3 – Space, Time, Flow and Memory47additive rhythm or divisive rhythm and meter.
Qualitative and quantitative potentials of listening dimensions are shown
in Fig. 3.2. The quantitative potentials are properties of the dimensions
pulse and pitch height, related to the low and the high end of the physical
frequency continuum.
Fig 3.2. Qualitative and quantitative potentials of listening dimesions
The Musical Timespace484
Time, Space and the Environment
Music creates time
Music does not "unfold in time". Music creates time. A succession of
musical sounds evokes sensations of time. The experience of musical time
depends on the nature of the sounding phenomena, their relations and
interactions. The experience of musical movement evokes sensations of
change and duration; the experience of musical pulse evokes sensations of
regulated continuity and tempo. These are two qualitatively different
kinds of time, called forth by the awareness of change and the awareness
of regularity. They interact with each other, and they may interact with a
third kind of temporal experience, related to sensations of gradual trans-
formations which are so slow or indiscernable that they are not perceived
as movement. Ligeti's Atmospheres is a prominent example of slow, gradual
transformations.
Due to the variable balance between experienced change and regularity
and due to the complementarity between the transitory flow of musical
sound and its retention in memory, musical time is flexible. Musical time is
different from the regularity of measured clock time. The flexibility of
musical time is characterized by Susanne K. Langer;The elements of music are moving forms of sound; but in their
motion nothing is removed. The realm in which tonal entities move
is a realm of pure duration. Like its elements, however, this duration
is not an actual phenomenon. It is not a period - ten minutes or a half
hour, some fraction of a day - but it is something radically different
from the time in which our public and practical life proceeds. It is
completely incommensurable with the progress of common affairs.
Musical duration is an image of what might be termed "lived" or
"experienced" time - the passage of life that we feel as expectations