On Music’s Subtle Expressiveness

Abstract

I suggest that emotions are not the primary affective attitude towards music. If we are to explain music’ s expressiveness according to the Resemblance Theory, that theory should be extended to include feelings. Because of the lack of intentionality in music and the dearth of universal emotional gestures to explain the sub tlety of music’ s expressive power, explaining this expressiven ess by making recourse to music’ s relationships with emotions is bound to face challenges. I will argue that, even though the movements in music asso- ciated with musical expressiveness might not necessarily be associated with emotions, they might very well be associated with certain feelings of the movement itself.