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Philosophy of Music Education Challenged: Heideggerian Inspirations pp 147–167Cite as

The Phenomenology of Music: Implications for Teenage Identities and Music Education

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Part of the book series: Landscapes: the Arts, Aesthetics, and Education ((LAAE,volume 15))

Abstract

Many writings about the philosophy of music and music education have focussed on concepts of meaning, metaphor, emotions and expression, invariably from the perspective of the individual listener or composer. This essay develops an alternative, phenomenological approach grounded in the writings of Hegel, Husserl and Heidegger. On the basis of these writers’ discussions of musical being, the time of music, and its internal dialectics, we present an understanding of “style” as the primary basis for the mediation between production, musical experience and music learning. The essay suggests that music comes into presence within, and resounds, a nonconceptual and collective socio-historical world, feeding into the identity-formation of, in particular, teenagers. Through this, we offer a way of understanding why, as has often been argued, a purely conceptual music education can never be entirely satisfactory.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    For some examples of recent work in this area within the philosophy of music generally see: Koopman, and Davies (2001), Trivedi (2001), Stecker (2001), Zemach (2002), Matravers (2003), Budd (2003), Carr (2004), Kivy (2006); De Clercq (2007), Zangwill (2007). An argument in favour of the nonconceptual in musical experience, which tallies in many ways with our position here, is found in Luntley (2003). Within the philosophy of music education, texts which put the concept of musical meaning centrally, though from different perspectives include Reimer (2003); and Green (1988).

  2. 2.

    Hegel’s Aesthetics: Lectures on Fine Art was published in 1835, 4 years after his death. It was later revised and expanded to include lectures that he had given in 1823, 1826 and 1829, and then republished in 1842. The Oxford edition, translated by Knox in 1975, is divided into two volumes which are through numbered. The first volume begins with a general introduction to the three parts (pp. 1–90), followed by the first two of these parts. Volume 2 begins with an introduction to the third part (pp. 613–620), which contains the section on music (pp. 880–958).

  3. 3.

    There is a detailed discussion of Hegel’s phenomenology in relation to musical experience in Green (1988), which differs slightly regarding the extent to which Hegel allows music’s objective status.

  4. 4.

    For another account of Husserl’s theory of time with reference to music see Clifton (1983).

  5. 5.

    Smith (2006: 231–33), gave an alternative account of Husserl’s theory of musical time; as did Clifton at greater length in the first part of his Music as Heard (1983).

  6. 6.

    L. B. Meyer’s music theory is grounded in a similar idea of melodic ‘implication’ to Husserl’s ‘protention’ (see especially Meyer 1956, 1973).

  7. 7.

    John Silkin uses the word “haeceity” to refer to “thisness” in poetry, by which term he means a similar “coming into presence” as Heidegger (1979: 56).

  8. 8.

    L. B. Meyer was probably the first music theorist to place such importance on style. See (1956, 1967, 1973).

  9. 9.

    See also Luntley 2003 on this topic.

  10. 10.

    For some examples see: Becker (1963), De Nora (2000, 2003), Frith (1978), Green (1988), Hennion (2003), Leppert and McClary (1987), Martin (1995), Shepherd et al. (1977), Small (1977), Willis (1978), Wright (2012a, b).

  11. 11.

    Bowie (2007) presents a profound philosophical argument as to why music might be able to transcend modernism’s challenge to the limits of language. An interesting application of Heideggerian thought to music education, this time in relation to composition, is to be found in Naughton (2012); and a discussion of the importance of the processes of musical engagement in relation to Heidegger’s thinking and music education is provided in Lines (2005).

  12. 12.

    Both the necessity and the vagary of the preconceptual world are illuminated by the ideas of ‘God’ in Christian theology, and ‘Tao’. See Lao Tzu (1963), especially paragraph XXI, p. 78 and XXV, p. 82.

  13. 13.

    Gibson (1986) used the term ‘affords’ to mean the possibilities that anything offers to interpretation. This has been applied to music notably by Moore (2002), De Nora (2000) and Clarke (2004).

  14. 14.

    On the drumming phenomenon, see Green (2008: 48–9). For some examples of teenagers’ listening habits see Hargreaves and North (1997, 1999).

  15. 15.

    It could well be argued that Kant’s idea of ‘universal subjectivity validity’ is equivalent to Heidegger’s ‘world’.

  16. 16.

    A few examples of practical work with teachers and students include: Abrahams et al. (2011), Andrews (2013), Baker (2013), Baker and Green (2013), Chua (2013a, b), Chua and Ho (2013a, b), Costes-Onish (2013), D’Amore (2011), Feichas (2010), Gower (2012), Green (2008, 2014), Ho (2013a, b), Jeanneret et al. (2011), Karlsen (2010), Lebler (2007, 2008), O’Neill and Bespflug (2012), Price (2005, 2006), Wright (2011, 2012a, b).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Musical Research, School of Advanced Studies, University of London, London, UK

    Charles Ford

  2. Institute of Education, University of London, London, UK

    Lucy Green

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  1. Charles Ford
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Correspondence to Charles Ford .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Dept. of Educ., Aarhus University, Copenhagen, Denmark

    Frederik Pio

  2. Norwegian Academy of Music, Oslo, Norway

    Øivind Varkøy

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Ford, C., Green, L. (2015). The Phenomenology of Music: Implications for Teenage Identities and Music Education. In: Pio, F., Varkøy, Ø. (eds) Philosophy of Music Education Challenged: Heideggerian Inspirations. Landscapes: the Arts, Aesthetics, and Education, vol 15. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-9319-3_9

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