Musical Times Publications Ltd.

Fact and Value in Contemporary Scholarship

Author(s): Margaret Bent
Source: The Musical Times, Vol. 127, No. 1716 (Feb., 1986), pp. 85-89
Published by: Musical Times Publications Ltd.
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/964562
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require alternative fingerings for certain notes. The alto is
the rarestmember of the family (I know of only three in
Britain).It was the firstto deferto a valvedsubstitute,having
lastedno more than ten years. Commentatorsof the period
describedits tone as pitiful andits intonationas worse. The
one used in the London Ophicleide Ensemble (made by
Halari, the inventor)is a lovely instrument, in every way
as agile and responsive as its brothers.
It is unlikelythatquintetsof keyedbrasswereeverformed
in the Victorianperiod. They came into being beforethere
was such a thing as formal band instrumentation. If a band-
mastercould not find a bassoon, an ophicleide or a serpent
would do. It has been suggested that the high tessituraof
early American bands and the prevalence of the E flat bugle
pointedto its assumptionof the E flat clarinet'srole. Never-
theless, greatthings were expected of the instrumentsand
players.Jullien had a favouriteophicleide virtuoso whom
he used to import from France. A number of American keyed
bugle players became internationally known, travelling the
Continent, attracting compositions and drawing vast audi-
ences. In the USA the keyed bugle is enjoying a revival of
interest with the enthusiasm for 19th-century martial music.
For some years the natural trumpet, cornett and sackbut
have been much performed and studied. Perhaps, with 19th-
century architecture, pre-Raphaelite painting and art
nouveau decoration and furniture respectable once more,
that period's popular music and the instruments that made
it could also engender interest.
TheLondonOphicleideEnsemble,consistingof twokeyedbuglesand
threeophicleides,will make its Londondebutat the PurcellRoom
on 17 February,whentherewill also be an opportunityto compare
thesoundof theseinstrumentswithsomeof their(alsoextinct)valved
successorslike the cornopeanand balladhorn.

Fact and Value in Contemporary

MargaretBent
'Musicology', writes Joseph Kerman, 'is
perceivedas dealingessentiallywiththe fac-
tual, the documentary,the verifiable,the
analysable,the positivistic. Musicologists
arerespectedforthe factsthey knowabout
music. They are not admired for their
insight into music as aesthetic experi-
ence.'1 Kerman argues that we should
raise the popular image of criticism; I
would like to arguehere that we owe it to
ourselves to foster a more generous view
of musicology.
It has become commonplace to label
pejorativelyas 'positivist'certainkinds of
scholarlypursuitsthatinvolvepatienceand
hardwork. But what is or was positivism?
As a late 19th-centuryphilosophy of his-
tory, it assertsan absoluteexternalreality,
from which facts of objective, scientific
statusaregatheredempiricallyby an 'inno-
cent eye'. It mandatesa separationbetween
this bedrock of certainty and the inde-
pendent interpretation of the facts so
gained. I have been labelled a positivist
myself.2 I must admit I am tempted to
takethe role of the priestwho askeda non-
believer to describe the God he couldn't
accept; after listening to the reply he
1 Musicology(London, 1985), 12
2 ibid, 116-20. Incidentally, Kerman has his facts
wrong. Thurston Dart specificallyincludedcriticism
in the postgraduatecurriculahe designedat Cambridge
and London, and I am not the first woman president
of the American Musicological Society.
Scholarship
responded:'well, if that'swhatGod is like,
I don't believe in him either'.3 The
positivistic musicologistis largelyfictive,
a straw man.
Notions of scientific certainty have
changed. Here is a view which has found
rather wide acceptance, even among so-
called positivists. I quote Karl Popper:
Theempirical basisofobjectivesciencehas
nothing'absolute' aboutit. Sciencedoesnot
reston rock-bottom. The boldstructure of
itstheoriesrises,asit were,abovea swamp.
Itislikeabuildingerected onpiles.Thepiles
aredrivendownfromaboveintotheswamp,
butnotdownto anynaturalor'given'base;
andwhenweceaseourattempts todriveour
pilesintoadeeperlayer,it is notbecausewe
havereachedfirmground.Wesimplystop
when we are satisfiedthat they are firm
enoughtocarrythestructure, atleastforthe
timebeing.4
3 I thank
Mary Lewis for this story, as also, together
with other friends and especially Ellen Rosand, for
helpful reactionsto an earlier version of this paper.
4 Karl
Popper:TheLogicof ScienztificDiscovery(New
York, 1959), 111; cited by ArthurMendel: 'Evidence
and Explanation', International
MusicologicalSociety,
viii: NewzYork1961(Kassel, 1962), ii, 2-18. Despite
some quiet qualifications, Kerman (115) alleges that
Mendel 'assumedthe roleof spokesmanforpositivistic
musicology'.
I am not concernedhere with the causal aspects of
positivism; Kerman's criticism seems to be directed
not so much at those who do proceed to an interpre-
tativestageafterapplyingthe two principaltenets,but
ratherat certaintypesof work:'the preparationofedi-
As to the separategatheringand inter-
pretingof material,it is often necessaryfor
some observation of data and certain
apparentlyroutinetasksto precedeothers
that more obviously engage the critical
mind. But this is as true for criticism as
it is for any other kind of scholarship.
Indeed,sometranscriptions, referencetools
and lists can be and are produced with
relatively little critical intervention. We
dependgreatlyon such workto locateour
materials,to make our selections, to save
time. But a referencetool will lend itself
to more critical use when it doesn't pre-
tend to be neutral,but ratheris shapedby
tions and studies of a documentary,archivalsort still
make up the dominant traditionin doctoraldisserta-
tions. These dissertationswith depressingfrequency
determine the type of work musicologists engage in
for the remainderof their careers'(115).
It is not necessary,for present purposes, to review
the parallelsbetween'normalscience'andclaimsabout
the 'stodgy' character (Kerman, 59) of 'traditional
musicology'.The interestedreadercan tracethem for
himselfin the discussiongeneratedby ThomasKuhn's
TheStructureof ScientificRevolutions(Chicago, 1962)
in Criticismand the Growthof Knowledge,ed. Imre
LakatosandAlanMusgrave(Cambridge,1970).In the
latter volume (p.52), Popper writes: 'The "normal"
scientist,as describedby Kuhn, hasbeen badlytaught.
He has been taught in a dogmaticspirit:he is a victim
of indoctrination.He has learneda technique which
can be applied without askingthe reasonwhy . . . all
teaching should be training and encouragementin
criticalthinking ... I believe, however, that Kuhn is
mistakenwhen he suggests that what he calls "nor-
mal" science is normal'.

85

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 an experienced,criticalscholaralertto the
need for a guidinghandand to the inevita-
bility of bias - preferablyinformed and
consciousbias. Ludwig'sRepertoriumis a
classicillustration.The betterthe scholar,
the soonerhis interactionwith the material
begins to shape it. Observation,selection
and orderingof data go togetherwith the
formation,testingandrefinementof hypo-
theses; the questions that arise, in turn,
directthe searchfor furtherevidence, the
search for a right course rather than the
rightcourseforthatinvestigation.Evidence
and interpretationare inseparable.
Even in the most traditionalsense, facts
change,as readily,andforsimilarreasons,
as criticalcommonplaceschange;we know
more music, we have more evidence in
hand.Factsarealive. Knowledgeis on the
move, dynamic and growing. How much
of it is consideredobjectivefact,hypothesis
orvaluejudgment,changesconstantly.We
can be sure that some facts will no longer
be factsnext yearor next century.Indeed,
I hope that some facts have changedsince
yesterday; why else are we here, at a
scholarlymeeting?The 'fact'thatthe Caput
mass ascribedto Dufay was by him has
given way to a new consensus that it is,
instead, an anonymous English work, a
ticket that would never have earnedit the
acclaimthatit enjoyedwhile it wasthought
to be by Dufay. Much thatwas built upon
that certainty must now be reassessed,
includingthe attributionof otherworksto
Dufayon stylisticgrounds.Most suchfacts
are hypotheses, based on data of more or
less compellingqualityandquantity.Many
of them are apparently so secure that
change is almost inconceivable. But we
know that some of them, like Caput,will
be turned on their heads, and experience
teachesus that we would be unwise to pre-
dict which of our current'hard'facts will
go. We may disagree in individual cases
aboutwhereto drawthe line between'rela-
tively hardfacts and relativelydisputable
interpretations'.But as IsaiahBerlin con-
tinued:
Wedodistinguishfacts,notindeedfromthe
valuations
thatenterintotheirverytexture,
but frominterpretations of them;the border-
line ... has, no doubt,alwaysbeenwide and
vague; it may be a shifting frontier, more
distinct in some terrainsthan in others;but
unlesswe knowwhere,withincertainlimits,
it lies, we fail to understand descriptive
languagealtogether.5
The new chronology of the Bach cantatas
5 in Historical
Inlevitability,reprintedin Patrick L.
Gardiner:Theoriesof History:Readingsfrom Classical
andContemporary Sources(Glencoe,Ill., 1959),324 - 5
hasunseatedSpitta's.Someof Stravinsky's
claims about the genesis of his works have
been calledin question.New datesfor the
initialdraftingandconceptionof manylate
works by Mozart have upset our beloved
Kochelnumbers.EinsteinjudgedKochel's
chronology to be insufficiently critical and
made substantialrevisions. But when he
wrote, for example,that the first theme of
Mozart'slast piano concerto, K595, com-
pleted in January1791, 'has the resigned
cheerfulness that comes from the know-
ledge thatthis is the last spring',6he could
not have forseen that Tyson would find
reasonto suggestthatthe essentialsof that
movement were already drafted in the sum-
mer of 1788, along with the three great
symphonies.7 These are dramatic cases
where new 'facts' with extensive biograph-
ical and critical consequences have super-
seded older facts that seemed secure enough
in their own time. Triumphs of positivism?
Surely not. They are simply good scholar-
ship, drawing on all available relevant
evidence. That the evidence includes docu-
mentation, handwriting and watermarks
does not render this or any other investiga-
6l ozart (London, 1945), 314 -15
'The Mozart Fragments', JAMS, xxxiv (1981),
502- 5

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86

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tion positivistic in approach;thus to con-
fuse methodandsubstancewouldbe a most
uncritical position. Nor are they better
scholarshipjustbecausethey providespec-
tacular results about well-known music;
scholarship is not judged only by such
criteria. It requires a little experience to
discernthe qualityof interactionbetween
evidence,selectionandjudgmentsthatmay
lie behind an archivally-basedarticle, an
edition or a bibliographical catalogue.
Scholarswho should know better may try
to suspend their criticalfacultiesfor such
'menial'tasks. It is hardlysurprisingthat
this attitude positively encourages bad
scholarship.
Relativist historians, such as E.H.
Carr,8 pay lip-service to the 'duty of
accuracy',of checkingfacts, while permit-
ting the historianto rely for them on his
'auxiliary'sciences, archivalwork, biblio-
graphy, paleography.Facts so conceived
become the lower level of a positivistic
hierarchywhoseupperlevelis criticalinter-
pretation.The scholarswho providethese
facts are usually readyto admit their slip-
pery status - more so than are those who
makeuse of them as mereappendages,iso-
latedfromthe textureof the argumentthat
produced them. It is the anti-positivist
historianswho disdain the fact-gathering
process while trusting its results. This,
paradoxically,placesthem in the position
of subscribingto the twin tenets of posi-
tivism:factualcertainty,andseparationbe-
tween evidence and interpretation.9A
caricatureof this positionwould see a divi-
sion of labourin which critics in Valhalla
exercise interesting, living judgments of
value upon dull, dead facts and artefacts
thatNibelungmusicologistshaveprovided.
8 What is History? (London, 1961), 10-11. Rose
RosengardSubotnikpleadsfor a similarexemptionin
'Musicology and Criticism', Musicologyin the 1980s,
ed. D. Kern Holoman and Claude V. Palisca (New
York, 1982), 154: 'What I do argue is that the kinds
of hardworkdemandedby good criticismaredifferent
from those requiredby empiricalresearch.What I do
challengeis the inhumandemandthatthe criticmaster
. . not only the skills ... of his own craft but also
those of empiricist musicology ... in orderto assure
his work a degree of certaintythat is neither relevant
to criticism nor intellectually attainable'.In arguing
here that the processes regardedby Carr, Kerman,
Subotnik and others as separable from criticism,
broadlydefined,are in fact centralto it and it to them,
I uphold a musicology, broadlydefined, that is more
widely practisedand more often realizedthan either
Kerman or Subotnik admit.
9 Carr,p.30, surely does not go far enough in argu-
ing that history 'is a continuousprocessof interaction
between the historian and his facts'; he has already
canonizedtheir separationas raw material,and there-
fore their status both as fixed and as independentof
interpretation.
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Is it not time that we confined the use of
'positivism' to its proper and specific
meanings?
Performers, analysts and editors can
address the artworkdirectly without the
mediationof verbalcommentary.Edward
Conewritesthat'theperformancecriticizes
the composition',10David Lewin that 'the
only complete, faithful and properlypre-
sented analyses of a piece are ... perfor-
mances'.11 The art historian is not
expected to paint, though some do. But
becauseof the complex collaborationthat
makesmusic happen,most scholarlywork
gainsauthorityfroma basisin skillsof note
manipulation and performance. Music
critics and analystswho dissociate them-
selves from the processby which musical
scores are arrivedat may find themselves
as vulnerable as the non-performing
scholar.
If a performance 'criticizes' a work, so
does an edition. Making a good edition is
essentially an act of criticism that engages
centrally with the musical material at all
levels, large and small. It underlies and
powerfully shapes performance, study,
analysis and verbal criticism. These and
othercriticalactivitiesin turnfeed into the
criticalprocessthatshouldproducethe edi-
tion. Given the special nature of musical
material,musical criticism does not need
to be literaryin orderto be humane. But
in his capacityas a teacherand communi-
cator, the critic must use words, and as
scholars we all teach and communicate.
While some level of music criticismis pos-
siblewithoutsourcecriticism,sourcecriti-
cism can only be done well when it em-
bodies music criticism. It may not show.
It may not be spelt out verbally. But the
term 'critical edition' should be taken
seriously;it must not be assumedto mean
'uncritical edition'.
I have chosen to emphasizeediting and
textual criticism here partlybecausethey
are among the most frequentlymaligned
activitiesof musicologists.To denythe pro-
per role of criticismin their common pro-
cess is to disarm criticism of some of its
most powerful potential. Surely no-one
seriously involved with editing music of
any period reallybelieves any longer that
the result can be objective or neutral, or
that it is possible to present anything 'as
10 'The Authorityof Music Criticism',JAMS, xxxiv
(1981), 7, and passim;he also gives the complementary
aphorism:'the compositioncriticizesthe performance'.
11 'Behind the
Beyond', Perspectives of New Music, vii
(1969), 63 n.4
it is in the original', 'to tell it as it was'.
That does not deter us from trying to get
as close as we can to the intentionsbehind
ourwrittensources,evenknowingthatper-
fection is ultimatelyunattainable.Trying
to be morefaithfulto the music thanto the
manuscriptscan producean editionwhich
correspondsto no surviving manuscript,
an appreciationof French Baroquemusic
that may look unpromising on paper, or
a reconstruction of an orally transmitted
repertory remote in time or place. We may
talk about right and wrong editorial deci-
sions, knowing that these are relative, that
they reflect merely a consensus of stylistic
knowledge achieved through the editor's
own experience and that of his predecessors
and contemporaries. We fully expect that
those who come after will see it from a dif-
ferent perspective. An edition can embody,
as descriptive prose cannot, the whole
gamut of judgments ranging from authen-
tic pieces to individual notes. I regard much
of my own and my colleagues' best think-
ing as being of this kind, not necessarily
embodied in prose, let alone in narrative
history. For not all musicologists who deal
with old music do so necessarily with the
concerns and orientation of a historian. The
new Josquin edition will be an act of co-
operative criticism in all matters from
authenticity of pieces and versions down
to the presentation of details. It will be
much more than a correction of the old edi-
tion, and will surely stimulate more debate
than any conceivable piece of verbal
criticism about Josquin. Editors share with
analysts a hands-on concern for every note.
Good musical editing demands a higher
level of integration of data and judgment
than almost anything else we do.
But if it is not neutral or objective, neither
is it unilaterally subjective. The decon-
structionist critic Stanley Fish expresses the
extreme subjective position thus: 'Rather
than restoring or recovering texts I am in
the business of making texts and of teaching
others to make them'. Fortunately, this has
not found much resonance as a model for
scholarly musical criticism. Let us have
reconstruction, not deconstruction. As
Helen Gardner put it:12
The subjectivismandrelativismthataccepts
any and every readingof a text as equally
valid,anddeclaresreadingto be the personal
importationof meaninginto texts, removes
criticismfromallkindsof intellectualenquiry
. . . The reader,occupied in 'makingtexts'
12
quoted by Helen Gardner: In Defence of the
Imagination(Cambridge,Mass., 1982), 3; her own
response is taken from pp'.20, 25
87
 rather than reading them has mislaid . . .
intellectualcuriosity, the desire to enlarge
his being by learningaboutsomethingother
than himself.
This does not deny the inevitable and
indeed desirableimaginativepresence of
the scholar-criticin his work. Imagination
is crucialto goodscholarship,but imagina-
tion andlearningmustalwaysactas mutual
controls on each other; learning is a
dynamicand shifting consensus of know-
ledge that includes aesthetic and musical
experienceas well as datain the traditional
sense.Continuingcollaborationanddebate
are a scholar's most effective safeguards
againstidiosyncrasy.Criticismwill advance
as scholarshipby strengtheningits input
to all musical scholarship,analytical,his-
torical, editorial and so on. Musically
informedtextualcriticismis a foundation
thatgovernseverythingbuilt upon it - the
piles in the swamp.
Fact andvalue, evidenceandinterpreta-
tion are inseparable. It follows that the
natureof aninvestigationdoesnot predeter-
mineits quality.High-andlow-levelteach-
ing and study are as possible in aesthetics
as they are in notation, in medieval as in
19th-centurystudies. Both Dahlhausand
Kermanhave slanted their metacriticism
towards post-medieval art music in the
West, and it has been suggestedthat early
musiclendsitselfless well thanlaterreper-
tories to certainkinds of critical confron-
tation. But even within the Westerntradi-
tion, the older repertoriesare precisely
those where we have most to learn, and
wherecriticalengagement,both for estab-
lishingmusicaltextsandfortheiraesthetic
andcontextualevaluation,aremosturgent.
How much moreshouldthose of us whose
experienceis predominantlyin Westernart
music be humbled by the equivalent
challengeof worldwide,popularand very
old musics?We have much to learn from
ethnomusicologywhen we face music we
think of as 'ours', despite distanceof time
and culture.
A criticalprogrammeoughtto be capable
of extensionfrommoreto less familiarter-
ritory if it is to have power to tell us
anything new about repertories nearer
home. To workonly with certifiedmaster-
pieces may dull the range of our critical
questioning.Mime wastedhis opportunity
to questionthe Wandererbecausehe knew
the answersalready;in turn he got caught
by being unable to answer the one ques-
tion thathe shouldhaveasked.Or, as a col-
league put it:13 'when did you learn
13 ProfessorJ. Marion Levy, Princeton University
anything from someone who agreedwith
you?'.The aestheticassumptionsunderly-
ing our predeterminedcanon of master-
piecesderivefromthe sameclear-eyedcer-
tainty that producedpositivism;we keep
the masterpieceswhile rejecting,on various
grounds,the ideologythatso definedthem.
While much teaching necessarilycentres
on this canon, we should not allow our
researchto be moulded by what we feel
appropriateto the classroom.The canon
hasgrownto includeolderandnewermusic
than it did 20 years ago, but it will grow
furtheronly if we continue to encourage
ventures into the unknown and the less
known, venturesundertakenwithout cer-
tainty of what we will find, and without
certaintythatthey will be rewardedwithin
our existingrangeof aestheticexperience.
It is not only the concept and canon of
masterpiecesbut the rangeof our aesthetic
capacity that we should seek to stretch
beyond what we and our students already
knowandlike. The messagewasembodied
in an old Guinness advertisement: 'I
haven't tried it because I don't like it'.
We should of course keep our eyes on
the broaderquestionswhile we addressthe
narrowones, andattendto the patentneed
for better communicationabout what we
do, evento peersforwhomwe hadassumed

-
- r~7~ I ~I~ET rI 'IV-,q-
--'I
si i; s

Erik Tomark ourassociation

with
Bergman thisimportant
andsenior
figure
ofScandinavian we
music,
"Oneofthemostimportant andinteresting shallbemaking
available
many
composersalivetoday... inventive, ofhismostsignificant
scores.
&compelling"WASHINGTON
imaginative POST
PUBLICATIONS
BorninFinland in1911.Studied atSibelius INPREPARATION
Academy (wherehelaterbecameProfessor of Borealis
2 pianos&perc.
Composition)&withHeinz Tiessen,Berlin
& 19mins
Duration:
WladimirVogel,Ascona.Early reputation score
Performing
ViolinConcerto
basedona seriesofremarkable choral
works. violin
&orch.
Hisstyleis basedona highlypersonal& Duration:
21mins
colourful
response to certain
aspectsofserial score
Study
technique&hismusicdisplays evidenceofhis
extensive
travels, inunusual
interest musical
instruments&hisstudyoftherootsof WorksintheFazer
and
music. Pan distributed
catalogues
European intheUK andselected
Otherimportant compositionsinclude territories
only.
orchestral,
chamber, vocal&instrumentalworks.
l i
..::' l{i
Novello
Enquiries: Promotion 8 Lower
Department, JamesSt,London,
W1R4DN
w
Tel:01-734
8080Ext203612619 :S~i

88

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apologiato be unnecessary.There is plenty
of room for improvement.Much editing,
for example, is less critical than it ought
to be. Many so-calledcriticaleditions are
indeed neithervery criticalnor very inter-
esting. But are they worse than bad prose
criticismexcept in being moredangerous?
For seriousmusic-criticalerrorsare made
on the basis of insufficiently critical edi-
tions. Our collectivecriticalresponsibility
includes the whole spectrum of critical
judgments. Nothing will improve if we
encouragea climate of thought in which
textualcriticismis seen as a jobfor second-
ratetalents.t4Certainlywe also need more
first-ratecritical writing about music, as
well as continuingexplorationof music in
its cultural and intellectual context. But
1 JeromeJ. McGann: A Critiqueof ModernTextual
Criticism (Chicago, 1983), writes (2): 'At certain times
... the traditional introductory guides will . . . seem
. . . problematic, and the field will suddenly erupt with
new vigor and activity. This is knowledge fighting for
its life; . . . scholars are . . . busy exploring the fault
lines of what they already know and experimenting
with new models and ideas ... This is partly why the
field is so interesting at the moment, and why it is being
worked by so many interesting minds ... [with so
much] innovative and exploratory worx . .. Textual
criticism is in the process ofreconceiving its discipline'.
Statements such as this from disciplines outside music
should help to counter the notion that musicology can
be rescued from its backward status only by emulating
the kind of criticism that is, in effect, performed as
autopsy on uncritical editions.
Erik Bergman:
Solveig von Schoultz
The Finnish composer Erik Bergman, who
is 75 later this year, visits England this
month; his wife, a poet, writes about her work
with him (translator: Jeremy Parsons).
It is naturalthat a composerand a writer
who sharetheirlives shouldexchangeideas
on texts for vocal works and should also
sometimescollaborate.My husband,Erik
Bergman,while busy on one composition,
has occasionallyaskedme to lookforsome-
thing suitableon the subjecthe hasin mind
forhis next;he hasthussavedprecioustime
and been able to concentrateon the work
in hand. I havebrowsedthroughbookson
my own shelves and others', hunted in
libraries,and come up with suggestions.
When my finds have been to his taste, as
moreoften thannot they havebeen, he has
This content downloaded from 193.144.2.35 on Tue, 20 Oct 2015 15:00:27 UTC
these are only partial, if important, res-
ponses to the goal of all musical scholar-
ship - to increase and to integrate our
understandingof music on as manyfronts
as possible. Let us not thin the definition
of musicology to what happens to be left
of musicalscholarshipaftervariouslimbs
have been amputated.
One of the saddestriftscurrentlyimped-
ing integrationis thatbetweentheoristsand
so-called'historical'musicologists.Howard
Mayer Brown has deplored the present
separationin a trainingthatwas once com-
mon to theorist-composersandto musicol-
ogists; Leo Treitler has called for integra-
tion along many lines, above all for the
confrontationandcollaborationof history
andtheory;EdwardLowinskymadean elo-
quent case for integration20 years ago,5
andI findmyselfechoingthatmessage.Let
us all listen harderto each other, without
territorial prejudice, individually and
through our societies, as colleagues and
teachers.Let us consolidateour common
groundwithoutforfeitingthe rigourof our
various specialities. Who wants inter-
disciplinary contact based on diluted
disciplines?Ourteachingencouragesus to
demonstratebreadthandrelevance,to com-
municate at many levels. But while of
15 'Character and Purposes of American Musicology:
a Reply to Joseph Kerman', JAMS, xviii (1965),
222-34
Words and Music
selected and combined the materialas it
suited him.
An interesting job - and, in its way,
creative. Often it has been a matter of
exploringtwo lines of investigationwhich
illuminatedifferentsidesof his personality.
As regardshis humour,one needonlythink
of his spiritual affinity with Christian
Morgenstern,his friendover manyyears.
Their subtle humour perhapsshows best
in the suite Vier Galgenlieder for speaking
chorus, but it was 'Fisches Nachtgesang'
from Bim Bam Bum that presenteda real
challengeto his powersof invention,with
its text of mute typography.Around the
onomatopoeicsounds of the male chorus
and tenor soloist its watery atmosphere
bubbles up from the seashell, flute, jews
harpand preparedpiano. I also remember
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
course welcoming the extent to which
teaching and research are mutually
enriching,we shouldnot confusethe needs
of teachingwith our specificallyscholarly
mission. Scholarshipmay be weakenedif
we discouragefromdifficultor unpopular
undertakingsinto the unknownthe young
researcherswho most need the respectand
faithof thecolleaguesuponwhomtheirsur-
vival depends. If projects described
pejorativelyas narrowratherthanapprov-
ingly as deeparesqueezedout, foundations
will be dug too shallow. As I have said
elsewhere,. the community of serious
musical scholarship is under sufficient
pressure from other musicians who are
suspicious of scholarshipand from other
scholarswho aresuspiciousof music, that
we cannot afford to exacerbate mutual
disrespect, either between our various
societiesor within any one of them. By all
meanslet us encouragehealthydiscussion
andself-criticismin the interestsof improv-
ing what we do, but not in such a way that
we erodethe fragileecology of confidence
in ourvariedand often lonely endeavours,
lest we destroythe environmentin which
fruitful musical scholarshipcan grow.
Thlisarticle is based on Margaret Bent's address,
as presidentof the American MusicologicalSociety,
to the plenary session at Vancouver last November
of the AMS, the CollegeMusic Society, the Society
for Ethnomusicology and the Society for Music
Theory.
the fun we both had one summerpicking
small ads from a randomcollection in the
newspapers that eventually became
Annonssidan/Small Ads, for male chorus
with hilarioussolo contributions.Thanks
to his work as choralconductor,Erik has
had at his disposal a laboratorywhere he
has been able to try out his ideas, burles-
que and otherwise.
The second, more important line of
investigationrunsin a differentdirection.
Although it has surely alwaysbeen there,
his inclination towards the meditative,
towards existential questions and the
silence surrounding them, has come
increasingly to the fore. He has.sought
sustenancefor these needs in the cultures
beyond ancient Greece. The first, I sup-
pose, was the RubaiyatdfOmarKhayyam
89