Music as an existential phenomenon and the main trends of its understanding in the history of culture

Odintsova Dar'ya Dmitrievna Postgraduate student of the Department of Philosophy and Social Sciences of the I.A. Bunin Yelets State University 399770, Russia, Lipetsk region, Yelets, Kommunarov str., 15 darina2008.90@mail.ru

Interpretation of musical art in different periods

Musical art is one of the oldest types of art that expresses human existence. D. I. Bakhtizina defines music as "the most abstract art form capable of rising to the highest levels of generalization of being" [1 p. 41]. Music is able not only to reflect the state of the human spirit, but also to form personal qualities, enriching the sensual principle. There is a spiritual work of the listener, which leads to purification.

Such scientists as A. F. Losev ^[2], V. P. Shestakov ^[3], A. S. Klyuev ^[4] were interested in the knowledge of the nature of music. To understand the nature of music means to find the source of the universe, to understand the essence of man.

The interpretation of music as an image of world harmony belongs to the Roman philosopher, music theorist Severin Boethius ^[5]. He classified music into three components:

- the world, which manifests itself in the interaction of natural elements and the connections of the seasons ("harmony of the spheres");

- human, finds expression in the relationship of soul and body;

            - instrumental, played by playing instruments driven by strings or by exhaling air to perform sounds.

Later, Adam of Field, in his treatise On Music, combined these two types into natural, divine music. And isolated instrumental music belonging to artificially created music.

In the XIX century, A. Schopenhauer summarized the thoughts of his predecessors, offering an interpretation of music as the cosmic world principle, the world will ^[6]. The sound of individual planets and the universe as a whole is correlated with the timbres of the human voice. Thus, the pattern of similarity of the structure of the Universe with being is revealed. The formation of the structure of the universe is dominated by sound waves having a certain height, which serves as the main material for musical art.

According to the doctrine of musical ethos: "any element that forms music as an art form – fret, rhythm, meter, timbre, melody and even a separate piece of music as a whole, has an ethos, i.e. a unique character [4 p. 40]. The interpretation of music as a semblance of character has an ancient Greek origin. Ancient Greek philosophers and theorists of musical art distinguished frets and identified them with different characters. So for example: Dorian mode – courageous and restrained, Lydian – deplorable, Ionian – easy, accessible, Aeolian – expressing a feeling of love, Mixolidian – passionately plaintive, and Phrygian – orgiastic. Each fret got its name from ancient nationalities, which, therefore, had their own character. In the Middle Ages, based on the theory of "musical ethos", John of Damascus ^[7] chose eight modes of ancient Greek music, which in Christian culture acquired the name "voices". D. Tsarlino in the Renaissance continued the thought of his predecessors, adding that the mode can affect human emotions and feelings.

The 2nd half of the XIX century became an important stage in the development of the idea of musical art not only as a manifestation of the emotional state of a person, but also the expression of feelings and experiences of an entire nation.

At the turn of the XX – XIX centuries, a person's emotional experiences are interpreted as manifestations of the activity of his consciousness. Here there is a division of thought in two directions: Western and domestic. Representatives of the Western trend E. Husserl ^[8], N. Hartman ^[9], R. Ingarden ^[10] believed that "the activity of human consciousness is the internal activity of consciousness." Russian thinkers (V. V. Medushevsky ^[11], A. N. Sokhor ^[12], E. V. Nazaikinsky ^[13]), on the contrary, believed that "consciousness is an external factor of human existence in society."

Confessional words in the musical art

So vocal or choral art, as a kind of natural human music, is a way of encouraging a believer to break his heart. Here it is appropriate to recall the words of Basil the Great "the psalm is a divine and musical harmony; it contains words that do not amuse the ear, but depose and tame evil spirits who confuse souls subject to their attacks." Hence it is appropriate to talk about the role of the word in the musical art.

The information received by a person through auditory activity (be it a sound or a word) is more subtle and is able to penetrate into the subconscious and be deposited in the bowels of the brain. A musical form can contain the movement of human thought from its origin as such to reflection as a result of mental activity. The revelations of the human soul are a bright feature of musical art, thanks to which the sound resonates in the hearts of listeners. Revelation can manifest itself both through musical language and through words. In this case, the word is considered as a guide to confession and repentance.

M. S. Uvarov paid attention to the issue of confessional words in general and in music in particular. He believed that "the confessional word is born not as a sound, even if it is the most benevolent and gracious, but as a condition of spiritual and moral perfection" ^[14]. Only true repentance and the subsequent sense of shame, perhaps, is the only form of human experience, thanks to which a person is not able to repeat the sin committed. The spirit of repentance embraces the timeless stay of the individual, affects the mind and heart of the penitent, which cannot be reduced to any spoken words. Confessional arises in the process of an internal mental dispute of a person addressed to himself.

In the modern world, the meaning of the confessional word is present not only in religious, but also in secular experience. In secular society, confessional is public, which is reflected in the literary genre of "autobiography" and in various musical genres. L. V. Beethoven is able to express a "monologue without words", a personal truth, with music alone.

Music and the relationship of time and space

Human life is strictly enclosed in time and space. Music, in turn, is outside of space. She is, as it were, out of time ^[15]. Heidegger believes that "music voices the tragedy of humanity trapped in time and space, in search of an answer to the question of the immortality of the soul" ^[16]. The power of music lies in the ability to express the spiritual self, which desperately strives for wholeness, but cannot find it. This is most clearly expressed in the melody of descending tones, when harmony tends to the tonic, to the final cadence, but does not reach its end. It is at these moments that the music reminds the listener of the imperfection of human nature, of the imperfection of the human "I" that he is. In this space-time sounding of the melody, it tells about the inexorable movement from the origin of life to eternal rest, about the history of human existence.

"Time, in principle, cannot be quantified by measurement. Most likely, time consists of moving periods and sequences of various durations" ^[15]. If all emotional "encounters" and experiences are felt out of time, then the person accordingly retains the emotional experiences that were at one time or another. These are the memories that create a kind of historical past, form and inform a person about who he is. The identity of each person is constructed analytically, through a return to memories. Thus, a person places his real life in time and space.

The philosophical question of the nature of time was investigated by such scientists as Heidegger ^[16], Levinas ^[17], Riker ^[18]. The emerging contradictions between time and being, the eternal and the coming serve as the basis for the movement of the entire system of philosophical fundamental concepts. Since the time of Kant, the concept of "time" has been established internally, and "space" has been rejected from man and expresses external nature ^[19]. In historical processes, time and space are in close unity, even to the point of indistinguishability. In general, it is necessary to explore time and space in their directions, states and transitions from one to the other. The time boundaries are more distinct in relation to the images of places and open spaces. The cashier combines orientation in directions with the natural changes of day and night, with the transition from light to darkness, with a value approach to the sacred-profane. He argues that "the primary religious feeling is determined by a 'transition', a change of state" ^[20]. In the archaic understanding, time and space are extremely connected, have no differences. Time arises at the moment of transition, at the junction of borders. A lot of transitions are transformed into a plot, a sequence of events that comes from the prototype of the original being. The reality of leaving one place and acquiring another arises through transformation as an established locality that has fixed what has been left and what has been achieved again. The primary musical and artistic "hints" of arrival unambiguously subdivide the "transitivity" of the transcendent realm. So the "countries of death" in ancient civilizations were real localities, territories, rivers could represent the true reality and metaphysical chthonicity.

This circumstance is interpreted in a structural and semantic framework, gaining indirect expression in a liturgical and symbolic interpretation. The description of states recognizes the concept of "now", further movement through time and coming to the final place. According to Cassirer, "primary time is transformed by the expression of spatial relations into empirical real time" ^[20]. Spatial relations were divided into opposites: light-darkness, day-night. This concept contains the insight of understanding time. These opposite meanings are not depersonalized, but are enclosed in a connection between each other, in a connection between life and death. If the modern perception of death is interpreted as irreversibility, then the archaic perception is explained as stepping over the edges of the everyday. Thus, "death is the original rebirth, but every rebirth is a small death" ^[19]. Death is unique in its kind, turns the individual-personality into the opposite concept of "time" – "eternal". D. M. Spector differentiates time into "primary" and "real" empirical. The unity of time and place is stored within temporality. Man's being is not separated from death, but is part of his space; the environment is not separated from the transcendent, being part of the eternal and being realized in time and space.

The driving force of the spirit, just like music, finds its support in the core of existence, where bodily disunity is perfected into a single, eternal before separation. Thus, time arises in a spatial gap due to its forcing. "Time is the time of overcoming disunity" ^[19]. The boundary of time is transformed from a barrier into a symbolic unity.

The narrative of the person himself about his life is always disputed and not objective, because memories can undergo changes. If such a temporary awareness is contrasted with a spatial awareness of completeness, then music provides a deeper and truer concept of self-awareness, in an effort to gain greater redemptive power, repentance. Thus, a cadence turn that completes a piece of music (it may not be in the original key) is perceived as a resolution of the conflict, a harmonic completion.

Music is highly conventional. Musical sounds should constantly change each other in time to create a musical canvas, give a sense of continuity. After they reach the ear, they disappear and remain in the past, but the one who listens to them keeps this past with a real sound in his memory. Thus, the structure of the continuous narrative of the work is created. Music arranges sounds, but at the same time music is always ready for modulation and new arrangements. She's kind of playing with time. Equivalent pauses in a piece of music may differ in the sound time. The change of meter indicates anxiety, impermanence, which causes emotions of a different spectrum in the listener. Thus, music makes a person listen to himself, to his feelings and experiences. So, in the process of modulation, there may be a change of fret from minor to major, thereby the melody challenges to question its subjective emotional moods and considers human passions as an integral part of identity, but not of the "I" as a whole.

Time control over music and the interaction of music with time allow you to improvise and syncopate temporary rhythmic forms, changing the time space, shortening or stretching the indicators of music. According to Begbie: "the temporal freedom of music is best characterized in terms of its difference from the everyday sense of time and independence from it" ^[21]. Whereas we understand time as the result of intensive interaction with temporality, which is integral to the world. The idea of spiritual music is that it explores the meaning of human, temporal-transcendent, spatial relations to the Divine.

In this case, music is considered as a temporary record of human existence. A person's life, regardless of what strong emotions he experiences, continues in the inexorable flight of time. E. Barnes, as a lexicographer, fills his musical compositions with textural density with the help of words accompanied by music. He discovers the depth of the texture of human existence, which gives the space distinctness. When the listener invades the moments of the composer's personal space with the help of music, he comprehends not only musical harmony, but also the delivery of sound in time, the timbre of music in the spatial dimension.

The emotional coloring of the work is revealed due to the density of the resonance of sound in space. An attempt to reproduce polyphonic complexity vertically transforms the time dimension into a linear one. Therefore, listening to music only in the horizontal plane means limiting the auditory perspective of playback. If you listen to the vertical sequence (chord consonance), you are more likely to encounter an auditory imitation of the human condition of an innate lack of worldly existence, which is recognized in musical harmony as an anticipating figure of the impending final and perfect cadence.

According to Begbie, "the desire to explore the spatial depth of musical notation is argued with the consonance of the temporal aspect of human experience with the movement resulting from the nascent creative act of God, who, creating the world and everything around, places a person in time" ^[21]. Music is supposed to be progressively moving sounds in time. Among other things, music is tied to the auditory range, which is manifested in how a composer can innovatively explore the creative freedom of a musical compositional language in overtones or chordal sound. Thus, a musical composition can not only affect the musical time, but also affect the volume of musical space.

At J. In this regard, the question arises: "Without the truths of music, what would our soul be filled with at the end of life?" ^[22]. Probably, music in time and space is the fundamental structure of human existence. The experience of being a person in time is also the experience of being in space, with a complex structural dimension. And if music contains a theological meaning, then the spatial aspect of the musical content, directly, can similarly contain a religious basis. 

Internal conflict and its reflection in music

The language of music can serve as an instructive means of considering the space of the inner self as an area of sensory cognition. Musical drama can lead to the identification of the listener with the performer, if viewed more deeply by the composer, through the emotional component of the work, thereby achieving "catharsis". The listener may have a feeling of empathy, which is sensory awareness. Awareness is a form of knowledge that the emotional state of the performer affects the state of the listener. As a result, a transformation occurs with a highly charged emotional response.

According to F. English, a British scientist, "music expresses the truthfulness of one's own self in direct sound, where we can, with the insight of a researcher, reveal the promising melody of confessional" ^[15]. The scientist wonders how listening to music reveals the inner essence of a person? How does music leave imprints in our souls and retains a certain "aftertaste" in the listener even after the melody has sounded for a long time? His concept that music is beyond time and space. This theory resonates with theological ideas.

So a person has an inner world that is in contradiction with the external environment. The presence of this duality generates a certain tension, an internal conflict. The great composers (J. S. Bach, L. V. Beethoven) contained this conflict, which to a greater extent had not personal, but universal significance. In their brilliant musical compositions, the composers sought ways of reconciliation, resolution of internal conflict. Musical art is more exclusively connected with the spiritual component of a person.

What does this inner world sound like? Rhythmic coherence, which gives a sense of peace, leads to inner harmony, harmony, which encourages the "inner" facets of human existence to sound. Musical intonations convey the echo of human aspirations and impulses. It is possible that in this desire to resolve an internal conflict — in the haunting sounds that haunt the creator (composer), there is a theological study, which is expressed in the analysis of the space of the depth of the human soul. Analyzing the musical symbolism, in the language of music one can feel the "hints" of the immortality of the soul.

The endless desire for peace is similar to the words from the confession of Augustine Aurelius "Truly, our heart is restless until it settles down in you" ^[23]. The fact is that we, as beings created in the image and likeness of God, strive to get closer to the Divine. In music, this truth is expressed with the help of a cadence turn, when tension is replaced by a tonic — the resolution of the conflict. The structure of musical harmony with the constant change of dissonances with plagiarisms, leading the listener to the final, can serve as a platform for theological research in search of God.

When creating a piece of music and listening to it, the composer refers not only to the sounds, but also to the inner world of a person who is "in standby mode". The masters of the musical art seem to adopt the instruction of the great Christian thinkers about life itself, about contemplation. Everyone's task is to wait patiently for God. So a person stays in the space of sounds, musical harmony, which consists in a constant search for cadence, in search of peace. In any case, music has its own ending. The last chord sounds, and the polyphony of sounds is replaced by silence. The time of listening to music is the time of its life, each final chord echoes the sound of its predecessors. In the art of music, it may happen that in a serious and complex search for cadence, the final chord, the promises of the future are listened to. So the state of rest in our space is short-lived, because from fleeting peace follows the desire of a lifetime to become truly human, once again actively persecuted. The sounds fade away, but the music is eternal.

Musical Art as a part of theology

Let's assume that music is the primary information structure of the language, music and mathematics of human existence. Take into account the statement that "to be a man means to be a man from the point of view of Christianity." So Begbie considered music as a significant part of theology ^[21]. If we perceive music as sounds spatially ordered in time, then what are the possibilities of knowing what it is to be a human being? In studies of theology, music is the fundamental structure of human existence. What resource does sound notation represent as a way of knowing what it is to be human? So Begbie explores this problem in a temporal relation ^[21]. Accordingly, how can music serve as a vehicle of human identity in relation to the divine?

As for modern Russian researchers of musical art in the context of theology, it is appropriate to mention Doctor of Philosophy M. O. Orlov, who highlighted the issue of dialectical unity of religious and secular nature of cultures. He argues that "culture cannot abandon its religious content without losing its uplifting and enlightening influence on the individual" ^[24]. The culture of peoples brought up on Church dogmas is a continuation of the God-human nature. O. V. Leontieva ^[25] an employee of the Saratov National Research State University named after N. G. Chernyshevsky continues research in this direction and highlights the problems of religious and secular principles in musical culture.

Cognition of one's self is one of the most important issues for thinkers not only of modernity, but also of ancient and medieval traditions. The description of the search for ways to ascend to God, ways to acquire the spiritual principle as a source of Christianity occurs through a number of theological metaphors: "inner", "ascent", "unity with God", "light and darkness". St. Grigor Narekatsi refers to such a number of Christian metaphors in the Book of Sorrowful Hymns ^[26].:

"The words that I have spoken to You in glory,

Paler than words that could

To hear You, O Lord, by right,

If only I wasn't so poor in speech."

Let's start with the assumption that it would be fruitful to consider the elements of the metaphorical language of the thinker, which found their reinforcement in the music of the brilliant composer of the XX century Alfred Schnittke's "Concerto for Chorus in four parts", unthinkable in terms of attitude.

First of all, let us turn to two terms that will clarify the meaning of the metaphorical nature of the Christian language: "apophatism" and its partner "cataphatism". In his essay "The Darkness of God" H. G. Wood, professor of theology at the University of Birmingham explains that "apophaticism" is the concept of theology as a strategy and practice of ignorance. The "negative path" is one of the factors of the Latin Christian tradition, which is implied by this term. It follows from this that, despite the variety of speech forms and the richness of linguistic language, little can be said about God. The Greek etymology of the term "apophaticism" — apophasis, in turn, is a neologism that denotes a violation of speech in the face of the unknowability of God, infinitely inconsistent with reality. The etymology of the word "theology" is "divine conversation" or "reasoning about God." The paradox lies in the fact that apophatic theology is what can be called a speech about God, which is considered a scarcity, a lack of speech ^[27].

The term "cataphatism" is a wordy element in theology. This is a Christian mind that uses all the resources of speech to express thoughts about God. It is "cataphatics" that determines the metaphorical nature of theology, forcing them to borrow dictionaries from other discourses such as literature, art, teaching and much more. The tendencies of cataphatics give heaviness, solidity to verbal constructions.

"You are impenetrable, intangible,

And You are without beginning, and endless,

You are the only thing that is immeasurable,

What is authentic and authentic in the world,

You are what the blessing gives us,

You are Noon without sunset, Light without shadow,

The only source of peace for us,

What enlightens the worldly being.

And You are boundless, and omnipresent,

You are the sweetest honey and daily bread,

Inexhaustible treasure, pure rain,

Inexhaustible power forever."

In its cataphatic form, theology is an anarchy of discourse, a verbal revolt. Turning to the nonverbal dictionary of theology, which includes liturgical, sacramental actions, architecture, gestures and music in particular, it should be noted that the musical language of A. Schnittke most reliably conveys the entire spectrum of emotions of the human attitude of ascension and unknowability of the divine principle. Experiencing a personal transcendent experience, the composer informs the listener of musical and informational flows, a personal drama that becomes the drama of all mankind, thanks to the coition of the ancient Armenian spiritual monument to Orthodoxy and the music of the postmodern era.

In the music of A. Schnittke, the relationship between apophatic and cataphatic elements of theology is clearly maintained. Verbosity and boundless desire to talk about God is replaced by musical pauses that do not lose their meaning, being a continuation of the conversation when words and music are no longer able to express what is beyond human perception. When to stop, for the movement of thought to the limits of consciousness.

"O Lord of all things,

He who gives us priceless gifts,

The Lord, Who creates everything out of nothing,

Unknown, Omniscient, Terrifying,

And merciful, and implacable,

Ineffable and incomprehensible,

Invisible, eternal, immense,

And terrifying, and gracious!"

St. Grigor Narekatsi uses a principle that H.G. Wood defines as "self-destructive". Metaphors that contradict themselves: "merciful — inexorable", "terrifying — gracious", "creating everything out of nothing". They are deliberately paradoxical and skillful in their linguistic character. It is likely that for the theologian, vardapeda from the Narek Monastery Gr. Narekaci metaphors were a natural means of theological language, deliberately subjected to the double pressure of affirmation and denial. "We must both affirm and deny everything of God; and then we must deny the contradiction between the affirmed and the denied" ^[27]. One should affirmatively assume that God is merciful, and then deny this statement with the definition of "inexorable". Next comes the negation of negation by the term "incomprehensible". This third utterance is not a synthesis of the first two preceding metaphors, but the collapse of everything preceding, arises not for emotional effect, but for comprehension of the paradox. This is the essence of cataphatics: it is necessary to say too much in theology for this confusion to be overcome.

The ontological basis for such an abundance of comparisons is that God is the cause of all things ^[27]. Everything created by God is potentially a source of images to describe him. The requirement of theological adequacy is that God is the first cause of the created order. In his own being, God also possesses uncreated images of everything He has accomplished. "And so it turns out that as the Cause of everything and as the superior of everything, he is rightfully nameless and yet has the names of everything that is..."^[27].

Therefore, if we call God by his consequences:

"You are our Light, greatness without edge,

An invisible road, but straight.

Your trail is invisible, only mercy is visible,

She came down from heaven to earth to us."

since It is the root cause of all things, it does not follow that It means only this causality. The metaphor, according to Denis the Areopagite, tells that God is by nature ^[27]. Thus, the abundance and diversity of the Divine essence lies in the total sum of his creations. No matter what limitations apophatic theology imposes, they will not be able to justify the restraint of theological language. Whatever we say about God, the language of speech is infinite in principle, but "if there are limitations in Its description, we also will not reach the point of verbal abundance, beyond which lies the collapse of language as such"^[27].

"The purpose of Your slave's song is

Not praising and not praising,

My words are insignificant — a plea,

Which I long to find salvation."

 Music in its movement creates time and space in which the theological principle is manifested: in the questioning intonations of the desire to find one's self. Music and theology seek to know what is beyond the human mind, what cannot be known about oneself, about the world, about one's own existence in any definitive sense. In its intonations of comprehension of hope, music evaluates the very state of human existence with penetrating accuracy. Musical art is more specifically able to comprehend the secrets of our hearts. It remains irreconcilably resistant to various comparative methods of evaluation, paraphrasing, explanation and description, unlike other types of art.

Familiarization with the art of music forces a person to open the way to the knowledge of his own soul. The essence of human existence is reflected in the musical sound of the works. In turn, music is a kind of "cast" of a person's spiritual life, where the main contradictions of human existence are concentrated, which has been defined as harmony since ancient times.