Musical semiology

Di tutte le annunciazioni che popolano la storia umana e le sue svariate tradizioni, al semiologo non interessa la fonte in sé, il numinoso che all’umano si rivolge per significargli di volta in volta la propria presenza, intenzione, sensibilità; interessa, piuttosto, il modo in cui a seconda delle epoche storiche, dei contesti culturali, delle vicende sociali, ma anche delle sensibilità individuali, uomini e donne hanno utilizzato i materiali del mondo, quelli dell’immanenza, per forgiare i significanti del divino. Ovvero, specularmente, il modo in cui hanno immaginato, e creduto con fermezza, che tali materiali divenissero d’un tratto appannaggio di una divina intenzione di comunicare, stoffa della rivelazione, parole annuncianti. Al teologo, non al semiologo, spetta immaginare la ricostruzione della totalità a fronte della quale si dipana il messaggio divino nella sua vicenda immanente. Al semiologo tocca invece un compito che è insieme più modesto e più costrittivo; innanzitutto raccogliere e inventariare queste tracce: in quali circostanze gli uomini e le donne hanno raccontato e raccontano di un loro incontro con il divino? Utilizzando quali segni? Piegandoli a quali necessità comunicative? Il compito successivo, più arduo, è analizzare questi segni, con gli strumenti di cui dispone la metodologia semiotica, per capire se si possano in qualche modo catalogare, suddividere in tipologie, distribuire in atlanti che, anche al di là e a dispetto delle differenze d’origine storica e confessionale, manifestino nondimeno dinamiche comuni nella costruzione e nell’elaborazione del linguaggio.

Semiotics (sometimes spelled “semeiotic”) is the name first given by John Locke, and later reprised by Charles S. Peirce, for the “doctrine of signs,” or the study of how some things can stand for other things to still other things. This deliberate inquiry can be contrasted with “folk semiotic” accounts, which assume that there is some intrinsic feature about, say, the human voice or a painted board that makes them capable of signifying. Such a naive assumption does not withstand serious scrutiny. From a philosophical standpoint, what makes something a sign is an involvement in a specific sort of triadic relation. This relation is found in human/nonhuman and deliberate/nondeliberate signs alike. Semiosis, the action of signs, is what permits communication, but it is wider than communication. For example, if while in an adjacent room I smell that the turkey in the oven is ready, my pet dog can smell it too, and the turkey is not trying to “tell” us anything. But if the cook in the kitchen tells me it is ready, I receive that message, while my dog hears the sounds but is none the wiser (in contemporary semiotic parlance, my dog and I couple our Umwelten via indices, but the symbols at hand generate interpretants only in my anthroposemiosis). In spite of the fact that it has a long and distinguished history (especially during the medieval period), general inquiry into signs became an organized research program only in the mid-20th century. Today, in addition to philosophers, semiotics attracts a wide range of scholars, such as ethologists, cognitive scientists, linguists, art historians, logicians, media theorists, literary critics, computer programmers, biologists, sociologists, and so on. From a methodological standpoint, then, parochialism is not an option. The scholarly literature can nevertheless be fruitfully divided into theoretical and applied strands. Not surprisingly, most philosophers drawn to semiotic questions work in the former strand. Semiotics is not to be confused with “semiology,” a (now largely defunct) project that originated in the lectures of the linguist Ferdinand de Saussure and which was active in the 1960s, mainly in France. Semiotics, by contrast, is a vibrant tradition that continues to flourish worldwide. Although some persist in employing the term “semiotics” when discussing narrow studies that focus exclusively on cultural codes, such terminological misuse masks the fact that a study of signs is broader than a study of language. A sustained philosophy of signs, then, promises (as Locke initially surmised) to yield truly novel insights.

"All being well, the reader who has made it to this last word will
at least empathize with an attachment to exploring the known
unknowns in music theory pedagogy. Admittedly, that concept
'known unknown' got an uneasy, mixed public reaction in the USA in 2002. All the same it has a respectable pedigree in fairly recent thinking-in philosophy, literature, economics. Its versatility alone qualifies it to be salvaged from political hubris.
Here, it was used to focus our attention on the promise of
technology, an important promise in that we do not have to
regard technology as cold science, but on the contrary technology guarantees us good outcomes, if we put it to good uses; and many believe that there is a moral imperative to do so. In principle we can know nothing about the future of technology while having every confidence in our ability to exploit its present virtues for future musical benefit. The ideas we develop now for the use of technology in music theory pedagogy will likely be those on which we shall build in the future-and of course the learning that technology produces currently will leave vital traces in that future, as certainly as anything can be certain. Ironically perhaps, the' archeology' of music, spread backwards in its absolute entirety, in all its immutable truth, may sometimes seem to present us with
fewer knowns. The idea of the known unknown can remind us of the truth content in the past, of the things that by definition we do know, while sometimes having yet to see perhaps their most important meanings for us now.

El trabajo investigativo “Las Músicas Tradicionales-Urbanas”, se desarrolla como consecuencia del interés por indagar y aportar al conocimiento de la música y su contexto social y cultural en la ciudad de Bogotá. En concreto, este trabajo se centra en las expresiones que incluyen elementos de músicas locales y que
actualmente se conocen como nuevas músicas colombianas, con el fin de comprender su origen, desarrollo, influencias, adaptación al contexto urbano y funcionamiento dentro del mercado. Para ello, y asumiendo una perspectiva semiótica, se toma la idea del discurso en su más amplia acepción, con el fin de integrar al análisis todos los elementos que pudieran ayudar a la comprensión de los elementos anteriormente descritos; es así como, junto con el análisis musical, se realizaron revisiones a materiales de textos producidos por los artistas, entrevistas y páginas web de los mismos

This essay examines the cultural phenomena of noise in its perceived social constructions and demonstrates its emergence as a form of resistance against prevailing dominant hegemonic codes of culture. In particular, the paper explores the ability of noise to be enacted as a tool to escape the shackles of heteronormative constructions of sexuality and gender in the cultural landscape of the United States. Examined to support this argument are the contrasting works of two American artists: John Cage and Emilie Autumn. Through Cage and his avant-garde articulations of sound, covert acts of resistance against the dominant heteronormative constructions of masculinity are explored, and through Autumn’s classical crossover work, a more overt and explicit form of resistance to subvert gender stereotypes and structures of normality and patriarchy are illuminated. Additionally, the paper explores possibilities for artists to engage with other movements, such as disability activism to create new possibilities for change.

Keywords: John Cage, Emilie Autumn, Queer Theory, Modernism, Musicology, Sound Studies, Noise, United States History, Cultural Studies

This is an unpublished keynote speech (annual meeting of the Music Theory Society of New York State, 2008). It considers issues of performance and analysis, the unique lure of music, and the metaphor of structure. The case study is the one-bar 'signal' from Birtwistle's 'Harrison's Clocks'. The recurrent perspective is semiological.

Building on the notational principles of C. S. Peirce’s graphical logic, Pietarinen has tried to develop a propositional logic unfolding in the medium of sound. Apart from its intrinsic interest, this project serves as a concrete test of logic’s range. However, I argue that Pietarinen’s inaugural proposal, while promising, has an important shortcoming, since it cannot portray double-negation without thereby portraying a contradiction.