The "Context" of Music: A Perspective on Musical Hermeneutics

Author: Xie Jiaxing
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2005-05-01
Features: This paper argues that there exist three layers of textual relationships in the meaning structure of music—contextual relationships: Layer 1, which is the relationship between musical material and its context, specifically the relationship between certain musical material and a particular musical work, as well as the relationship between a specific piece of music and its formal environment; Layer 2, which is the relationship between the connotation and denotation of a musical work, i.e., the relationship between a specific musical form and its aesthetic emotions; Layer 3, which is the relationship between a specific musical text and its social background, i.e., the social conceptual environment. Musical text—emotional context and musical conceptual context. With this framework, this paper comprehensively elaborates on the contextual issues of music from five parts: the theoretical foundation of the contextual concept—analytical reasoning of contemporary hermeneutics, the context in music hermeneutics—basic perspectives, tasks, and methods, the formal context of music—connotative meaning of musical form, the emotional context of music—connotative meaning of musical emotion, and the conceptual context of music—the conventional meaning of music.