Energy in Music: An Inventory of Observations and Ideas

Abstract

The contemporary field of musical analysis and theory features an overwhelming pre ponderance of studies related to the pitch domain. However, very few studies have explored the question of energy—that force without which there would be no sound in the first place, no creative drive in the second place, no directed motion, no articulation, no climax, and so on. After summarizing some important work already conducted in the field of energy in music, I discuss various ideas and observations I have made, both in my efforts as a composer and through my work with aural analysis (aural sonology) of music-as-heard, since here the multiple roles of energy are far more evident than in the musical score. I present an inventory of ideas that, by implication, challenge the consensus of what the limits of music theory and analysis should be. I argue that to understand the craft of musical composition in greater depth, it is necessary to study the synergies between a greater number of musical "parameters," and I therefore propose the need for a multidimensional approach to music analysis.