La Musique au temps des encyclopédistes
The shifting of traditional values concerning music, as well as the process through which Rameau, Rousseau, Diderot and D’Alembert transformed music from mimetic epistemological models into ones embodying formalist concerns, is the subject of the meticulous monograph presented by musicologist Claude Dauphin. Situating his study on the process of defining the musical fabric of the Encyclopédie, and on efforts of the philosophes as a group to situate music among the many disparate branches of knowledge, the author describes the collaborative project of the Encyclopédie as a work that embodied, first and foremost, the principle of tolerance. In focusing his study on the period from 1750 to 1772 (the period dating from of the Prospectus of the work to its completion, or the period between the death of Bach and the birth of Beethoven), he sets his project within the framework of the century-long evolution of opera, the rise of instrumental forms such as the sonata, and the transition from the harpsichord to the pianoforte. Thus, his study prepares the reader to enter the realm of interdisciplinary debates over music and language, of music’s conception as midway between art and science in the Prospectus, and of its role as part of the Système Figuré, all highlighting its final embodiment as an auto-referential aesthetics, conceived through the lens of the encyclopedic project.
Highlighting his study is the author’s astute positioning of Rameau, whose theories initiated the shift from music conceived from the standpoint of purely mathematical and aesthetic paradigms to a formalist system of knowledge. His discussion of the animated quarrel between Rameau and Rousseau, prefaced in theoretical works of the period, is of note, in which he draws directly from the paradigm of Antiquity, elucidating fundamental differences between the mathematician, Pythagorus, whose disciples were designated harmonists par calcul, and his pupil and critic, Arixothenus, whose followers were harmonists par oreille. Epistemological consequences stemming from scientific observances of Rameau caused irreparable schisms with the encyclopedists, many of whom admired his work.
As author of the majestic Traité sur l’harmonie, Rameau’s presence and specter haunted the musical entries written for the Encyclopédie, and is prescient in the Avertissement by D’Alembert of tome VII. Rameau’s exclusion from the project, stemming from his rivalry with Rousseau (which Dauphin elucidates in his chapter entitled Du Numérique et du sensible) is of note, stemming from his profound disagreements with the group over conceptions and archetypes of musical form .
In contradistinction to Rameau, Rousseau associated imitative properties of music with dramatic and theatrical forms, subsuming therein such complex forms as comédie-ballet and opéra. In his study, the author reveals the formidable presence of Rousseau as musicographe, preceding that of nascent political philosopher and social critic. Rousseau’s accomplishments as music historian, teacher, and theorist were better known than were his theoretical works.
The delineation of the parameters of the quarrel between Rousseau and Rameau, whose Traité de l’harmonie Rousseau initially admired and adapted as a theoretical base on which to emerge as self-taught musician, is thoroughly explored in this study. Therein, the author suggests the professed intent of Rousseau, as musicographe and author of articles on music for the Encyclopédie, was to provoke Rameau’s wrath, in order to criticize more astutely.
The author’s detailed discussion of “imitation” should be of particular interest to Enlightenment scholars in the fields of art and literature. In citing such detailed examples as the brevity of Rousseau’s 1752 entry, Imitation, (wherein is described the technical meaning of the word), compared with the entry later published in the Dictionnaire de musique, (wherein is elucidated the principle of using the same chant in several sections of a composition, played in different registers, such as fourths, fifths, and in unison), the author “explains” such dissimilarities by citing the rarety of writings on the subject compared to the proliferation of the procedure in actual performances of baroque and classical works.
Of particular note is the chapter L’Opéra selon Rousseau, wherein the omnipresence of Rousseau’s contributions to the development of opera is made clear. The melodramatic form inaugurated by Rousseau’s opera, Pygmalion, wherein the orchestra vies with poetry and drama as equal to advance the argument by enforcing its own “linguistic code” had important consequences for musicians of the period, including Mozart and Gluck.
Competing national styles also figured in interpretation of musical categories. In the early century, Italian and German music dominated throughout Europe. The author underscores the case of French musical theory that, overall, professed an inherent disdain for formalist concepts, a stance that was viewed by writers of the period as problematic, but only in France. Basic arguments against French music, cited by Rousseau, are of note. In initially seeking to espouse the principle of conformity of melody, harmonic ranges, and evocation of registers representative of poetry, French music denied formalistic principles such as the transposition of musical themes, the mirroring of motives, or repetition of specific formulas. Diderot, for example,deemed few French works to be as musically sound as the Italian intermède. Moreover, in his entry, Intermède, he cites only three works including one by Rameau: Ragonde, Platée, and Rousseau’s Le Devin du village.
As musicians, composers, and theorists, Rameau, Rousseau, and music historian Charles Burney all aspired to a musical discourse that was auto-referential and opposed to one purely based on mimetic principles. In framing the discourse of these and other contributors to the Encyclopédie, in delving in fields ranging from melody, harmony, science, and the foundations of knowledge, Dauphin’s study excels as a testimony to the interdisciplinary interests of the philosophes .
Dauphin introduces his study within the parameters of the century’s three musical rivalries, all foreshadowing debates undertaken in the Encyclopédie. Thus, he asserts that the musical eighteenth century’s listening practices and consequent development of a musical aesthetics that transported the listener, do provide invaluable clues for the understanding of our present musical culture. Notably, the rivalry of the lullists versus the ramists (1730-1740); the Quarrel of the Bouffons (1752-1754); followed by the rivalry of the gluckists versus the piccinists (1772-1779) comprised three events that resounded throughout the century, accentuating the role played by music in the public sphere. The central argument of the work concerned the parameters of music as a perceived branch of knowledge, and had reified by mid-century what the author describes as a “first,” true états généraux de l’esthétique, dutifully preserved as history to this day.
