II
CONTEMPORARY MUSIC1
T is of course impossible to offer any adequate survey
of contemporary music or even of one of its phases
within the space of a single lecture; moreover, I hasten to
admit that there is only one thing which I should find still
more difficult, and that would be to explain my own music
or comment upon it; indeed, were I in position fully to
explain my music, I should then be inclined to doubt its
worth and value. The reasons which lead me to this conclu-
sion are, perhaps, different from those generally cited by
lecturers on art. For instance, it is often said that music
defies analysis, whereas other fine arts, such as painting,
sculpture, and architecture, have not a medium of mani-
festation so intangible, elusive, and evanescent as the vibra-
tion of sound. On this point I differ somewhat, because I
am under the impression that current progress in acoustical
science makes possible dimensional measurements of sound
as many and as varied as are those of other means of artis-
tic expression, employed, for example, in architecture. I
would even say that since the young Russian scientist,
Theremin, has perfected his original instruments, and can
now transform ethereal vibrations into tonal vibrations of
any pitch, intensity, or quality that he may desire, the
sound part of music would seem to have come quite within
the reach of analysis. So it is not because of the elusiveness
of sound vibrations that I consider it impossible to explain
1Lecture delivered under the auspices of the Rice Institute Lectureship
in Music by Maurice Ravel in the Scottish Rite Cathedral, Houston, Texas,
April 7, 1928.
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