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. . . no serious work has yet
been done on the relationship
between music as a science and music as a means of expression. In logical
sequence the most recent studies in this field go back to the eighteenth
century, since when there have been nothing more than studies in acoustics,
nothing really new, no basic investigation of the structural relations
possible between the language of music and the language of science, though
the one is founded on the other. I think that all today’s discoveries,
whether in the instrumental or the electro-acoustic field, demand a much
wider basis, and to achieve this we need a kind of general school, or laboratory,
where researchers in different disciplines can study these problems with
a view to finding solutions applicable to music. This would at least avoid
a great many misunderstandings.
You may well object—as many others have done—that music is not a science. It is indeed a purely individual means of expression reflecting an interior expression, not just a putting-together of mathematical structures. But, as I say, the language has not really been investigated for almost two centuries, and it is high time that this should be done. . . .
Pierre Boulez
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