8.

POLITICS AS MUSIC: THE SOUND OF IDEAS AND IDEOLOGY

Frith and Scruton, in joining aesthetics to ethics and identity, become part of a long-
established tradition, in which music becomes a central feature of the way lives are lived and
assessed. It is a tradition that places music at the heart of politics, but it is also a tradition that
has been largely neglected, at least by those who study political thought and action.
Music as moralit: Plato a!" Aristotl#
Plato insisted that types of music could be distinguished morally as well as aesthetically, and
the music of a lesser quality was a danger to the social order. usic had the capacity to wor!
upon the soul and to bring harmony. "ecause music was of such importance, it was necessary
for judgement to be made about its particular qualities. It was not just a matter of taste. For
Plato, such decisions had to be made by those capable of so doing. usic was too politically
important to be left to the people.
For #ristotle, as with Plato, musical education was important to the wider political order. Its
purpose was to enlighten and to lift its beneficiaries above the lot of other mortals.
In such arguments, we hear not just the claim that music is an important feature of the good
life, but that discrimination between forms of music is not simply an e$pression of taste% it is a
matter of morality and political order.
T$# sou!" o% sil#!c#: Ho&&#s' Mill a!" Mar(
&hey had little or nothing to say on the subject of music.
Music as la!)ua)# a!" #motio!: *#a! + *ac,u#s -ouss#au
'ousseau echoed Plato and #ristotle in viewing music in moral terms and according it social
importance. (hat he added was a sense of music)s relationship to identity and emotion, and
their place in the formation of human society. *e argues that music)s power is greater than
that of the other arts because it generates the feelings directly. &he languauge of sound and
hearing caters for social, collective needs, by which he meant moral needs, the passions. &he
emotions, particulary compassion, find e$pression in the way sound becomes the basis of
organi+ed co-e$istence. For him, music articulates the emotions. &hevoice does not directly
imitate the emotion, but ma!es it present.
*is theory places music at the heart of the social order as the means by which humans come
to !now themselves and each other. &he quality of music is not a matter of taste%it is lin!ed to
moral quality.
*e lin!s different political orders to different sound and music. (hat is important about
'ousseau is that music becomes a vital aspect of human communication that is directly
implicated in forms of political order.
Music as co!solatio! a!" "#solatio!: Fri"ric$ Ni#t.sc$#
*e claims that art and not morality is the true metaphysical activity of men. usic is
profoundly connected to a sense of identity, albeit a sense that is shattered in the musical
e$perience. *e too! a view that collective music-ma!ing is the form of art that brings us as
close as it possible for us to come to the e$perience of the basic truth that our individual
identity is an illusion.
Music as co!trol a!" !#)atio!: T$#o"or A"or!o
*e places music within a particular political economy, that of capitalism. *is theory of music
was to be uderstood li!e *ollywood films, as an artefact of mass production. It is a
commodity which has been standardi+ed, so each pop hit is the same lenght, e$presses the
same sentiments. &he tric! is that while being standardi+ed, such songa appear as individual
and different. It is this illusion that provides a mechanism of ideological control and of profit.
usic performs for #dorno a vital function in pacifying those who might otherwise challenge
the system under which they live.
From this perspective, music shapes our sense of the world and our response to it.
-# + &irt$ o% a tra"itio!
For #ttali and #dorno, the commerciali+ation and commodification of music has resulted in
its banali+ation, popular music and roc! have been recuperated, coloni+ed, saniti+ed.
-ane "ennett claims that our sentiment have to be energi+ed% they require an embodied
sensibility.. It is not enough just to view something as unjust or unfair. (e have to feel it.
&hrough singing, through the rhythms of repetition, "ennet argues, we are conected to others
and enchanted by our world, She claims that this effect provides the motivation we need to act
on behalf of others. usic, in this sense, mobili+es politics.
From music to i"#olo)
(e !now what it means to tal! of conservative music. (e mean those songs whose
sentiments accord with a conservative political agenda.
/onservativism is not just attributed to individuals and ideologies, it is also attributed to entire
genres. ost familiarly, country music is described as conservative, partly because of its
propensity to loo! bac!, both lyrically and musically. It celebrates the old ways and the old
days. #lso, heavy metal and indy roc!.
#udiences too may be described as 0conservative. where it is meant that they, li!e the
indusrty and certain performers, are happier with what they !now, and are reluctant to
e$periment.
If the mainstream is conservative, it is because it is constituted as conservative.
# wor! of art can be politically radical and aesthetically conservative, and vice-versa.
-a"ical critics a!" co!s#r/ati/# art
'adical critics while not following e$actly the same path mapped out by popular critical
discourse, share much in their condemnation of culture as conservative. It always is a
condemnation, and it is one that applies to the politics and aesthetics of the culture, its
performers and its audiences.
El#)a!tl co!s#r/ati/#
'oger Scruton critici+es youth culture, and pop in particular, for being a culture which is
largely indifferent to traditional boundaries, traditional loyalities, and traditional forms of
learning. *is argument is that these gestures nof protest belie and encrypt a deeper concern,
the inability to register real feelings. &his is because the music is e$ternali+ed by wich he
means taht it does not issue from an organic musical form or aesthetic vision.
Music as co!s#r/atism
/onservatives believe in tradition, but not necessarily in nostalgia. &here are different
conservative traditions.
&he conservatives and radicals might listen to different music, but they value it in similar
ways.
0. O!# mor# tim# 1it$ %##li!): music as 2olitical #(2#ri#!c#
T$# 2o1#r o% music
usical e$periences are 0tagged. neurologically as important.
1ovdje se opisuje sva2ta, od toga da br3i itam gla+be u restoranu idu4anu poti5e br3u
!on+umaciju hrane i ve4u potro2nju i sl.6
Music a!" com2assio!
7ussbaum suggests that not all forms of music are equally capable of tapping emotions. For
her, music is a form of 0symbolic representation. a!in to language, but not identical to it, and
that it has an intimate connection with our emotinal dephts by which emotinal materila is
embodied in peculiarly musical forms. usic provides access to emotions in ways that
language cannot because it cannot bypass the intellectual defenses we have cope with the
world.
*er view of music is lin!ed to a larger set of claims about the role of compassion in personal
and communal relations, and in liberal democracy more generally.
Music a!" 2olitical ima)i!atio!
usic can be seen as a product of, and producer of, forms of social organi+ation.
In sharing in a song, the participants come to understand and e$perience a political ideal.
Music as 2olitical /alu#s: t$# %##li!) o% %r##"om
&he organi+ation and the performance of the music wor! to create a political idea, or rather
the feeling evo!ed by political ideal. ingus understood music to do more than describe a
principle, but to live it, and to live it as part of a community.
Music as commu!it
&he uses of music to brand a political identity may be misguided, but their intentions are clear
enough, to create an imagined community for the supporters to share.
Music as t$# #(2#ri#!c# o% 2olitics
(hat all these dimensions of music)s engagement with politics have in common 8 is the
thought that music ma!es it possible to e$perience them.
Co"a
usic has the capacity to ma!es us do and feel things that we would not otherwise, and it
does so with immediacy and directness. It has the capacity to ma!e the ordinary special.
usic can help constitute identities and communities,it can create organi+ation and
institutions% it can embody ideals and values.