Note † — Chapter XX · The Impasse of Musical Theory

More than forty years ago Gurney summed up the state of musical theory as follows: “When we come to actual forms, and to the startling differences of merit which the very simplest known to us present, the musical faculty defies all explanation of its action and its judgements. The only conceivable explanation indeed would be an analogy, and we know not where to look for it†”. And the work done since has added remarkably little. As he so admirably insisted, even though we confine ourselves to the responses of one individual, all general explanations of the musical effect apply equally to the ineffective, to the distressing and the delightful, to the admirable and the atrocious alike. But the same is true of all attempts to explain the effects upon us of any forms which neither represent something nor are in obvious ways serviceable. Whether they are forms seen or heard, whether they are made up of notes or of movements, of intervals of time or of images of speech, the same is true of them all.