Linking musical metaphors and emotions evoked by the sound of classical music.

Simon Schaerlaeken,Didier Grandjean,Donald Glowinski

doi:10.1177/0305735621991235

Abstract

Musical meaning is often described in terms of emotions and metaphors. While many theories encapsulate one or the other, very little empirical data is available to test a possible link between the two. In this article, we examined the metaphorical and emotional contents of Western classical music using the answers of 162 participants. We calculated generalized linear mixed-effects models, correlations, and multidimensional scaling to connect emotions and metaphors. It resulted in each metaphor being associated with different specific emotions, subjective levels of entrainment, and acoustic and perceptual characteristics. How these constructs relate to one another could be based on the embodied knowledge and the perception of movement in space. For instance, metaphors that rely on movement are related to emotions associated with movement. In addition, measures in this study could also be represented by underlying dimensions such as valence and arousal. Musical writing and music education could benefit greatly from these results. Finally, we suggest that music researchers consider musical metaphors in their work as we provide an empirical method for it.

Highlights

Musical meaning is often described in terms of emotions and metaphors
The metaphors were assessed with the Geneva Musical Metaphors Scale (GEMMES) (Schaerlaeken et al, 2019) which consists of five subscales: “Flow,” “Force,” “Interior,” “Movement,” and “Wandering.” The entrainment caused by the music was assessed with the Musical Entrainment Questionnaire (Labbé & Grandjean, 2014)
The aim of this study was to describe the relationships between the musical metaphors reported in the GEMMES, the musical emotions assessed with the Geneva Emotion Musical Scale (GEMS), and a variety of musical descriptors, including acoustic parameters, perceptual features, and subjective entrainment

Summary

Introduction

Musical meaning is often described in terms of emotions and metaphors. While many theories encapsulate one or the other, very little empirical data is available to test a possible link between the two. It resulted in each metaphor being associated with different specific emotions, subjective levels of entrainment, and acoustic and perceptual characteristics How these constructs relate to one another could be based on the embodied knowledge and the perception of movement in space. Piaget proposed a theory for cognitive development explaining that children construct knowledge and understanding of the world by coordinating experiences from physical interaction with objects (e.g., stepping, grasping, and sucking; Piaget & Inhelder, 1969) Several central concepts such as height, path, containment focus on this implicitly embodied learning. A series of three studies attempted to capture the most widespread categories of metaphors associated with Western classical music (Schaerlaeken, Glowinski, Rappaz, & Grandjean, 2019) This led to the creation of the Geneva Musical Metaphors Scale (GEMMES), which consists of five subscales that can be linked to the most commonly used or relevant families of musical metaphors: “Flow,” “Force,” “Interior,” “Movement,” and “Wandering.”. Musical emotions can be evoked from the sounds of a piece of music as a kind of basic building block, but they can be conveyed through schematic expectations and knowledge of musical forms (Davies, 1994; Levinson, 1980)

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