Understanding Musical Consonance and Dissonance: Epistemological Considerations from a Systemic Perspective

Abstract

Different accounts have been given in order to face the problem of the emergence of musical consonance and dissonance. Getting a more adequate comprehension of such phenomenology may require a systemic view to integrate such multidimensionality into a unitary picture in which every partial solution enlightens a particular aspect of the very same problem. Such a systemic viewpoint shifts the focus from different explanations to analytic dimensions that seem to be embedded in music perception. Taking into consideration these dimensions means understanding consonance and dissonance in an embodied context, in which arithmetic, physics, psychology and physiology are part of a complex and dynamic process of understanding, which is not reducible to any privileged explanatory level.

Geometry of Music Perception

“…Consonance is a psychoacoustic quality of perceived chords considered to be an important factor in Western music with the usual twelve-tone equal temperament system. Two or more musical tones are considered consonant/dissonant, if they sound pleasant/unpleasant together, and there are a variety of explanations for this phenomenon [94]. The most important ones go back to roughness (interference) by Helmholtz [41] and tonal fusion (neural periodicity) by Stumpf [96,97].…”

Geometry of Music Perception

“…Consonance is a psychoacoustic quality of perceived chords considered to be an important factor in Western music with the usual twelve-tone equal temperament system. Two or more musical tones are considered consonant/dissonant, if they sound pleasant/unpleasant together, and there are a variety of explanations for this phenomenon [95]. The most important ones go back to roughness (interference) by Helmholtz [96] and tonal fusion (neural periodicity) by Stumpf [97,98].…”