interest".

 But what's up with banning modes, instruments and rhythm. What did they ever do to Plato?

Poem in October

In class, there was some interest in a frequency analysis of "Poem in October". The image below is the spectral analysis of the mp3 file. Time is the horizontal axis, frequency is vertical axis, and intensity is color (blue -no amplitude to red - peak amplitude).

For sake of comparison, here is the poem represented in the time domain:

While conceptually intriguing, a spectograph offers little insight into the feel or inflection of the speech. What is more noticeable is the amount of noise (the shades of light blue and green) in the recording, which is a combination of several factors: microphone selection, recording medium, ambient sound, and mpeg compression. Of note, such distortion lends itself to certain adjectives, some of which arose during our phenomenological discussion of the piece- warm, brown, etc.

The recording is also frequency limited. Human hearing (and hi-fidelity recordings) extend up to 20 kHz, it is the range responsible for adding 'air' or 'presence' to a sound. The bulk of Thomas' voice lies within the 1-3 kHz, which is average for a human voice (see below).

Better illustrated is the dynamics, or changes in volume, of Thomas' performance. As seen in the waveform above (Figure 2), his narrative arch rises and falls very naturally.

Ferrara, "Chapter 2: Should the method define the tasks?"

Ferrara, "Chapter 2: Should the method define the tasks?"

Summary

Should the method define the tasks, Ferrara asks. There is no doubt that each method does indeed define their task. All means of musical analysis enables one to accomplish the method, thus it's tasks. And, on a rudimentary level, success is achieved when a method's criteria are satisfied.

The author suggests a more encompassing measure of an analytical approaches' robustness. The analysis must work on multiple levels of significance, and the work should define the method, not the method define the work. Ferrara explains that "music analysis must benefit from an eclectic method that supports the disclosure of the multiplicity of levels of musical significance." He later clarifies that he does not mean to demean or challenge established methods. In fact, he states the each level of analysis is critical- particularly that phenomenology and reference would be unfounded if not for a syntactical perspective.

Entering an analysis can never be completely pure. All studies are inherently subject to one's past knowledge, or "pre-understanding". Hans-George Gadamer described this as prejudice. Man is a product of his time, and can never remove himself from it. He continues, "[o]ne's tradition is always understood in some relation to the present."

An analyst must engage a work in reference to his own time and place. While there may be some degree of importance to the composer's onto-historical world, Ferrara warns that one should not limit themselves to the composer's intention. He also adds that analysts may not be best suited to judge a contemporary work, as s/he may not be able to remove themself from their "immediate life-world".

Analyst's must also be listeners, or put themselves in a listener's shoe, so to speak. Music has an impact on those who listen to it, and one should not remove themselves from that experience. In experiencing, one engages a work as an aesthetic object... s/he enjoys the work in it's form and reference. An art object is something removed from one's appreciation. It exists until someone gives it meaning.

Phenomenology can be bifurcated into two seperate philosophical approaches: 1. Husserlian's descriptive phenomenology, known in the book as phenomenological principles and, 2. Heideggerian interpretive phenomology, referred to as hermeneutic.

Husserl believes that man discovers himself (thus his consciousness) first, then the world. Heidegger suggests the opposite, and further, that "to be historical means to be characterized by the present status of one's tradition". His philosophy is used in the study of referential meaning.

Ferrara draws a "loose" analogy between the three forms of analysis and a physical examination. Syntax is an x-ray, (supposedly) objective. Phenomenology is the actual physical examination, control with a more hands on approach. Referential meaning is the patient's history and background, which is important to understanding his/her current condition.

The author ends by noting "[p]henomenological and hermeneutic systems are able to respond to new and different questions posed by a musical work." Syntax is important in anchoring the former methods, but it's objectivity is superficial. Form is more appropriately titled 'obscured subjectivity'. The method (convential analysis) defines the work, and filters out it's sound and meaning.

Reaction

Ferrara's articulation and explanation of his eclectic method are, as usual, spot on, insightful, and well justified. His introduction of Gadamer's principle of prejudice and tradition does much to explain an analyst's position in relation to a work, and interestingly transcends music. One's prejudice, that is, the effect of their onto-historical world on their personality and views, can help to explain why people do what they do and think what they think- both positively and negatively. 

The bifurcation of art object and aesthetic object also transcended the musical realm for me. Specifically, the author's explanation of everyday items' artistic validity, in the era of modern art, was insightful. He says, "the transformation of ordinary objects into aesthetic objects, natural or man-made, relies solely on the attitude of the appreciator." I appreciate artists like Marcel Duchamp, whose readymades are subject to much controversy in artist circles.