FEMINIST THEORY, MUSIC THEORY, AND THE MIND/BODY PROBLEM

L7T7
SUZANNE

G. CUSICK

cach of us from a uniquc Situation born of multiple idcntitics laycrcd cach on thc othcr-class, racc, gcndcr, scxuality, cthnicity, rcligious bclicfs, and so forth. Further, it is undcrstood that cach of us spcaks from a Situation that is partly dcncd by our listcncrs or rcadcrs: cvcry communication is thc acting out of a rclationship, in which our idcntity of thc momcnt is partly dctcrmincd by thc rclationship wc havc or scck to havc with othcrs. As cloqucntly claboratcd by Donna Haraway in hcr now-classic cssay Situatcd Knowlcdgcs, fcminist cpistcmology assumcs that all knowlcdgc claims bcgin lifc as partial knowlcdgcs, dctcrmincd by thc Situation of thc knowcr; and that thcy dcvclop into morc gcncrally usc1l knowlcdgc claims as thc rcsult of convcrsation among situatcd

ONE OF THE FIRST intcllcctua] rituals a pcrson cncountcrs on bccoming a fcminist is thc ritual ofsclf-idcntication. It is undcrstood now-as it was not twcnty ycars ago-that cach of us spcaks for surc only for hcrsclf,

Feminist Theory. Music Theory

knowcrs. It is from Lhis idca-that uscful knowlcdgc cmcrgcs from convcrsation among situatcd knowcrs-that I want to siruatc my sclf in rclationship with you, with music, and with fcminism by rcvcaling thc Original impctus for this papcr. That Original impctus was an invitation from my collcaguc Frcd Maus to considcr thc problcm of imagining what a fcminist music thcory might bc likc. Frcds invitation lcd mc to think of how I, a musicologist/organist/choir dircctor, usc music thcory: for mc it is a tool for undcrstanding picccs that I nccd to know about, or that movc mc. It furthcr lcd mc to acknowlcdgc that my thinking wasnt inucnccd by all fcminist thcoryt0 assimilatc it all and thcn graft it onto thc cxisting root stock of music thcory would bc an impossiblc and vanity-aunting task. I havc sought instcad to think honcstly about thc thcory I was rcally rcading and how I was rcally trying to apply it to my thought about music. What I want to do hcrc is focus on onc point of intcrscction bctwccn fcminist thcory and music thcory, a point of intcrscction that raiscs somc intcrcsting qucstions about how wc think about music. My intcrcst in using fcminist thcory to illuminatc music thcory ariscs from an intcrcst in undcrstanding why music has not bccn particularly susccptiblc to gcndcr-dccoding tcchniqucs and thcorctical paradigms borrowcd from thc fcminist criticism of litcraturc and art. It has bccn my imprcssion that thc various critical stratcgics wc havc tricd to borrow from thosc disciplincs havc not takcn us nearly as far as thcy havc takcn scholars in thcsc othcr clds; worsc, I think thcy havc takcn us to oddIy paralyzing rathcr than cmpowcring conclusions about gcndcr; pcrhaps worst of all, I fcar that thcsc borrowcd critical stratcgics arc justiably criticizcd as bringing us to intcllcctually intcrcsting but ultimatcly unmusical placcs, or to placcs that makc us bcgin to hate what wc oncc most lovcd in thc world. Contcmplating (somctimcs in my own work) what has fclt to mc likc a profoundly unmusical quality to somc music criticism lcd mc to rcconsidcr thc situation that is thc ccntral corc of my own scnsc of musicalan idcntity so ity. Thc Central corc of my musicality is pcrformancc, what othcr musical idcntitics pcoplc strong that I can barcly imaginc (cspccially critics) might havc. As I bcgan to think from thc pcrformcr in I I myscIf, and not from thc musicologist in her, fclt acutcly that was not supposcd to bc thinking that way. I bcgan, lrthcr, to suspcct that thcn: wcrc rcasons rclatcd to gcndcr {hat my musicological sclf had bccn profcssionally formcd to bc diffcrcnt from my performing sclf. As a performcr, I act on and with what wc ordinarily call music with my body; as a musicologist I havc bccn formcd to act on (and with?) what wc ordinarily Call music with my mind, and onIy with my mind. Thus, my musicological habitus inclincs mc to think about musics xcd, tcxtlikc

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Perspecuves o!New Musoc

qualitics, an inclination that is pcrpctually at odds with thc way my petforming sclf inclincs to think about and rcspond t0 music. And whcn l turn to music thcory as a tool to hclp mc understand a piccc I nccd t0 know about, I nd {hat its habitm, too, inclincs to focus on music: xcd, tcxtlikc qualitics. Could it bc I havc wondcrcd, that thc focus on musids xcd, tcxtlikc qualiticsa focus that somctimcs sccms contrary to my own musicalityis also implicatcd in our disciplins failurc to dcciphcr vcry much of thc gcndcr coding wc can assumc to bc part of our musical traditions? I bcgan to think that it could bc so, partly bccausc of an old problcm of minc rcgarding Fanny HcnscPs Trio in D minor, op. I l . I havc bccn thinking about this Trio for ycars, thinking about it as a musician who lovcs thc piccc, and thinking about it as a fcminist critic who would likc to cxplain how gcndcr is cncodcd in thc work. For I assumc, from analogy with litcrary criticism, that thc work ofwomcn may bc diffcrcnt from thc work of mcn in its cncoding of gcndcr: indccd, it sccms scIf-cvidcnt that this should bc so, sincc gcndcr is a systcm ofpowcr rclationships that is dcsigncd to givc mcn and womcn diffbrcnt cxpcricnccs of lifc. Thus, I assumc that thc cxpcricncc Hcnscl had as a middlc-class, cthnically Icwish woman in ninctccnth-ccntury Europc may havc informcd hcr work in audiblc-or at any rate in analyzablc-ways. But to admit that assumption is not cntircly honcst, for it is not thc a priori fact in my thought. Thc originating prcmisc in my thought is a hearing of thc piccc (Examplc 1).2 To my car, thc immcdiatcly striking thing about HcnscPs trio is thc drama and force of its opcning gcsturc. I idcntify thcsc qualiticswhich I admit to having rst hcard as rcmarkablc in thc work of a woman-with thc upward, angular, tonic- and modc-dcning lcaps of thc violin and ccllo; I idcntify thcm, sccondarily, with thc furioso rumbling of thc piano part, which providcs thc strings bold opcning thcmc with its harmonic support and with a microcosmic rhythmic grid. To my car, howcver, what is morc striking still is thc long-tcrm working o u t of thc rclationship among thc parts in thc rst movcmcnt. That is, thc piano part hardly rests from its tcchnically dcmanding passagcwork, playing at a much highcr tcchnical lcvcl than do thc strings; yct not until thc last turn to rccapitulation docs it participatc in thcmatic givc and takc with thc strings, and only thcn do its companions takc up a thcmc it has introduccd. Strings and piano might as wclI livc in separate worlds, worlds scparatcd with a rigidity that is unparallclcd in thc trio litcraturc as I know it. Yct thc piano in its ccasclcssly Supporting rolc has both thc most difcult part and thc most crucial part in articulating thc tonal plan of thc movcmcnts sonata form.

Feminist Theory, Music Theory

1'310.
Vivlioo.

I. Kabinen

Bunt. op. l l

Violunnllo .

EXAMPLE

Perspectives ofNew Music

EXAMPLE

1 (CONT.)

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Itisaveryoddpicceinthatwaygwhile notsooddinmostothaways. Its tonal plan, for instance, is not by itself remarkable. Nor do die nature of the themes seem promising candidates for the kinds of readings of sonata form as gendered discourse that Marcia Citron and Susan McClary have essayed: che sccond thcme is not very different from the rst, and is certainly no less angular, leaping, stylisdcally masculine. At best one might argue [hat the presence of a second maseuline theme where a feminine one ought to havc been (according to HensePs contemporary A.B. Marx) construes the discourse as having no room for the feminine (or no room for the feminine side of an actual woman composers thought) But the similaxity of thcmes could as easily be explained as a manifestation of Hensel: concem for organic unity, a concern revealed in countless details of this work. Indeed, as I think many fcminist critics have found, formal and tonal analysis by themselvcs seem not to reveal anything much about the gender of composem, or their experience of difference. Becausc I incline to think that a composes experience ofdifference will show up-if it does at allin a works eccentricity, I havc thought for years that the weird relationship of the piano and the stxings, amounting to a really striking imbalance in roles that is resolved at the recapitulation, is somehow the site where difTerence has been inscribed, described, or reconciled. I havc encountcred highly skcptical states when I have tried to take this position in classes or professional conversation. I now think that Lhe skeptical stares have been the result of my having rcspondcd t0 thc piece om a situation that is not professionally sanctioned, that of potential piano player. Only recently have I understood why that situation was not profcssionally sanctioned; and only recently have I had an idea of how fcminist thcory could help mc get around music theorys apparent preoccupation with thc tcxtlike nature of music, that is, with the grammar and syntax of pitches and durations. Here is my idca: I was interestcd in the relationship among parts a5 the place where this works gcnder subtext (and real drama) lay. Therc arc various ways I could makc a historical argument exploring analogies between the roles thc piano and strings play in relation to each othcr and the roles women and men in ninctcenth-century middlc-class life playcd in relation to each othcr. I could relate those analogies to thc srylistic norms of nineteenth-century trios, and to the shifting balance bctween piano and strings that is part of the genres history.5 But I thought an argumcnt by analogy to social relations by itself might be prerty wcak. I wanted to be more analytical about thcse particular roles in Hcnscls piece; and I wantcd a way to explain prcciscly how they changcd, and why their changing might count as thc reconciliation of tension onc cxpccts at thc recapitulation of a sonata form.

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Perspectives ofNew Musnc

Sincc music thcory as I havc known it is almost cxclusivcly about pitch Syntax, I didnt think it could hclp mc. But a combination of argumcnts from fcminist thcory sccmcd likc it could. In hcr cssay Gender: A Uscxl Catcgory of Historical Analysis, historian Ioan Scott argucs that gcndcr is a systcm of mctaphors about thc powcr rclationships bctwccn and among ccrtain kinds of bodics. Scott contcnds that mctaphors for gcndcr arc practically cvcrywhcrc in our public and private discoursc, and that tracking thcm tclls us intcrcsting things about oursclvcs and about how gcndcr intcrsccts with apparcntly ungcndcrcd parts of lifc. If gcndcr mctaphors actually da circulatc throughout a socictys discoursc, it sccms logical that gcndcr mctaphors arc circulating in a societys musicin thc sounds composcrs choosc, in thc ways pcoplc hcar thosc sounds and in thc associations thcy makc with thcm. Scotts thcorctical liccnsc to look for gcndcr mctaphors in thc oddcst placcs and thc strangcst transformations docs not by itsclf hclp mc to ground my hcaring of thc Hcnscl Trios drama. A morc important thinkcr for my nccds is philosophcr Iudith Butler. In hcr 1991 book Gender Traublc: Feminism und thc Subvention ofIdcntity, Butler argucs thc initially astonishing proposition that gcndcr is all an act.7 That is, both what fcminists havc takcn t0 Calling scx (thc biological congurations of bodics) and what wc call gcndcr (thc power relationships cxpcctcd of those bodics) rcsult from thc (obscssivc) repctition ofthc acts which constitutc idcntitics. For Butler, thcrc is no originary corc sclf which exprcsses idcntity by socially rccognizablc acts; rathcr, thc gcndcrcd self is thc cumulativc rcsult ofperfornmnccs. Lcaving asidc thc troubling or libcrating implications of thc idca that all our idcntitics arc littlc morc than claboratc drag shows, I want to focus on what I takc to bc thc most salicnt clcmcnt of Butlcrs thought for any pcrson cngagcd in a pcrformancc art: that gcndcr is pcrformcd; is performcd through countlcss actions thc aggrcgatc of which bccomcs rccognizablc both to thc pcrformcr and to hcr social companions as gendcr, as thc rolc she will play in a continually contcstcd systcm of relationships among bodies. If gcndcr is constitutcd by bodily pcrformanccs, and mctaphors of gcndcr arc constantly circulating through discoursc, might not clcmcnts of all bodily pcrformanccs bc rcad as mctaphors of gcndcr cvcn whcn thcy sccm to bc pcrformanccs of othcr things? If bodily pcrformanccs can bc both constitutivc ofgcndcr and mctaphors fbr gcndcr, thcn wc who study thc results of bodily pcrformanccs likc music might protably look t0 our subjcct as a sct of scripts for bodily pcrformanccs which may actually constitutc gcndcr for thc performcrs and which may bc rccogniz-

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l5

able as metaphors of gender for those who urimess the performers displays. Here thcn, is an intellectual ground from which I might tell my story about the role of the piano in Hensels Trio, a role which I initially hcard as cast and gendered feminine in relation to the theme-declaring strings, whose role I heard as gendered masculine. Is there evidence in the physica] actions and interactions of the parts that gcnder is either metaphorically or actually enacted by performers of I-IensePs score? I tried to answer this question by concocting an analysis that was hopelessly boring to read, but that considered the movements tonal, thematic, and relational scripts in tandem. I became more convinccd than ever that I had been right: for reading the tonal and thematic scripts of the movement mm the situation of the pianos role gave me a narrative that moved me in just the way and just the places that the music moves
me.

But what had I really done? I had started from a feminist theory that urged me to think about bodies, performers bodies, and I had instead slipped into thinking about textural roles as metaphors for social roles. Although I had conrmed for myself the intuition with which I began (and thus I am onc step closer to writing a cntical essay on Hensels Trio someday), I had not actually got much farther than I could have done by using the work of Edward Cone, who in various writingsnotably the essays of T71: Composcr: Voico-teaches us how to identify various parts of a musical whole as agents or personne, metaphors for human agency.8 But the implications of Butlers and Scotts thought do not necessarily lead me to this familiar Situation for critical knowledge. I at xst arrived at a Cone-style analysis as the result of having allowed long-standing mental habits to prevent a systematic application of the ideas I proposed to borrow. For the implication of Butlers theory, in particular, is that I ought to have been thinking about actuul bodies, not social roies. Indeed, that is partly what I did to conrm my intuitions about the social roles; it was the dropping of that thread, a difcult onc to pick up again, which caused me to think I should withhold that part of my argument until I can do it well. Whcn I write an essay on Hensels Trio, I will want to argue that Hensels script for the metaphorical social actions that resolve imbalances in her sonata-form movement is only readable if onc acknowledges the inextricable presence of the body in musica presence both musicologys and music thcorys focus on the intentions and the texts of composers scrupulously denies. Indeed, I suspect that Hcnscl wrote so much of this story into the relationship among physically enacted parts (as opposed to writing it into the relationship among notes or themes) because she undcrstood the tension surrounding her role as a woman

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Perspectives ofNew Music

nonpractices without the bodily practices they call forabout which it has become unthinkable to think. That is, we have changed an art that exists only when, so t0 speak, the Word is made Flesh, into an art which is only the Word. Metaphorically, we have denied the very thing that makes music music, the thing which gives it such cnormous symbolic and sensual power. I think there are theological, moral, and dass implications to this deniaJ of the esh in an art which cannot cxist without thc esh, but my job today is to explore the feminist implications of this delusion. In denying the bodily actions involved in any musics existence, we have taken a position on onc of our civilizations most fundamental and enduring philosophical dilemmas, the so-eallcd Mind/Body problem. In effect, we have rescued music for inclusion in the realm of the privileged position. Surely no onc needs to be rcminded how the elements in the Mind/ Body duality are gendered. Metaphorically, when music theorists and musicologists ignore the bodies whose performative acts constitute thc thing callcd music, we ignore the feminine. We erase her from us, cven at the price of mctaphorically silencing the music.

composer to bc as much metaphorical as it was real: it was metaphorical because the role of the composer is implicitly always gcndercd masculinc. Thc composcr is masculine not bccausc x0 many individual: who live in thc category an biologically male, but bccausc thc composer has come to be understood to bc mind-mind that creates pattcrns of sounds to which other mind: assign meanings.9 Thc rclationship of notcs to each other, bccausc susceptible to apprehcnsion a: mind by mind, could not contain HensePs story as I hear it, the story of a biological and metaphorical woman seeking cntry into masculine discoursc. Nor could music theory as I have known it help me tell the story l thought I heard, bccausc it is a discipline that identics nearly totally with the composer as mind, and which identics music as mind. Identication of both composer and music as mind may bc our disciplines version of what Donna Haraway calls the god tnck, the epistcmological illusion of allencompassing, and thus objective, knowlcdge. 1 Music, an art which self-evidently does not cxist until bodics make it and/or receive it, is thought about as if it were a mind-mind gamc. Thus, when we think analytically about music, what we ordinarily do is describe practices of the mind (thc composes choiccs) for the sake of informing the practices of other minds (who will assign meaning to the resulting sounds). We locate musical meaning in the audible communication of onc creating mind to a cocreator, onc whose highly attcntive listening is in effect a shared tenancy of the composcs subject position. We end by ignoring the fact that thcse practices of the mind are

Feminist Theory, Music Theory

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How could it ever be possible to hear (or read) the gender meta-_ phors in a music if we operate out of a paradjgm that has so fundamentally emsed the metaphorical feminine? Perhaps the gender metaphors are must richly therc, prccisely there in the work of bodies which, through years of discipline and minutes of intense labor bring forth music for our pleasure; preciscly there in the silenced metaphorical feminine, in the performative acts. Thus have I thought myself into an unthinkable position-the idea that a feminist music theory must include theorizing about (and analyzing with great care) the practiccs of bodies (real ones) as well as the practiccs of minds. And especially a feminist music theory would theorize about the practices of performing bodies, the bodies most likely to enact metaphors of gender or to enact the constitution of gender itself. What would such a theorizing be like? Would it add anything to our knowledgc of music or gender, or the relationship between them? First, l think such a theorizing would be more like feminist theory than it would be like traditional music theory, for traditional music theory consists more of answers-descriptions of practices which are understood to be objective and true-than ofquestions. Feminist theory, on the other hand, tends to consist more of questions, or of hypotheses around which to frame questions. At this point, theorizing about musical bodies would be characterized, I think, by the kinds of questions it would ask. It might interrogate the social and symbolic meanings embedded in the bodily techniques used to produce sounds. What disciplines are imposed on the bodies which produce the sound? What meanings are ascribed to the public display or the deliberate concealment of those disciplines? When do those meanings constitute gender for the performers? When can they be read as metaphors for gender by an audience? How do layers of meaning result -om the display and acknowledged concealment of a priori bodily disciplines in the actual performance of a work? And, especially in thinking about the actual performance of ensemble music, when individually scripted combinations of discipline display and discipline concealment interact in a collectively scripted way-how are individual self-control and submission to discipline displayed as a social performance, an acting out of individuals relationships to others whose scripts may allow them greater or lesser social power? We who spend our paid livcs thinking about music might suddenly need to spend a lot of time talking with our colleagues in the studios and practice rooms, in order to develop answers to these sorts of questions. We would certainly need to acknowledge that all the metaphors or constitutive acts of gender performed by musical bodies have been mediated by the performers minds. Indeed, we would need to acknowledge

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PcnpewvesoINewMusac

of making music is thc cxact sitc of an actual soludon to thc Inmd/lxxdy problcm (u,arguably, i: thc act of listcning attcntivcly t0 munic). A: auch, thc act of making music would sccm to b: a: least 1s likcly a placc for mctaphon of gcndcr (o bc found as is thc rclationship of nutcs u: cach othcr. A thcory of muaical bodics would most hclpfully thcorizc, I think, from a pcrformcr-ccntcrcd subjcct position, bccausc it is pcrformcrs who arc mm: ignorcd and dismisscd by a mind-mind conccption of music. Ilnlikc thc listcncr-as-mcntalpcrformcr or thc critic-as-mcntalpcrlbrmcr imagincd by Conc and othcrs, an actual cmbodicd pcrformcr knnws any work as a sct of actions to bc coordinatcd in particular ways. A pcrfurmcs composcr-idcntication is ncver as complctc as a listcncrs; wlnat impcdcs it is thc scnsc that thc work tcmporarily bccomcs not-thcwork, but instcad something you da. It is somcthing you do which is, whilc yourc doing it, cntircly cotcrminous with who you arc. Gctting to thc point of pcrformancc involvcs thinking about thc composcrs intentions, of coursc, and undcrstanding what will bc rcquircd of you if you arc to cithcr rcalizc or contradict thcm. But thc scorc is not thc work to a pcrformcr; nor is thc scorc-madc-sound thc work: thc work includcs thc pcrformcs mobilizing of prcviously studicd skills so as to cmbody, to a sct of rclationships that arc only partly makc rcal, t0 makc soundinF, 6 rclationships among sounds. Lct mc givc an cxamplc that is not cxplicitly fcminist, a passagc from thc big choralc prcludc on Aus ticfcr Not (Out of thc dcpths I cry t0 Thcc) in Bachs Cluvierbung, Part III, BWV 686 (Examplc 2). This is far and away thc most physically challcnging momcnt in thc piccc. Neithcr foot can rcst long cnough to balancc thc body, ncithcr hand can rcst long cnough to balancc thc body. For thcsc fcw tcrrifying mcasurcs (terrifying in thc organisfs cxpcricncc), onc might as wcll bc oating in midair, so confuscd and constantly shifting is thc bodys ccntcr of gravity. Thc tcrror-and thc difcultydisappcar at thc placc markcd by thc
(im thc act

arrow. Nonc of this is audiblc, cxccpt possibly as wrong notcs, muddlcd articulations, or somc subtlc way thc organists rcturn to bodily casc will rcsult in morc condcnt playing. Ccrtainly, ncithcr harmonic nor contra puntal analysis would idcntify this littlc passagc a5 critical to thc works mcaning, much lcss as what it is to thc pcrson playing thc piccc, thc climax.

Scnd mc thc gracc my spirit nccds. Gracc is arguably rcprescntcd for thc cocomposing ideal listcncr throughout thc phrasc in thc form of a dancc-likc bass. Gracc, dramatically rcprcscntcd as an abscncc by thc bodys craving for a placc to balancc, come: t0 thc otganist at thc cnd of

Yct this passagc scts thc phrasc of Out of thc dcpths which prays

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thc

Thcrc arc thus two mcssagcs about gracc hcrc: onc from Bachs to and thc othcr a private mcssagc thc cocomposing listcncr, mm5! frgm Bach s mmd through thc body of thc Organist to thc organisfs mmd (which is induccd to cnact a praycr statcfor a Luthcran, a statc of gracc).
phrasfc.

EXAMPLE 2

It sccms to mc self-cvidcnt that both mcssages arc part of thc works musical mcaning, cvcn though onc of thcm is unhcard. Traditionally wc of this dcvicc with sixtccnth-ccntury cquatc thc purcly physical rcading visiblc to thc perAugmmuxik (a kind of tcxt-rcprcscntation thats only formcrs, not audiblc to listcncrs), and dcclarc both to bc musically mcanas inglcssz" to d0 so, howcvcr, is to ncgatc thc possibility of pcrformcrs rcceivcrs of mcaning. To dcny musical mcaning to things only thc performcrs of a work will lcnow implicitly dcnics that pcrformcrs arc knowthcir minds crs, knowcrs whosc knowlcdgc comcs om thcir bodics and T0 (knowers whosc plcasurcs comc om thcir bodics and thcir minds).

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Perspectives ofNew Music

deny musieal meaning to purely physical, performative things is in effect to tmnsform human pcrformers into machines for the transmission of mind-mind mcssagcs between members of a mctaphorically disembodied class, and, because disembodied, elite. An embodied music theory, then, would include in its notion of musical meaning things which could not be heard by even the most attentive cocomposing iistener. What could an embodied music theory tell us about gender, the supposed intellectual focus of feminist cheory? What could it tell us about
music? If, as Ioan Scott argues, gender is always and everywhere a metametaphor of power; and if ultimately musical performances can be deciphered as simultaneously individual and soeial enactments of power (control of the self and control of tools; cooperarion with, Support of, dornination of ones companions), then we might leam a great deal about how the norms of gender pass sideways through society by watching them pass through such bodily actions as musical performance. Indeed, we might discover implicit as well as explicit gendering attached to certain musically performarive acts, from which we could learn enormous amounts about how music teaches or (possibly more importantly) unteaches gender. For music draws its performers (and possibly its listeners) bodies into enacting physical and psychic intimacy with what thinkers as ehronologically diverse as Giovanni Maria Artusi and Edward Hanslick have idemied as musics body, sound itselfm These enactments of intimacy allow for play with the power dualities implied by our contemporary gender System. Thus, it may be that we will discover that much of the pleasure in music is afforded the opportunity it gives us

Such Lheorizing might lead Lhinking about music, European or Eurocentric music anyway, in quite unlikely directions. It might considcr the nodon that musical choicesrlike ones instrument or mediummight be gendered in unexpected ways, not for what the instrument or medium seemed t0 represent but for what its performance encouraged one to enact; or for how it characteristically interacted; or for how its performance eharacteristically negotiatcd the relationship of body and mind. It might consider the hypothesis that in our time musieal performance is always gendered feminine because it so involves the body; thus, perhaps, musical performance has acquired the negative prestige usually bornc by the mark of the feminine. If (hat were so, or to the extent (hat it was, a career in musical performance of any kind would require complex negotiations on the part of performers seeking to reclaim their masculinity or their social prestige. An embodied music theory might consider the

to play ourselves free of genders rigidities}

b!

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2|

incrcasing modernist control of performance and, in a largely recordedmusic culture, the virtual erasure of performance from the idea music as a means of undcrstanding the value of the metaphorically feminine in our high culture. It might thereby understand better the virtual disappearance of musical performance as a behavior considered suitable for responsible adults. It might investigate the phenomenon that singing, in both art and pop musics, is a thing more likcly to be done by women than by men (I mean singing alone, without apparent mastery of an instrument). Is this phenomenon related to ideas of the body as feminine? For surely singing is the most fully embodied kind of music-making and paradoxically, therefore, the one which most demands what a piano student of mine once callcd rigorous mind control, the integration of a persons mind and body to a singlc end. Is singings full embodiedness related to the longterm trend in European art music that has deprivileged vocal music in
favor of instrumental? Does that long-term trend, acted out from the sixteenth through the twentieth centuries, tell us something important about our cultures responses to the feminine? These are questions I would like to explore. They dont sound at rst like questions a music theorist would want to ask; at least they dont sound so to me, a person who has long supposed that theory was mainly about the syntax of musics most textlike elements. Certainly, it is hard to imagine how to apply this kind of thinking to the hearing of a particular work-which is why I ran aground in my effort to do so. I think it possible, in fact, that this sort of thinking undermines a focus on works, because works are the products of a composers mind, and this is a thinking intendcd to complement composer-identied thinking with performer- (and ultimately listener-) identied thinking. While my goal is to use such complementary thinking as a means to better understand the intersections of music and gender, a corollary goal of such thinking would be to restore a recognition of the bodys actuaI contribution to the web of meanings understood by the word music. We as listeners and critics can hear much of what musical bodies do, and in so hearing we more fully know the Mind/Body resolution which music promises-cven if we know it only with our minds. Weescape the limitations of the mind-mind game by acknowledging in our dcscriptions (analyses, hearings) the mediations and meanings of bodies. Thus, we stand to know music more inmately if we know it as a complex conversation of (situated) minds and (situated) bodies. And sincc gender is the system of power relationships among bodies, we cannot possibly know all the gender content there might be in a given work without understanding how our musics complex conversations require actual bodies to behave.

22

Perspectives ofNew Music

I think this sort of thinking will cvcntually bc callcd by thc narnc of whatcvcr disciplinc givcs it a homc. Music thcory sccms onc likcly placc for that homc bccausc bcsidcs offcring us a sct of practiccs to analyzc thc. and structurc of Syntax works tcxtlikc qualitics, music thcory has a long tradition of thcorizing about thc phcnomcnon that is music. In thc modcm cra, spcculation about music has not bccn thc dominant strand of music thcory-but it has ncvcr quitc gonc away, cithcr. And it is in that philosophy-oricntcd corncr of thc disciplinc" that I would cxpcct a thcory of musical bodics to ourish. In thc xturc, if such a thcory can lcnd its insights to practitioncrs of thc composcr-idcnticd thcory so wcll dcvclopcd in thc mainstrcam, thcory would havc bccomc what this fcminist wants: a thcory that can rcsolvc or transccnd thc Mind/Body problcm, a thcory that can cxplain how musical cngcnder us, a thcory that gracticcs 0 would thcn bc worthy of music itsclf.

Feminin Theory. Musoc Theory

73

Norr-zs

1. Donna Haraway, Situated Knowledges: The Science Question in Feminism and the Privilege of Partial Perspective, Feminin Studie: l4 (1988): 575-99.

2. Fanny Mendelssohn-Hemd, Trio in D minor: vr piano, violin und cello, op. 11, introduction by Victoria Sirota (New York: Da Capo Press, 1980). At least four recordings are available: by the Macalester Trio for Vox Records (SVBX 5112, 1979); by Iean-Claude Bouveresse, Hughes Mackenzie, and Francoise Tillard for Calliope Records (CAL 1213-14, 1984); by the Clementi Trio for Largo Records (5103 Largo, 1986); and by the Dartington Piano Trio for Hyperion Records (CDA66331 I-Iyperion, 1989). 3. See Susan McClary, A Material Girl in Bluebeards Castle in Feminine Endingr; Marie, Gender und Sexuulity (Minneapolis and Oxford: University of Minnesota Press, 1991), 1-34, especially 12-17; her ideas on sonata form as gendered discourse are also central to the argument of the essay Sexual Politics in Classical Music, op. cit. 53-78. Marcia Citrons reading of sonata form as gendered discourse is most illy elaborated in the fourth chapter of her forthcoming book Gender und the Musical Cunon (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993). I am very grateful to Professor Citron for having allowed me to read this chapter in typescript. 4. A. B. Marx, Die Lehre von der musikalischen Komposition (Leipzig, 1845). His clearest reference to the gendering of themes, oen cited, is on page 273:
In diesem Paar von Satzen ist . . . der Hauptsatz das zuerst, also in erster Frische une Energie Bestimmte, mithin das energischer, markiger, absoluter Gebildete, das Herrschende und Bestimmende. Der Seitensatz dagegen ist das nach der ersten energischen Feststellung Nachgeschafie, zum Gegensatz dienende, von jenem Vorangehenden Bedingte und Bestimmte, mithin seinem Wesen nach nothwendig das Mildere, mehr schmiegsam als markig Gebildetc, das Weibliche gleichsam zu jenem vorangehenden Mannlichen. Eben in solchem Sinn ist jeder der beiden Stze ein Andres und erst beide miteinander ein Hheres, Vollkommneres.

In this pair ofthemes . . . the main theme is the rst one, therefore rst and foremost the decisive one in eshncss and energy,

hvspeetnmolNe-vnx

therefore the one eonstrucred rnore energetically, more vigoeously, more completely-the dominant one und the decisive one. The subsidiary theme. on the other hand, serves as contmt, constructed and determined by the preceding, thus by nature necessarily the gentle, culrivated more exibly than Vigorously-the feminine, a: ir were, to that preeeding maseuline.
ln this seme each of the rwo themes is different and only with the other becomes something higher, more perfect.

1 am grateful to Professor Citron for leading me to rhis exact passage, and for this translation. . For an overview ofthe genres history, see Basil Smallman, 771e Piuno Trio: lt: Hirtory, Teebnique und Repertoire (Oxford: Oxford Universiry Press, 1990).

sis" in Gender und the Politie: ofHirtory (New York: Columbia University Press, 1988), 28-50. . Iudith P. Butler, Gender Trouble: Feminin und the Subvention of Identity (New York: Routledge, 1990). See also her essay Imitation and Gender Insubordination, in Inside/Out: Lesbiun Theories, Guy Theories, ed. Diana Fuss (New York: Routledge, 1991), l33l. . Edward T. Cone, 771e Computer: Voiee (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1974). Cones boolt has proven to be the source for much of the most inventive music criticism of the last decade. Anthony Newcomb has made particularly fruitful use of Cones ideas about musical personne, particularly in such essays as Once More between Absolute and Program Music: Schumanns 2nd Symphony, 19th Century Marie 7 (1984): 233-50; and Schumann and Late 18th-Century Narrative Strategies, 19th Century Marie 11 (1987): 164-74. Carolyn Abbate has made equally good use of Cones ideas in her recent book Umimg Voiees: Opern und Musical Nurrutive in the Nineteenth Century (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991). . For an early articulation of the value that great music should be that understood as a mindmind game, see E. T. A. Hoffmanns famous 1813 essay on Beethovens instrumental music in Smtliche Werke, ed. C. G. von Maasen (Munich and Leipzig, 1908), vol. 1, 55-64. Excerpts from the essay are translated in Williarn O. Strunk, Saure: Reuding: in Marie Hirtory (New York: W. W. Norton, 1950), 77581. In a passage discussing the intrinsic unity underlying Beethovens

. Ioan Wallach Scott, Gender: A Useful Category of Historical Analy-

Feminist Theory. Music Theory

Fih Symphony, Hofnann dcscribcs (hat unity as consisdng of a dccpcr rclationship which docs not rcvcal itsclf in this way [by man: of thc famous rhythmic motivc] spcaks at othcr timcs only from mind to mind . . . (Strunk, 778).

l0. Haraway, Situatcd Knowlcdgcs, 587. l1. For a particularly cloqucnt prcscntation of this position, scc Edward T. Conc, Thc Authority of Music Criticism, [ournal oftbc Ammcan Musicological Socicty 34 (1981): 1-18. In this cssay, Conc sccms to arguc that critical knowlcdgc of a piccc of music is only availablc through its pcrformancc, real or imagincd (l5). Yct thc pcrformcr hc imagincs is curiously omniscicnt, having a knowlcdgc of picccs of music that is, in an cmbodicd rcality, availablc only to pcrformcrs of solo rcpcrtoirc. For all othcr kinds of picccs, Concs pcrformcr/critic must know thc music through an imagincd pcrformancc-a discmbodicd pcrformancc that is thcrcforc closcr to thc Situation of knowlcdgc Conc Calls conccption than to that which hc calls pcrccption, thc apprchcnsion of a piccc by physical can. Composcr and critic mcct, thcn, in thc discmbodicd world of conccption. Conc implics that somctimcs thc critic has a clcarcr idca of that world than thc composcr. Thus, by implication, thc mccting of composcr and critic in this world can occasion a compctition bctwccn thcm for conccptual compctcncy. 12. Whcn an carlicr vcrsion of this cssay was rcad at thc 1992 annual mccting of thc Socicty for Music Thcory, scvcral auditors found my suddcn usc of thcological languagc startling, if not on thc vcrgc of offensive. I mcant to usc imagcry that would startlc, and felt that usc of thcological imagcry was consistcnt with much of thc languagc of profcssional music thcory, cspccially thc work of Conc. I ccrtainly did not mcan to privilcgc thc vicw of any traditional Europcan religion ovcr that of any othcr; rathcr, I mcant to draw attcntjon to thc way that wc havc comc to usc classical music as a sourcc of religious cxpcricncc, including thc kind of cxpcricncc that tcmporarily rcsolvcs thc pcrcnnial Mind/Body problcm. For two vcry diffcrently situatcd ovcrvicws on thc usc of classical music as a sourcc of rcligious cxpcricncc, scc Carl Dahlhaus, T71: Idm ofAbsolut: Music, trans. Roger Lustig (Chicago and London: Univcrsity of Chicago Press, 1989), and Lawrcncc Lcvinc, Highbraw, Lowbraw: T72: Emergencc ofCultural Hierarcby in Amcrica (Cambridgc, Mass.: Harvard Univcrsity Prcss, 1988), cspccially chaptcr two Thc Sacralization of Culturc.
'

26

PeIspetvvesofNew/hxue

l3. I have intentionally used languagc her: that would evoke the imagery of birth, to suggest the possibility that pan of academic music: reisal to contemplate the work of performing bodics anses from just such an intuitive connection between musical performance and birth-giving, the rcisal to contemplate it being a manifestation of our cultural horror of the act of birth-giving. l4. Such interrogations are already addressed to non-Europcan musics, both by ethnomusicologists and by participants in the cultures in question. See, for example, John Baily, Musical Structurc and Human Movement in Musical Structure und Cognition, ed. Peter I-Iowell, Ian Cross, and Robert West (London: Academic Press, 1985), 237-58, on the greatcr importance of kincsthetic patterns than sound patterns in the playing of the African kalimba. And scc Bcll Yung, Choreographic and Kinesthetic Elements in Performance on the Chinese Seven-string Zither, Ethnomusicolagy 28 (1984): 505-17. I am grateful to Ioscph Dubiel for pointing out these refcrences to me. 15. See Roland Barchess famous essay Musica Practica, in The Remousibility ofForms: Critical Etmys an Marie, Ar: und Reprexentation, trans. Richard Howard (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985), 261-66, for a beautiilly distilled explication of the performing bodys apprehension of music as somcthing you do. 16. This performer-situated idea of what a musical work is differs substantially from that proposed by Roman Ingarden in 171e Worlz of Marie und the Problem ot: Identity (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1986). In chapter 1, The Musical Work and Its Performance, Ingarden argues that musical works do exist independent of any performances. l7. The imputation of meaninglcssness to Augenma} was rst madc in Alfred Einsteins monumental 771e Italiun Mudrggal (Princcton: Princeton University Press, 1949). His valuation of compositional gesmres comprehensible only to the performers holding partbooks has remained a commonplace of the scholarly literaturc on madrigals.

18. Artusi and Giulio Cesare Monteverdi both referred to soundarmoniar-as constituting the body of music (as distinct from its soul) in the various documents which made up the so-callcd ArtusiMonteverdi controversy at the turn of the scventeenth century. See Claude Palisca, The Artusi-Monteverdi Controversy in 771e Nerv Monteverdi Companiou, ed. Nigel Fortune (New York: Norton, 1985), 127-58, and my essay Gendering Modern Music: Thoughts

Feminist Theory, Music Theory

on the Montcvcrdi-Artusi Controvcrsy, Journal ofthe Amcrican Musicological Socicty 46 (1993): 1-25, for two vicws of the rhetoric used in this controversy. On Hanslicks vicws in this regard, sec Frcd Everett Maus, Hanslicks Animism, journal of Musicology l0 (1992): 273-92.
19. On musical performance as a performes acting o u t of intimacy with the piece played, see my On a Lesbian Relationship with Music: A Serious Effort Not to Think Straight in Qucering the Pitch: Tbe Nm Guy and Lcsbian Musicologics, ed. Philip Brett, Gary Thomas, and Elizabeth Wood (New York: Routlcdgc, 1993). 20. Versions of this essay were presented at Gender and Music Theory: A Symposium, University of Virginia, October 1992; at the 1992 Annual Meeting of the Society for Music Theory, October 1992; and at the conference Feminist Theory and Music II: A Continuing Dialogue, Eastman School of Music, June 1993. I am very grateful to Ioseph Dubiel, Marion Guck, Marianne Kielian-Gilbert, and William Benjamin for their comments on early drafts of this paper. I am gratell, too, to my colleagues Elizabeth Hudson, Fred Everett Maus, and Alicyn Warren for extrcmely incisive and helpful criticisms; and I acknowledge the inuence on my thinking of long conversations with Gloria Trode, a singer in Syracuse, New York, and with Eric Stassen, a percussionist and conducting student at the University of Virginia. I dedicate this essay to Margaret McFadden, whose gracexl struggle with the Mind/Body problem since the summer of 1992 is the essays inspiration.