(1) Definition

Aesthetics of Music is a basic theoretical discipline that studies the essence and inherent regularity of music from the overall perspective of music art. Musical aesthetics has close internal connections with general aesthetics, music technology theory, music history, music criticism, etc., and the development and deepening of the subject of musical aesthetics is often inseparable from drawing nutrients from the achievements in these fields.

(2) Object

Music aesthetics is different from the above-mentioned fields in terms of research objects. General aesthetics regards art as a concentrated expression of human aesthetic consciousness and studies the essence and universal laws of art as a whole, while musical aesthetics regards music as a special category of art and studies its special nature and special laws; music technology theory (such as Harmony, counterpoint, musical form, orchestration, etc.) study the techniques of music creation and the specific principles of music composition, while musical aesthetics takes music as a whole and examines its essence and laws from a more general perspective; Music criticism practically takes specific music phenomena as the object of its analysis and criticism, while music aesthetics conducts basic theoretical academic research on music as a whole, providing theoretical premises for music criticism.

(3) Research perspective

The study of music aesthetics can be carried out from the following different perspectives: philosophical perspective, psychological perspective, broad sociological perspective and the perspective of musical works themselves. Aesthetic properties perspective. The philosophical study of music art mainly involves the following questions: What is the essence of music? What is the content of music? What is the relationship between music and reality? And so on. These issues are extremely closely related to philosophical epistemology and are of fundamental nature. They are the first issues to be discussed in musical aesthetics. Questions that need to be answered when studying music art from a psychological perspective, such as what are the psychological processes of music creation, performance, and appreciation? How do people experience music? In what ways does music affect the listener? Since the 20th century, the development of psychological science has provided the basis and premise of natural science for the study of music from the psychological perspective, and opened up the way for this new field of music aesthetics research. Studying music art from a broad sociological perspective involves a series of issues such as the social function of music, the value standard of music, the class factors of music, the continued existence and inheritance of music, etc. As for the aesthetic characteristics of the musical works themselves, Perspective research involves a series of issues such as examining musical aesthetics from the structure of musical works and the intrinsic characteristics of various constituent factors.

People can engage in the research of music aesthetics from one of the above different angles, but as a science, music aesthetics should be a whole with its own complete system. Research on the philosophy, psychology, sociology of music art and the aesthetic characteristics of musical works themselves. There is a profound inner connection between these four aspects. It is incorrect to devalue or even deny the value of other aspects of research by emphasizing one aspect in isolation. Only by integrating the valuable results of the above four aspects of research can we form a complete whole of musical aesthetics.

(4) Historical development

The concept of musical aesthetics has appeared in the works of German music scholars at the end of the 18th century. As an independent discipline, it was gradually established in Europe in the second half of the 19th century. After more than a century of exploration, it has become an important branch of general aesthetics and musicology. However, musicians from all over the world have long thought and discussed basic issues such as the nature of music, the aesthetic feeling of music, the social functions and value standards of music. Whether in the East or the West, its history can be traced back to Distant ancient times. Ancient Chinese Music Aesthetic Thoughts The origin of ancient Chinese musical aesthetic thoughts can be traced back to prehistoric times. Materials in ancient documents show that the ancestors not only had an aesthetic awareness of music, but also had various imaginative thoughts about the origin and function of music. They believed that music originated from the imitation of nature, wind and gas. The function of music is to help humans conquer nature, defeat enemies, etc. At that time, these views all appeared in the form of religion and mythology, and became the embryo and bud of musical ideas in later civilized society.

Zhuangzi believes that the laws of music and the laws of nature in the universe are connected and consistent.

Nature itself contains many factors found in music, such as rhythm, rhythm, regularity, harmony, etc. Therefore, in Zhuangzi's view: music is also created based on nature, and the blueprint must be better than the model, the beauty of nature must be better than the beauty of man, so silent music must be higher than sound music. This is probably the meaning of "pure happiness without happiness". European musical aesthetics from ancient times to the Middle Ages Ancient European musical aesthetics had developed considerably as early as the ancient Greek era around the 5th century BC. From here we can see the earliest embryos and germination of the development of modern Western musical aesthetic thought.

Pythagoras made indelible contributions in exploring the relationship between musical numbers and the proportional relationship between the length of strings and the pitch of their sounds. However, his explanation of numbers as the essence of music and his emphasis on the existence of an inaudible cosmic music formed by the movement of celestial bodies clearly have an objective idealism and even mystical color. During the heyday of slavery in ancient Greece, simulation theory dominated the understanding of the nature of music. Thinkers usually regard music as a kind of simulation like other arts. The difference is that the objects of simulation of various arts are different. Materialists Heraclitus (540 BC - 480 BC), Democritus (about 460 BC - about 370 BC) and others usually understand the objects of music simulation as real objects in nature (such as birdsong); Although the objective idealist Plato (about 428 BC to about 347 BC) also admitted that the object of music simulation is the real world, this real world is only a derivative or shadow of the ideal world, and music is just "the shadow of the shadow." ". Plato's contribution lies in his emphasis on the social role of music and his belief that music can have a subtle influence on people's spiritual morality.

He opposed treating music as a kind of entertainment and advocated using music as an important means to cultivate citizens of his "Utopia". Plato's student Aristotle (384 BC - 322 BC) connected music with people's emotional life. He not only pointed out that music can simulate various emotional states of people, but also pointed out that the reason why music has this ability is that it interacts with people. Emotions are also a process of movement. He not only recognized the moral education role of music, but also recognized the entertainment role of music, believing that it can enable people to enjoy spiritual fun in their leisure time, purify the soul, and produce pleasure. The above-mentioned theory that emphasized the moral and ethical role of music was later called the "Aitos doctrine."

Aristotle’s student Aristoceneus (4th century BC) broke through his predecessors and took the musical aesthetics of ancient Greece one step further. He opposed the speculative attitude of understanding mathematics as the essence of music, and emphasized the importance of the perceptual and auditory nature of music; he even regarded feeling and memory as two components of music understanding. In this way, Aristoceneus proposed a new direction for the study of music aesthetics at that time and became a pioneer in later studying music from a psychological perspective. The Aitos doctrine was rejected by some people during the period when slave society was declining. This tendency is clearly reflected in the writings of Empiricus (2nd century BC) and Philodemus (1st century BC). They believe that music cannot express people's emotional and spiritual qualities, nor does it play a moral and ethical role at all. It is an obvious mistake to assert that Aitos's theory is wrong. According to Empiricus, music can at most play a temporary buffering role in people's emotional life. European medieval musical aesthetics, with Christian thought as its spiritual pillar, absorbed some concepts from ancient Greece and distorted and transformed them to suit the requirements of its religious worldview. This resulted in many valuable achievements in ancient Greek musical thought being abandoned or castrated. This tendency can be clearly seen in the writings of the early Christian father St. Augustine of Hippo (354-430). On the one hand, he inherited the theory of ancient Greece, regarded numbers as the basis of music, and recognized the emotional role and entertainment of music. But at the same time, he believed that music should free people from secular evil thoughts, purify people's souls, and deepen people's religious feelings. . This tendency can also be seen in the works of A.M.S. Boethius, a Roman thinker who had a more in-depth study of music. Medieval scholastic theologians believed that the content of music had nothing to do with the real objective world or the ideal world of thinking, but was connected with God in the other world.

In their view, the source of music is God; the beauty of music is nothing more than the mark God has left on the object and a reflection of God’s own nature; and the emotions expressed in music can only be devout faith in God and hope for the other side. The longing for the world and the endurance of earthly suffering. This view became central to the dominant view of music in the Middle Ages.

Edit this paragraph The turning point in the development of music aesthetics The development of music aesthetics in China after the Wei and Jin Dynasties Starting from the Wei and Jin Dynasties, China's music aesthetics thought clearly showed a turning point. People are no longer satisfied with general inspections of the origin, essence, characteristics, functions and other issues of music, but have turned to in-depth studies of the laws of music itself and the special laws of each specific department (guqin, vocal music, opera, etc.) Research. The first representative of this change was Ji Kang and his two famous works - "On Soundless Sadness and Music" and "Qin Fu". The main point of "Soundless Music Theory" is that it denies that music has human emotional content, and believes that the essence of music lies only in the form of the sound, such as simple, complex, high, soft, comfortable, and quick. The beauty of music is composed of musical sounds. The composition is beautiful in form. The general tendency of the "Soundless Music" theory is to emphasize the independence of music art and deny the relationship between music and social politics. Although this tendency belongs to idealism, it is in line with the trend of artistic consciousness that emerged in the Wei and Jin Dynasties; at the same time, it is a rebellion against the Confucian etiquette and music thought that has been dominant since the Qin and Han Dynasties. It has its historical rationality. The viewpoint of "Qin Fu" is basically consistent with the theory of "sound without sorrow and music". In this article, Ji Kang vividly describes the harmonious beauty and formal beauty of Qin music, which can be regarded as the specific image development and application of his theory of "sound without sorrow and music".

After the Wei and Jin Dynasties, the focus of the development of Chinese music aesthetics gradually shifted to the field of qin (lyre). The aesthetics of the piano also originated very early in China. In the Han Dynasty, there have been many chapters about "Qin". For example: Liu Xiang's "Qin Shuo", Yang Xiong's "Qin Qingying", Cai Yong's "Qin Fu", Huan Tan's "Qin Dao Pian" and so on. But most of them were not systematic enough, and the study of piano at this time was still in its infancy. The real foundation period for the aesthetics of Qin was in the Tang and Song Dynasties. The first important work in the history of qin studies can be regarded as "Qin Jue" by Xue Yijian (active from 742 to 756), a qin master of the Tang Dynasty. According to the "History of Qin" written by Zhu Changwen (1041-1100), there are only seven chapters in this work. The full text has not been published today, only some fragments remain. It was mentioned in these fragments: "The gentlemen of ancient times were all controlled by events, either to adapt to their emotions, to express their feelings with sarcasm, or to express their anger with anger, so they could concentrate their minds..." This shows that Qin’s aesthetic spirit is mainly about writing from the heart and conveying aspirations.

Among the works of the Song Dynasty, the most ambitious one is Zhu Changwen's "History of the Qin", but the views contained therein rarely break through the tradition. As for the one that truly made a breakthrough and truly treated the study of qin art aesthetically, it should be the "Qin Lun" written by Cheng Yu, a qin master of the Northern Song Dynasty (active from 1111 to 1117). The issues involved include the following aspects:

① It is believed that "the method of playing the piano is generally based on contentment", which can be said to be the forerunner of the artistic conception theory.

② It proposes "elegance", "peace", "simplification", "nature" and "vivid charm" as aesthetic criteria for the art of Qin.

③ In terms of voice, we are opposed to "losing frivolity" and "being too vigorous", and believe that only "quality but not wildness, literature but not history" can be superior.

④ When discussing the cultivation of piano playing, it is used in combination with Confucianism, Taoism and Buddhism. For example: " Attacking the harp is like practicing Zen", etc. After Cheng Yu□, until the Ming and Qing Dynasties, a large number of musical works appeared, which are countless. Among the more representative ones are "Qin Yi Pian" by Liu Ji of the Song Dynasty (date of birth and death unknown), "Qin Lv Fa Wei" by Chen Minzi of the Yuan Dynasty (active between 1314 and 1320), and Li Zhi of the Ming Dynasty (1527-1602). "Qin Fu", "Eight Principles on Drums and Qin" by Qing Su (active around 1744), and Zhu Fengjie's "Shuo Shen Shuo", etc., although they have their own characteristics, most of them cannot surpass Cheng Yu's "Qin Lun" 》 territory.

During the Ming and Qing dynasties, the work that best embodies the aesthetic characteristics and achievements of Chinese lyre music should be "Mountain Qin Kuang" by Xu Shangying, a qin player in the late Ming Dynasty. Its main contribution is the development of the "artistic conception theory" since the Tang and Song Dynasties. "Mountain Qin Situation" describes 24 styles and realms of Qin art. Its main arguments include the following aspects: ① Pay attention to the commanding role of "meaning". It believes that artistic conception not only contains emotions and scenery, but also contains reason and spirit. Therefore, "artistic conception" can be said to be the unity of emotion, reason, shape and spirit under the leadership of "intention".

② The characteristics of the artistic conception are "infinite" (there is infinite flavor in the piano), "profound and subtle" (the meaning is deep and profound) and "outside the strings" (if you get it outside the strings, there is more than enough). The artistic conception is the deep structure of the musical image. ③ Obtaining artistic conception requires the use of imagination (i.e. "fugue"). Without imagination, there will be no artistic conception. "Mountain Qin Kuang" is a masterpiece that collects the aesthetics of the qin after "The Theory of the Qin". It includes almost all the achievements of the traditional Chinese qin aesthetic theory. In addition to the aesthetics of the piano, traditional Chinese music aesthetics also includes aesthetic ideas in performance and singing. One of his earliest works is "Singing Theory" written by Zhi'an (date of birth and death unknown) of the Yuan Dynasty. Subsequently, there were "Qu Lv" by Wei Liangfu (active in the mid-6th century) of the Ming Dynasty, "Fang Zhuguan Qu Lv" by Wang Jide (active between 1573 and 1627), and "Yuefu Chuansheng" by Xu Dachun (active around 1744) of the Qing Dynasty. ", etc., are all his representative works. Chinese traditional singing theory has the characteristics of applied aesthetics. Most of them deal with technical and technical issues such as pronunciation, phonology, rhythm, and accent. It is relatively rare that the system involves aesthetic issues, but there are still valuable insights. Chinese performance aesthetics not only pays great attention to the beauty of the sound and form, but also emphasizes that singing should start from the content, act according to the mood, have intention in the heart, etc. From this, we can get a glimpse of the spirit of traditional Chinese aesthetics. The development of musical aesthetics after the European Renaissance. The Christian scholastic music thought that had dominated Europe for nearly a thousand years began to be shaken with the development of humanistic trends in the 15th and 16th centuries. Scholars and musicians with a new humanistic worldview, under the banner of reviving ancient Greek culture, regard the simulation theory of ancient Greece as the basis of their musical outlook, giving this theory new theoretical content and contemporary content. This is reflected in the fact that they broke through the shackles of religious, theological and musical views and regarded the secular real life of the emerging citizen class, especially their emotional life, as the broad object that music should simulate. Musician V. Galilei boldly advised musicians to go to the market place to observe the lives of various people and listen to the colorful tones and expressive voices in their speech. Although humanistic music scholars have not been able to completely get rid of the influence of the theological worldview, they have begun to give human dignity and emotion an important position in music, claiming that music is "the expression of people's passionate souls." This musical thought had a profound impact on the music creation of the Renaissance at that time. During this period, music scholars devoted themselves to the study of musical technical means, and G. Zalino made contributions in this regard.

In Germany from the 17th to the mid-18th century, the "passion theory" in musical aesthetics developed. This is the continued development of the humanistic music view of the Renaissance under new historical conditions. It has a direct impact on the music creation of the European Baroque period. Its representatives are J. Mattsson and F.W. Mapurge (1718 ~1795), J.G. Zulzer (1720~1779) and others. They regard music as an art that describes various mental fluctuations, various inner intentions, and expresses various human passions. They emphasized that the purpose of music is to express universal human emotions, acknowledging its effect on the human psyche. This theory also developed in France in the 17th century, and M. Mercene (1588~1648) was a representative. He not only believed that music is the embodiment of human thoughts and emotions, but also recognized that music has a positive impact on human spiritual realm and moral sentiments. In the second half of the 18th century, with the development of the bourgeois Enlightenment, the ideas of the French Encyclopedia School were also reflected in the field of music thought. J.-J. Rousseau (1712～1776), J.LeR. d'Alembert (1717～1789), D. Diderot (1713～1784) and the composer C.W. Gluck and others further developed the ancient Greek and The simulation theory of the Renaissance emphasized that music is a simulation of "nature", and this "nature" is actually understood as human nature and extensive social life. Like the German passion theory, they emphasize that music is the expression of human emotions and passion. Their understanding of the social function of music is more of the rationalism of the Enlightenment period. Later, L. van Beethoven, who was cultivated by the French Enlightenment thought, required that every art, including music, be regarded as a process of identifying sincere feelings. He believed that music can lead human beings to a higher level. A kind of spiritual enlightenment of the realm.

At the end of the 18th century, the musical thought of I. Kant (1724-1804) appeared in Germany ("Critique of Judgment," 1790), which had an important influence on the subsequent development of Western music aesthetics. Kant did not generally deny that music contains emotional factors, but based on his own philosophical aesthetic system, he excluded the content factors of purely instrumental music and regarded it as a kind of conformity that has no meaning in itself and does not express anything. Purposive form, this will inevitably lead to the conclusion that belittles the ideological value and social function of music art. Kant's musical thoughts paved the way for the subsequent development of formal music aesthetics. In the first half of the 19th century, Romantic music aesthetics dominated the field of music thought. Romantic musicians emphasized that music is an expressive art. They advocated emotion and fantasy, regarded them as the central content of musical art, and even placed them above reason. They highly affirm the value of themselves (including their own emotions) and strongly demand to break through the old spiritual constraints, further develop and liberate their individuality. They regard music as the most ideal field where this spiritual tendency can develop broadly. This aesthetic concept, later called "emotional aesthetics", was developed in R. Schumann ("On Music and Musicians"), especially F. Liszt ("Berlioz and His Harold Symphonies", 1850) is clearly reflected in the music criticism. The aesthetics of G.W.F. Hegel (1770~1831) had a profound impact on Liszt's musical aesthetics. In his view of music derived from his objective idealist philosophical system, Hegel emphasized that only the abstract, completely objectless inner life of emotion is the unique domain of music ("Lectures on Aesthetics"). After the Romantic music aesthetics that emphasized emotional content was highly reflected in Liszt's treatises in the mid-19th century, it was strongly impacted by the musical aesthetics ideological system represented by E. Hanslick that emphasized form. Therefore, in music In the field of aesthetics, there is an obvious opposition between content aesthetics and formal aesthetics. It was also during this period that musical aesthetics separated from philosophy and general aesthetics and began to become an independent discipline. As early as the 1830s, J.F. Herbart (1776-1841), Hanslick's pioneer, had already put forward the argument of explaining the essence of music in terms of form and denying that music can express emotions. Hanslick further developed this idea in his On the Beauty of Music (1856). He pointed out: Emotional expression is not the function of music at all. The beauty of music is a beauty that is not attached and does not require external content. Music has nothing to do with the scope of thought outside music. His final conclusion is that the content of music is only the form of musical sound movement. Hanslick's criticism of Romanticism's emotional aesthetics is based on this theoretical premise. This aesthetic theory that regards form as the essence was soon thoroughly applied by R. von Zimmermann (1824 ~ 1898) to various art types including music ("General Aesthetics as a Formal Science", 1865 ).

Hanslick's formal aesthetics encountered fierce opposition from content aesthetics in the second half of the 19th century. Representative figures belonging to the school of content aesthetics at that time included A.W. Ambrose, A.B. Marx, F. von Hauserger and others. Ambrose's "The Boundaries of Music and Poetry" was published in 1856, Max's "Beethoven" was published in 1859, and Hauserager's "Music as Expression" was published in 1885. The later H. Kretschmar (1848 ~ 1924) had somewhat different views from the above-mentioned people. He emphasized the importance of analyzing formal factors, but still tried to explain it on the premise of recognizing that music has emotional content. of. He is the founder of music hermeneutics, and his book "An Initiative for the Study of Musical Hermeneutics" was published in 1902. Later, German musicologist F.M. Gatz summarized the differences between the above-mentioned different views of musical aesthetics in Europe since Kant at the end of the 18th century into two opposing schools, namely heteronomous music aesthetics and autonomic musical aesthetics (" The Main Schools of Musical Aesthetics, 1929).

19. H. Liman, who had a great influence at the turn of the 20th century, is a representative figure in this transitional period. His views tend to be eclectic, which is reflected in his acknowledgment that some types of music have non-musical content, while others do not. For this reason, he divides music into title music and absolute music, and the latter is more High class music. Liman's attention is more focused on studying musical aesthetics from a psychological perspective.

The object of his research is often the auditory experience of listeners when experiencing musical works ("Principles of Music Aesthetics", 1900). However, Riemann's eclectic tendency did not eliminate the opposition between formal aesthetics (autonomy) and content aesthetics (heteronomy). After Riemann, among the more influential music aesthetes who have formal aesthetic tendencies are A.O. Halm ("Two Cultures in Music", 1913) and E.G. Wolfe ("Foundations of Autonomous Music Aesthetics", 1934) As well as composer I.F. Stravinsky ("Musical Poetics", 1942) and others; those with content aesthetic tendencies include A. Schellinger ("Musical Composition and the Cultivation of Musical Hearing", 1911), E. Solentin ("Problems of Musical Expression", 1932) and later D. Cook ("The Language of Music", 1959) and others. Thoughts on Chinese Modern Musical Aesthetics After Chinese history entered modern times, especially after the "May 4th" movement, the field of music and art began to be affected by modern revolutionary trends of thought. The musical aesthetic thoughts of music theorists Wang Guangqi and others at that time all showed democratic tendencies to varying degrees. Wang Guangqi advocates:

① Music is the expression of national life and must have national characteristics. Therefore, Chinese traditional music must be based on ancient Chinese music and current folk ballads ("The Evolution of European Music").

② Music should express the feelings of the people, not the feelings of some intellectual classes.

③ Emphasizes the social role of music and believes that music can evoke the fundamental thoughts of the Chinese nation and complete its cultural renaissance movement.

④ The construction of new Chinese music also needs to learn from the scientific methods of Western music. On the other hand, after the May 4th Movement, Western romanticism and expressionism music aesthetics also began to influence China.

The thoughts of music theorist Qing Zhu have this characteristic. He is the author of "Music Talk" and "General Theory of Music", which systematically elaborates on a series of musical aesthetic issues such as the nature, content, form, creation, performance, and function of music. His proposition is: music is the "language of the soul." Or "a world language of the soul" (i.e., "the language of the upper world"); music is the expression of the soul, a subjective creation, and has the function of improving the human mind. While paying attention to the emotional content of music, we also emphasize the ideological and spiritual nature of music, and the importance of life experience in creation. Its shortcoming is that it ignores the national characteristics of music. After the 1930s, among the pioneers of proletarian revolutionary music, Xian Xinghai was one of the first musicians who tried to use Marxism to observe music issues. In the late 1930s, he wrote a series of papers such as "On the National Form of Chinese Music" and "Several Issues in the Current Chinese New Music Movement", focusing on how to develop Chinese national and popular music, and how to view National forms of music and other issues. Its propositions are generally as follows:

① Developing the music of Chinese workers and peasants is the most basic starting point for creating Chinese national forms. The direction of new music is popularization, nationalization, and art.

② Content determines the form. The new social reality, the new national thoughts, feelings and life, that is, the new content, must require new musical forms to adapt to them.

③ There is inheritance between the new form and the old form. New forms can only be produced on the basis of transformation, processing, change and development of old forms. Therefore, we must pay attention to the exploration, arrangement, criticism and research of inherent national folk music.

④ Refer to Western forms and methods, but not copy Western music. ⑤ Emphasize that the national form is a reflection of the national life tradition and lifestyle; the national form must have the unique style and style of the nation. Modern European Music Aesthetic Thoughts A new school of music aesthetics represented by E. Coote and H. Mersmann (1891-1971) appeared in Europe around the 1930s. Some people call it the "energy school" music aesthetics. This school of thought is closely related to Halm's Autonomy, which advocates getting rid of the emotional world of composers and listeners and studying the musical works themselves independently, but the difference is that it shows a tendency to try to overcome the weaknesses of Autonomy itself in explaining the nature of music. . Coote believes that the essence of music is not the sound form, but a certain will tendency in music. This will tendency is inseparably and closely linked with musical materials and various factors that constitute music, and is reflected through the energy form existing within the sound phenomenon. The tone tendencies that make up the melody are called dynamic energy, and the tone tendencies that make up the chords are called potential energy.

In his "Applied Musical Aesthetics" (1926), Mersmann made a detailed so-called purely objective investigation of the regularity of acoustic material materials based on the theory of energy. This tendency to attempt to get rid of the constraints of the philosophical worldview and discuss music based on music reflects some of the influence of the "New Objectivity" literary and artistic trend that emerged in Germany in the 1930s. After this, a new school emerged, namely the school of phenomenal music aesthetics based on the phenomenal philosophy of E. Husserl (1859-1938). The important representative is R. Ingarden. Ingarden believes that music belongs to the intentional world that is parallel to the real world, and regards music as a "pure intentional object". As a purely intentional object, music has no essential connection with the real world. On the premise that there is no identity between the musical work and the conscious feelings of the composer and the listener, and between the musical work and the score of the work, Ingarden raised the issue of the special way of existence of the musical work (" Musical works and their identity issues"). After the Second World War, phenomenological aesthetics influenced the music aesthetic thoughts of N. Hartmann, S. Lange and others to a certain extent. Inspired by Ingarten's theory, Hartmann proposed the hierarchical theory of musical works. He decomposes musical works into a real layer as a sound entity (i.e., the front layer) and an illusory layer as the content and meaning (i.e., the back layer). The front layer exists independently of the consciousness of the appreciator, while the back layer is related to the consciousness of the appreciator who has artistic sensibility. In a sense, this theory is an attempt to reconcile the contradictory opposition between heteronomy and self-discipline regarding the content and form of music (Aesthetics, 1953). Although Lange's musical aesthetics was also influenced by phenomenological aesthetics to a certain extent, he mainly explained the essence of music from the concept of symbols. In Langer's view, music, like other arts, is a pure form of emotional expression composed of unique artistic symbols that are much more complex than language symbols. This form is actually just a virtual image. In explaining the relationship between musical form and emotion, Lange relied on the isomorphic correspondence theory of Gestalt psychology ("Emotion and Form", 1953). But whether it is Hartmann or Lange, when they regard music as an intentional object or some illusory entity, they always isolate it from the real world to a certain extent and examine it. In the 1950s and 1960s, attempts were made to resolve the opposition between autonomic heteronomy and form and content in music from the perspective of psychological research. The theory of A. Wellek (1904~) who proposed a comprehensive form-expression aesthetics based on Gestalt psychology is an example.

After the Second World War, especially from the 1950s, the study of music aesthetics based on Marxist epistemology-reflection theory and historical materialist philosophy began to develop in the Soviet Union and Eastern European countries. The main works that appeared in this regard include B.B. Vanslov's "On the Reflection of Reality in Music" (1950), □.A. Kremlev's "Introduction to the Aesthetics of Music" (1953), Z. Lee Sa's "Problems of Musical Aesthetics" and "On the Particularity of Music" (1953), etc. They regard music as a constituent factor of social ideology, point out that it is ultimately the product of the reflection of social reality in people's spiritual world, examine it in connection with the socio-economic foundation, and on this basis, analyze music The special nature that distinguishes it from other types of art is explored. In the 1960s and 1970s, this school underwent further changes and development. To varying degrees, they absorbed certain results from Western music aesthetics research. Some of the influence of modern semantics and semiotics can sometimes be seen in some of their works (such as Lisa's "New Essays on Musical Aesthetics", 1975), and some even have phenomenology, etc. Some imprints of theory.

Since the 1970s, the development of information theory, cybernetics, and systems theory began to have an impact on the study of music aesthetics, and some works in this area have appeared. Although it is still in its early exploratory stage, this direction will undoubtedly have broad development prospects and may have far-reaching significance for the development of future music aesthetics.