SPECIAL PROJECT 

musicology and the musical composition 
part ll, the musical composition 

Cherrl Seltzer, editor 

In the preceding issue Current Musicology initiated a special project, 
"Musicology and the musical composition." The purpose of this symposium 
is to increase our understanding of the musical work in Western tradition 
by evaluating modes of musicological description and explanation. Patricia 
Carpenter and Richard Crocker explored, from different points of view, the 
notion of a musical composition. They considered, in historical context; such 
questions as the conceptualization and apprehension of music, the nature and 
criteria of a musical entity, music as object and music as process, and our 
assumptions about musical form. 

Commentaries on these papers were solicited from individuals representing 
the field of musIc and other relevant disciplines. Leo Treitler, Ruth Halle 
Rowen, Edward Cone, David Burrows, psychologist Rudolf Arnheim, and 
Bernard Stambler, from the field of literature and cultural history, con-
tributed the first group of responses. 

In the present issue Saul Novack, responding to Professor Crocker's 
question, what is a musical piece, investigates the cohesion ofmuIti-movement 
compositions and the criteria of musical structure. Maria Rika Maniates 
evaluates Miss Carpenter's distinction between music as object and music as 
process and sketches the historical factors which have conditioned our con-
ceptualization and apprehension of music. In regard to Miss Carpenter's 
discussion of the historical emergence of the objectified musical work, 
architect Kenneth Kaiser considers analogous developments in the con-
ceptualization of an architectural entity. Treating the apprehension and 
description of the musical work, philosopher Arnold Berleant proposes a dis-
tinction between experiential and conceptual realms of musical perception. 
The nature of music in its relation to man's emotional experiencing of his 
world is discussed in a historical context by philosopher Robert Hall. 

Finally, we present Professor Crocker's reply to the initial group of papers 
and Miss Carpenter's response to the discussion as a whole. Further ex-
ploration of this topic will follow, and Current Musicology's readers are invited 
to participate with their letters. (for a comment on the project, see the 
Letters section of this issue.) 

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