Heckling speakers now are you, Derek?
I like this anxiety over the word "understanding" --- because it's really an
anxiety over purpose.
Among aesthetes -- i.e. music lovers -- to understand music is at least to
follow it -- and at most to love it. (and actually -- I think I do start
humming when any kind of music has just thrilled me)
Among musicians -- to understand is to recognize specific effects or
structures - and know how to make them.
And among the various other kinds of scholars -- to understand is to answer
questions relevant to their discipline.
So -- why didn't this speaker just reply "in this context, to understand is to
provide explanations for the kinds of questions asked by the philosophy of
music" ?
Possibly -- because she had some anxiety concerning the relevancy of those
questions and/or the adequacy of her explanations. (as well there should be!)
(and she should have just conceded that the philosophy of music is very
different from mathematics.)
I like the quote that A8 took from Monet: "it is simply necessary to love" --
although that only applies to us aesthetes.
So, I would prefer to snip out the word *simply* - to make it also apply to
artists, philosophers, and even historians as well.
********************
What does it mean to 'understand' a work of art?
I was at a conference recently where one of the speakers, who writes a
lot about music, kept talking about understanding music. In question
time I asked her what she meant by 'understanding' in this context. I
said I could see how one could talk about understanding a mathematical
proof, for example, but what did the word mean in relation to music
(and I really meant all art).
She first began to answer by saying that one understood if one could
recognise shifts in keys etc. But I said I was talking about the
average person not someone schooled in the techniques if music.
(After all, that clearly can't be the point.) So then she said in a
rather flippant way as if to make light of the matter that one
understood music if one could recognise its tunes and hum them.
I didn't pursue the question further but this obviously can't be
right. How does humming tunes equate to understanding? Moreover,
there is a lot of music I love medieval and Renaissance liturgical
music for example - where I couldn't hum the tunes to save myself.
(The same goes for certain forms of non-Western sacred music which
often has no recognisable 'tunes').
I came to the conclusion that the person concerned had not really
given any serious thought to the problem (leading aesthetician though
she was). But it *is* a problem and Monet's comment highlights it
nicely. What does 'understanding' a work of art mean?
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