Music is an artistic form with sound as the means of expression, and the shaping of images is completed with organized sound as the material. Therefore, just as literature is the art of language, music is the art of sound. This is one of the basic characteristics of music art. As a means of musical artistic expression, sound has some characteristics different from other sounds in nature.
The sounds produced in any musical work are created by the composer's careful thinking. These sounds can be found in nature, but they cannot be music without the ingenious creation and combination of artists. Therefore, whether it is a simple song or a large-scale symphony, the author's creative thinking and inspiration are permeated.
casually smeared lines and colors are not paintings, and randomly stacked language and characters are not literature. Similarly, chaotic sounds are not music. The sound that constitutes the musical image is a kind of organized, regular and harmonious music, including melody, rhythm, mode, harmony, polyphony, form and other elements, which is always called musical language. Without creative factors, no sound can be turned into music.
second, the art of hearing
since music is the art of sound, it can only appeal to people's hearing, so music is also an art of hearing. The principles of directional reflection and inquiry reflection in psychology tell us that among all kinds of external stimuli within a certain distance, sound can attract people's attention most, and it can force people's auditory organs to accept sound, which determines that auditory art can directly act on people's emotions and shock people's hearts than visual art.
Music can only be expressed by sound and felt by hearing, but this does not mean that when people create and enjoy music, only the parts of the cerebral cortex corresponding to hearing are excited, while other parts are in a state of inhibition. In fact, musicians feel, experience, know and express life with their whole body and mind, not only through auditory channels, which is no different from other kinds of artists. The difference is that in artistic conception and artistic expression, musicians condense personal feelings in many aspects into auditory images through image thinking, and then express them in concrete acoustic forms.
Third, emotional art
Among all the art forms, music is the art form that is best at expressing emotions and can stir people's hearts. It truly conveys, expresses and feels aesthetic emotions through the medium of sound. Music is superior to other art forms in conveying and expressing emotions because the perceptual material and aesthetic form it uses-sound is the most suitable for expressing emotions. Or solemn, or warm and excited, or sad and angry, or touching and delicate, or crying.
Music can express people's feelings more directly, truly and deeply. Then, why can music express people's emotions with organized voices? One theory holds that the expressive nature of music comes from the imitation of people's expressive language by music. People's language uses expressions such as pronunciation, tone, language flow, rhythm and speed to express their ideas with semantics, while musical expressions such as timbre, pitch fluctuation and rhythm speed can play the same role as language expressions.
Fourth, the art of time
Sculpture, painting and other art forms are solidified in space, making people clear at a glance. When we appreciate a work of art, we first see the whole work of art, and then we taste its details. Music, on the other hand, should unfold and flow in time. When we appreciate music, we will first start from the details, start from the parts, and leave us with an overall impression until the whole song is played (sung). It is impossible to obtain a complete musical image only by listening to individual fragments in musical works. Therefore, music art is also an art of time.
As an auditory art, musical images are developed in time, presented, developed and ended in the movement as time goes on. The so-called "musical image" refers to the image or artistic conception that the whole musical work shows the artist's thoughts and feelings and arouses in the appreciator's thoughts and feelings. For example, "Moonlit Night on the Spring River" uses sweet, comfortable and quiet tunes to express the feeling of boating on the picturesque Chunjiang River on the moonlit night in the south of the Yangtze River, creating a fascinating musical mood.