Hellmut
Federhofer: Interpretation und
musikalische Praxis
For centuries, interpretation, bound to the written word, had its time-honored
place in the fields of theology, philosophy, and law. Its application to an
aesthetically appraised listening experience began gradually and not before the
beginning of the twentieth century, where it pertained to both the practice and
theory of music. However, a vague understanding of a work was not a sufficient
basis, finally, for terminological clarity. The relevance of interpretation in
its musical context rather came to be applied to the seemingly self-evident
relationship between the performer (“Interpreten”) to a given
composition and its reception by the listener. The explanation put forth for
this alliance—namely, the claim to a differentiation between structural
and performative meaning—is unsustainable since idealized sonority is a
prerequisite for the structuralized form of notated music. The fact that tonal
music is buttressed by a stable interrelation between central and peripheral
tonal qualities is thereby overlooked. The disengagement of this relationship
first began with the advent of new music in the twentieth century, which
allowed the performer to gain predominance over a composer and his intentions.
Only then did it become possible to speak of performativity as its own
structural entity separate from the traditional meaning of structure. Both H.G.
Gadamer’s blending of horizontals (Horizontverschmelzung) and J. Derrida’s supplementary interpretation,
theories that also bear upon art, must for various reasons be rejected. In
tonal music it is the duty of performers as well as critical editions to
exercise allegiance toward composers and their intentions, even though
achieving this goal always remains a relative proposition.
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