I like most of your comment very much—but I visited the webpage of the trainwreck, and I agree with all of it. The claims the author is making are quite modest. I am willing to go out on a limb as far as he did, and say that 12-tone music is objectively superior to atonal music; that some combinations of notes are more useful than others; that some chord progressions are more useful than others; and that fractal structure, at least as far as having some instruments providing beats at low frequencies and others at multiples of that frequency, is often a good thing.
12-tone music is objectively superior to atonal music
I definitely don’t understand this (not the aesthetic preference, but the assertion of its objective correctness). The only plausible account I’m aware of for how some music could be objectively better than some other music is the so-called “intersubjective” account, where music possesses more intrinsic quality the more widely liked it is by large numbers of people. This still runs into the problem of what it could possibly mean to tell someone who likes some unpopular music “I acknowledge that you like this, but you are incorrect”—which I take to be a fatal flaw. But nevertheless, in the case of (let’s say) tonal versus atonal music, it must be acknowledged that tonal music has various features that make it more pleasing to most people, and this can look like objective superiority in some respects (though I myself insist that it is best described as widespread agreement on its subjective superiority).
But in the case of 12-tone versus atonal music, there isn’t even widespread agreement that one or the other is better. Most people don’t like either kind and could not distinguish them from one another by ear. Among people who understand the difference, the relative merits of the two approaches is hotly disputed and has been essentially since the advent of the 12-tone system. So there isn’t even the intersubjective reason in this case to create the appearance of a particular type of music’s being objectively superior.
Some might insist that something about the presence of some type of “mandatory” structure in 12-tone music (vaguely akin to, though very different in practice from, the structuring influence of tonality in tonal music) makes it objectively superior to atonal music even if we can’t demonstrate that people actually prefer one to the other in practice. I am quite sure that no argument of this type will hold water either, but I would need to know more of the particulars to know how to address my objections.
But nevertheless, in the case of (let’s say) tonal versus atonal music, it must be acknowledged that tonal music has various features that make it more pleasing to most people, and this can look like objective superiority in some respects (though I myself insist that it is best described as widespread agreement on its subjective superiority).
And that is objective superiority, for sufficiently high values of “most”. Because we’re only talking about humans here. Ants will not value that kind of music highly, because they can’t hear it. But we can make some claims about objective superiority when we limit ourselves to humans.
Hi Phil, that Skytopia web page doesn’t mention 12-tone music being superior. It mentions “12 notes to the octave”, and maybe that’s what you meant (tonal music—the stuff most people like).
But ’12-tone’ (with the word ‘tone’) in its strict definition is actually usually atonal.
I like most of your comment very much—but I visited the webpage of the trainwreck, and I agree with all of it. The claims the author is making are quite modest. I am willing to go out on a limb as far as he did, and say that 12-tone music is objectively superior to atonal music; that some combinations of notes are more useful than others; that some chord progressions are more useful than others; and that fractal structure, at least as far as having some instruments providing beats at low frequencies and others at multiples of that frequency, is often a good thing.
I definitely don’t understand this (not the aesthetic preference, but the assertion of its objective correctness). The only plausible account I’m aware of for how some music could be objectively better than some other music is the so-called “intersubjective” account, where music possesses more intrinsic quality the more widely liked it is by large numbers of people. This still runs into the problem of what it could possibly mean to tell someone who likes some unpopular music “I acknowledge that you like this, but you are incorrect”—which I take to be a fatal flaw. But nevertheless, in the case of (let’s say) tonal versus atonal music, it must be acknowledged that tonal music has various features that make it more pleasing to most people, and this can look like objective superiority in some respects (though I myself insist that it is best described as widespread agreement on its subjective superiority).
But in the case of 12-tone versus atonal music, there isn’t even widespread agreement that one or the other is better. Most people don’t like either kind and could not distinguish them from one another by ear. Among people who understand the difference, the relative merits of the two approaches is hotly disputed and has been essentially since the advent of the 12-tone system. So there isn’t even the intersubjective reason in this case to create the appearance of a particular type of music’s being objectively superior.
Some might insist that something about the presence of some type of “mandatory” structure in 12-tone music (vaguely akin to, though very different in practice from, the structuring influence of tonality in tonal music) makes it objectively superior to atonal music even if we can’t demonstrate that people actually prefer one to the other in practice. I am quite sure that no argument of this type will hold water either, but I would need to know more of the particulars to know how to address my objections.
And that is objective superiority, for sufficiently high values of “most”. Because we’re only talking about humans here. Ants will not value that kind of music highly, because they can’t hear it. But we can make some claims about objective superiority when we limit ourselves to humans.
Hi Phil, that Skytopia web page doesn’t mention 12-tone music being superior. It mentions “12 notes to the octave”, and maybe that’s what you meant (tonal music—the stuff most people like).
But ’12-tone’ (with the word ‘tone’) in its strict definition is actually usually atonal.
I’d like to add to grouchymusicologist’s comment by pointing out that, unless otherwise stipulated, 12-tone music is a subset of atonal music.