Music and the Philosophy of the Will

Good evening, dearest of friends. On this evening we are going to discuss Music and the Will.

I have this hypothesis about Music and the Will. It is probably wrong, but I will tell it regardless. It is this: that the musical establishment, ever since the days of Wagner, has been utterly devoted to the philosophical primacy of the Will. Might I add, that this is stupid. Thus I mean to approach my hypothesis from two angles, first that there is plain evidence for this, and second that it is stupid. The former shall be dealt with by analysis of example, the latter shall be granted as being perfectly obvious following the analysis.

For a while, Richard Wagner and Friedrich Nietzsche were friends. In fact, they were friends even unto the very moment they stopped being friends, but that moment was far too late; the damage was done. Now, Nietzsche occupies a prominent place in Will-centered philosophy. On a popular basis, it is likely fair to say that he is their king, verily, their Superman. Being a member of the populace, a villainous and ignorant armchair philosopher (a vile sort of being for whom there is no excuse if he takes himself seriously), I shall run with this view. Sophistry, the villain's sincerity and the fool's jest, is the only real duty of the armchair philosopher, after all, so it is no wonder Nietzsche is so beloved by him. I shall play the fool, by the way.

Behold how I have provided an entire paragraph devoid of substance. In no way did it address anything that it was supposed to address, even freeing itself altogether from the advancement of my hypothesis, which I remind you is probably wrong. I am off to a great start. In fact, prospects are excellent for my doing the same in this paragraph, but I digress. Because of his association with Nietzsche, Wagner, the founder of what the musicologist calls Wagnerism, became associated with the primacy of the Will. Wagnerism then also found itself yoked to the Will, and Wagnerism, if I may say so, formed the ideological base for twentieth century music, in embrace or opposition, but mostly in opposition. I have decided to Will myself the right to say so, for whatever that is worth. Of course, it is not worth very much at all.

Wagnerism is known for obscene grandiosity above all else. It is known for other things, as well, like chromaticism, but I do not wish to acknowledge those things today. Some other day I will acknowledge them. Vague statements are usually more accurate than detailed statements, so I will cling tightly to vague statements, if that is all right. I will it to be all right, for whatever that is worth. Wagner is also remembered for attempting, in his long, long operas, to synthesize all the Arts in to one glorious whole, but that did not work out all right. Wagner, so I am told, only successfully composed music, whereas his libretti, costumes, sets, and the like were incompetent. I have neither read nor seen the latter three (as the verb applies), but my experiences with the former have been second rate.

I believe, then, that Wagnerism was a colossal failure, and so did many others. Tchaikovsky took no delight in Wagner, saying after the premier of Der Ring des Nibelungen that the end was comparable to being released from prison. He was probably right, as the four Ring operas take somewhere in the area of fifteen hours to stage, so they usually are spread out over three or four nights, as was the case then. The French impressionists (and their friend Satie), it might be argued, were essentially anti-Wagnerian. I am not going to argue it myself, I am merely going to say so. So was, on essentially those same unstated grounds, the Second Viennese School, which gave the world twelve-tone atonality. Really, it existed before that (a la Liszt's Bagatelle sans Tonalite), but they actually put it to extensive use. More on this later.

Recalling the hypothesis, mostly because I have forgotten about it, I say again that the twentieth century musical establishment was and still is dominated by the philosophy of the Will, which I have thus far claimed originated in Wagnerism. That is really the sum of it. The rest was just senseless babble. Wagner, then, tried to will his atmosphere (or something like that) upon his audience, and it worked on some. Mahler and Strauss, our Apostles of Wagnerism, certainly thought it was swell. By the way, a favorite phrase of mine, "The Music of the Future," is best remembered for its association with Wagner, especially in his lifetime. It seems to have been accurate. At least, it fits with my hypothesis, and that is what really counts. Wagner perhaps wanted to will his vision on the Future. Fair enough, I say. It fits. Wagnerism has survived, and it yet survives, primarily in film, musicals, and other such arenas long despised by at least the elite of the musical establishment. Sometimes Wagnerism is done far better than Wagner ever could have done it, but usually not.

Rather than proceed onward to the twentieth century now, I would like to delve farther back in time, say, to the beginning of the Romantic period of music. The arbitrary musicologist, who is an idiot, marks this in 1828 (late March, I believe), for that is the death of Beethoven. I declare it to be "around 1800," in the lifetime of Beethoven and, more importantly (in literature), Goethe. Beethoven, though, the musicologists tell us, was the first musician to successfully form an independent career out of music, which was rooted in the beginning with performance upon the pianoforte. That is all about Beethoven. How about Liszt? Pianists like to say that Liszt was the greatest pianist of all time, even though there is no objective basis for this. What is best? Perhaps he willed the most out of the pianoforte, just as Wagner is supposed to have tried to will the most out of the orchestra. Liszt was Wagner's father-in-law, by the way, and his dear beloved friend, only two years older than Wagner. But what about Liszt? Liszt was worshiped as a pianist above all else. Look at the simplistic line I have drawn, which points out that the preeminence of the performer (think of Paganini on the violin, contemporary to Liszt), is a creature of nineteenth century Romanticism. Sure, it had been around for a long time in opera, but I will to ignore this point in favor of my own.

Now it is safe to address the twentieth century, and I will begin by stating that I shall state no more upon the French impressionists (and their friend Satie), as I love them far too much to include them in my denouncements. I will also include among them Scriabin, even though he was perfectly distinct from the French impressionists and a Russian, like his schoolmate Rachmaninov, who was entirely different from all of them. Also, all of them would certainly frown at my calling them impressionists, especially Debussy. Regardless, hooray for their anti-Wagnerism, and do not apply my comments on the Second Viennese School to them in any way. Speaking of the Second Viennese School, I comment upon them now. Actually, no. I thought I would comment upon them, but I will not. I tried, but it did not work, so I will to ignore them, too. That is the nice thing about the Will. By the way, please apply all the comments I would have made about the Second Viennese School also to the later minimalists, such as John Cage. It is the same sort of thing, an attempt to minimize the Will of the composer. The audience must will a great deal, though, in order to like what it is hearing, and in the name of pomposity, many will successfully. Even I have often willed successfully in this way.

Let us get this train back on the tracks. What I really wanted to talk about is the musical establishment, and how it is obsessed with the Will. Up to here, I have attempted to draw a case wherein will-centered philosophy formed the backbone of the twentieth-century musical establishment. Objectively, I have failed, but fortunately, we can all will otherwise. Will to believe! Will to extrapolate all the other points I would have made in the assembly of a coherent argument! Nietzsche never once, to my knowledge, made a coherent argument, so why should I? Nietzsche, by the way, was much more Artist than philosopher. It makes sense, then, that will-centered philosophy would be embraced in Art, as it is an Artistic creation. Furthermore, it is appropriate that existentialism and its crippled spawn, relativism, should also themselves come not from philosophy, but from Art. Need I say more than that Sartre and Camus were were both writers of fiction? I do not mean that exclusively, but still. Perhaps that is all that needed saying, but I do not will to throw the rest out. Why? That is both the point and the fatal flaw, now is it not? Will to apathy!

So the other day I was playing Satie on the pianoforte, and the musical establishment wanted me to give the piece a more definite conclusion, which Satie did not provide. I am inclined to think that the inconclusiveness was the whole point that Satie wanted to make, and that by creating an illusory conclusion we are falling into his joke, but the establishment will have none of it. The establishment, in the tradition of Liszt, gives the performer, the willer, primacy. Forget the poor stupid composer and his directions! Just feel it, and feeling, Will. Thus I put in a nice ritardando and a healthy diminuendo, but that was not enough. That unresolved chord at the end needed a crescendo, but the pianoforte necessarily must diminuendo on a sustained note. Will to grammar! I was told, therefore, to play an imaginary crescendo. How does one do this? Why, by willing it, of course! Build up emotion within myself, I was told verbatim. Then apply increased pressure to the keys (which were already pressed) and to raise my wrist so that it looks like I am playing louder. Last, I was told to create tension in my abdomen. Basically, I was told to will the belief upon both myself and any listener that there is a crescendo on that final chord, when in fact it is just the opposite, and I thought that that (taken in full seriousness) was approximately the stupidest thing I had ever heard; however, I did not say so. I tried to will a crescendo.

Then today the pianists gathered together to listen and comment on one another's playing, and O the willing that took place! All of them felt like something should have been the case which was not. They all wanted to feel some other thing, like mystery or organics in the performance. Play it with a different color, or give your phrases a rounder shape. Thus they all willed to hear these things, these things that have absolutely nothing to do with music, being category mistakes, and they insisted that the performer will them into the performance. The primacy of the performer alone is enough to show the dominance of will over, say, reason in Art, if the composer is supposed to have set down rational commands for his idea.

What is more telling, though, than a final historical note, if nothing else for the sake of symmetry. The recently dead Karlheinz Stockhausen wrote a composition (whose name I cannot remember) which consisted of a number of short phrases arranged haphazardly around a page of music, which the performer would play in whimsical order until one of them was played twice. This gave complete primacy to the performer in terms of musical form, much like a cadenza in a classical concerto would do with content, except that was not degenerate.

Let us now forgo a sound conclusion, for I will it to be so. It is obvious now that the philosophy of the Will rules in music, except that in the preceding mess that was certainly a fact obscured. Will to clairvoyance!

One of Saite's directions in the third Gnossienne was "with clairvoyance." Satie knew the truth. I will that interpretation upon him, for he is much too dead to argue otherwise. This is good because I am probably wrong.