조성음악의 화성분석과 해석에서 나타나는 음악적 중의성(重義性)

Ambiguity in the Analysis of Tonal Harmony: Case Studies and Reflections

Musical ambiguity is one of the issues most often discussed in music-theoretical discourse these days. Not everyone welcomes this some scholars find it problematic and consider ambiguity as a mere trend. It is undeniable, however, tonal harmony depends on contexts and frequently admits ambiguous interpretations. This paper examines the concept of musical ambiguity in harmonic theories of Rameau, Riemann, Weber, Weitzmann, and Schoenberg, and in the selected phrases from the music of Beethoven, Schumann, and Schubert. This examination revealsthat music analyses can employ the idea of ambiguity in two different ways. First, it can focus on the process of disambiguation, that is, how ambiguity is dissolved eventually. Or, it can embraces the fact that a single musical event can have more than two lexical or structural meanings simultaneously. In either ways, music analyses tend to underscore the matter of how we hear music by encompassing the notion of ambiguity. And this is precisely what we want to teach to our students in music analysis courses. Therefore, embracing the idea of ambiguity is not a post-modernistic threat to the existence of music analysis, as some suggested; rather, it enables us to recall what the genuine purpose of music analysis is.