Review of Theodore Gracyk and Andrew Kania, eds. 2011. The Routledge Companion to Philosophy and Music. Abingdon, UK, and New York, NY: Routledge.

Abstract

Early in Plato’s Symposium, after the guests arrive at Agathon’s house, after Socrates’ entrance, after deciding as a group not to drink wine to the point of excess, but before reclining into the philosophical discussion proper (orations in praise of Eros), Eryximachos, the physician, abruptly dismisses the aulos–playing female (αὐλητρίδα) from the room and from the philosophical conversation to follow (1997:176e). With this gesture Eryximachos dismisses art from science, experience from thought, music from philosophy. Apparently unable to listen to music while thinking philosophically, music is to have no part in the conversation—the philosophy—that follows. The problematic, then, of philosophizing about music, or even conceiving a kind of musical philosophy, has conditioned our discourses since their putative origins. An essential addition to the modern literature, The Routledge Companion to Philosophy and Music shares in this problematic but raises its stakes, encouraging us to renew our attempts to think music philosophically. While philosophers have consistently discussed music (see, for example, the British Journal of Aesthetics), philosophical work by scholars trained primarily as musicians has only lately emerged within academic circles as a growth industry. The Society for Music Theory’s Music and Philosophy Interest Group has witnessed a renewed intensity in work and focus, and the American Musicological Society recently established a Music and Philosophy Study Group, as has the Royal Musical Association. (I imagine an English–language journal devoted solely to the topic will be forthcoming. In the meantime, there is Musik und Asthetik.) The Routledge Companion to Philosophy and Music signals these changes and will provide an important resource for musicians interested in discussing philosophical issues. It accomplishes its primary goal admirably: it could very well accompany discussions of music and philosophy for some time to come. Edited by scholars employed in philosophy departments, the Companion features entries by many of the leading philosophers of music who have been working in the field for decades. Far less represented, however, are scholars working in music departments—indeed the latter’s entries are somewhat marginalized, appearing primarily in the final part. While the Companion reads primarily as a philosophy of music text (the “and music” in the title, while certainly not an afterthought, figures music as