Musical Notation as the Externalization of Imagined, Complex Sound

Abstract

Henrik Sinding-Larsen analyzes how new tools for the visual description of sound revolutionized the way music was conceived, performed, and disseminated. Early on, the ancient Greeks had described pitches and intervals in mathematically precise ways. However, their complex system had few consequences until it was combined with the practical minds of Roman Catholic choirmasters around 1000 ce. Now, melodies became depicted as note-heads on lines with precise pitch meanings and with note names based on octaves. This graphical and conceptual externalization of patterns in sound paved the way for a polyphonic complexity unimaginable in a purely oral/aural tradition. However, this higher complexity also entailed strictly standardized/homogenized scales and less room for improvisation in much of notation-based music. Through the concept of externalization, lessons from the history of musical notation are generalized to other tools of description, and Sinding-Larsen ends with a reflection on what future practices might become imaginable and unimaginable as a result of computer programming.