Objectivity and Subjectivity in Music Criticism

To write about music is, in a sense, rather like speaking of touch or taste. If one says that something feels cold or hot, everyone understands what is meant. The same holds true if, for instance, a fruit is described as sweet or bitter, sour or sweet-and-sour. In all such cases the nature of the sensation is roughly the same. But from these general notions, upon which we easily agree, it is a long way to explaining why one person eats tomatoes with delight while another detests them.

In other words, there exists here as well a certain objectivity, founded upon the common presuppositions and experiences which Goethe summed up in the concept of normality. Yet alongside this objectivity there also comes into play a subjective notion of value which often leads to diametrically opposed judgments about one and the same object.

MUCH THE SAME, roughly speaking, applies to all discourse about music. For those who are responsible for music criticism in a major newspaper, the primary task must therefore be to attempt to bridge the gulf between the objective and the subjective. Insofar as this is possible, it can be realised only if the history and aesthetics of music are allowed to form the soil from which an understanding of personal value judgment may grow.

To understand, after all, need not be the same as to approve. Yet even when one disapproves of a personal value judgment, it may still be useful to have become acquainted with it. For no critic who is clearly conscious of his responsibility can dispense with a firm general outlook upon which to base his value judgments. And since such an outlook must in turn rest upon a more or less extensive body of knowledge, it is self-evident that acquaintance with it cannot be entirely unfruitful.

The knowledge with which a critic presents and justifies his subjective judgment may be used by the reader for independent reflection in an entirely opposite direction. Thus the indirect exchange of ideas is set in motion, and in this way the critic, even in apparently negative cases, has accomplished something positive.

EVERY CRITIC, moreover, must surely be aware that in the newspaper column he is always confronted with counter-critics who are invisible, but none the less eager. Alongside such readers there are those who are more readily persuaded. For the sake of the latter he must ensure that the former are given as few points of attack as possible.