Klarinet Archive - Posting 000536.txt from 1997/08

From: Roger Shilcock <roger.shilcock@-----.uk>
Subj: Kant etc.
Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 16:50:37 -0400

It seems to me that intelligible and communicable aesthetic judgements
depend on:
Common linguistic concepts;
Common cultural heritage;
common (innate?) learning processes;
common innate propensities
in varying and indeterminate (indeterminable?)proportions. I'm not
addressing what I mean by "common" - i'ts too big.
Given this, the problem with the use of terms such as "dark" and "light"
to describe musical sounds is that they are borrowed from a primary realm
of use where their usage is clear but not necessarily very informative, i.
e., the description of visual experiences. Their use to describe sounds is
secondary and metaphorical and hence likely to suffer some redefinition
every
time they are used. There *ought*, I suppose, to be summarizing
adjectives
meaning things like, "the lower even harmonics are prominent", or "there's
a bit of unwanted white noise contributing here", but they don't seem to
exist - hence, the usages Dan L. is always castigating.
Roger Shilcock