Schoenberg, Wittgenstein and the Vienna Circle

In 2006, Schoenberg, Wittgenstein, and the Vienna Circle received a Lewis Lockwood Award (Finalist) from the American Musicological Society, for outstanding new books on musicological topics.
This study examines relativistic aspects of Arnold Schoenberg's harmonic and aesthetic theories in the light of a framework of ideas presented in the early writings of Ludwig Wittgenstein, the logician, philosopher of language, and Schoenberg's contemporary and Austrian compatriot. The author has identified correspondences between the writings of Schoenberg, the early Wittgenstein (the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, in particular), and the Vienna Circle of philosophers, on a wide range of topics and themes. Issues discussed include the nature and limits of language, musical universals, theoretical conventionalism, word-to-world correspondence in language, the need for a fact- and comparison-based approach to art criticism, and the nature of music-theoretical formalism and mathematical modeling. Schoenberg and Wittgenstein are shown to have shared a vision that is remarkable for its uniformity and balance, one that points toward the reconciliation of the positivist/relativist dualism that has dominated recent discourse in music theory. Contrary to earlier accounts of Schoenberg's harmonic and aesthetic relativism, this study identifies a solid epistemological core underlying his thought, a view that was very much in step with Wittgenstein and the Vienna Circle, and thereby with the most vigorous and pivotal developments in early twentieth century intellectual history.

Autorentext

The Author: Canadian composer/musicologist James Wright has taught at Wilfrid Laurier University, McGill University, the University of Ottawa, and Carleton University, where he currently teaches in the School for Studies in Art and Culture. In 2002, his Ph.D. dissertation on Schoenberg and Wittgenstein was awarded the Governor General's Gold Medal, the first time in McGill University's history that this distinction has been conferred upon a musicologist.

Klappentext

In 2006, Schoenberg, Wittgenstein, and the Vienna Circle received a Lewis Lockwood Award (Finalist) from the American Musicological Society, for outstanding new books on musicological topics. This study examines relativistic aspects of Arnold Schoenberg's harmonic and aesthetic theories in the light of a framework of ideas presented in the early writings of Ludwig Wittgenstein, the logician, philosopher of language, and Schoenberg's contemporary and Austrian compatriot. The author has identified correspondences between the writings of Schoenberg, the early Wittgenstein (the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, in particular), and the Vienna Circle of philosophers, on a wide range of topics and themes. Issues discussed include the nature and limits of language, musical universals, theoretical conventionalism, word-to-world correspondence in language, the need for a fact- and comparison-based approach to art criticism, and the nature of music-theoretical formalism and mathematical modeling. Schoenberg and Wittgenstein are shown to have shared a vision that is remarkable for its uniformity and balance, one that points toward the reconciliation of the positivist/relativist dualism that has dominated recent discourse in music theory. Contrary to earlier accounts of Schoenberg's harmonic and aesthetic relativism, this study identifies a solid epistemological core underlying his thought, a view that was very much in step with Wittgenstein and the Vienna Circle, and thereby with the most vigorous and pivotal developments in early twentieth century intellectual history.

Inhalt
Contents: Musicology Music theory Intellectual history Twentieth century Harmony Aesthetics Dissonance Philosophy Analytic philosophy Vienna Vienna Circle Epistemology Relativism Universals Conventionalism Formalism Logical positivism Logical empiricism Mathematical modeling Set theory Twelve-tone theory Serialism Is/ought dichotomy Synthetic/analytic distinction Linguistic turn Tautology Constructivism.