How-we-listen-to-music中文翻译.docx
18页How we listen to musicAaron Copland1. We all listen to music according to our separate capacities. But, for the sake of analysis, the whole listening process may become clearer if we break it up into its component parts, so to speak. In a certain sense we all listen to music on three separate planes. For lack of a better terminology, one might name these: (1) the sensuous plane, (2) the expressive plane, (3) the sheerly musical plane. The only advantage to be gained from mechanically splitting up the listening process into these hypothetical planes is the clearer view to be had of the way in which we listen.我们都根据各自的能力来听音乐。
但是,为了便于分析,如果我们将听的整个过程提成几种构成部分的话,那就会更加清晰了在某种限度上,我们听音乐提成三个不同的层面,因找不到更好地术语,我姑且把她们命名为:(1)感官层面(2)表义层面(3)纯音乐层面我把听音乐的过程机械地提成以上假设的三个层面,纯正是为了更清晰地理解我们是如何听音乐的2. The simplest way of listening to music is to listen for the sheer pleasure of the musical sound itself. That is the sensuous plane. It is the plane on which we hear music without thinking, without considering it in any way. One turns on the radio while doing something else and absent-mindedly bathes in the sound. A kind of brainless but attractive state of mind is engendered by the mere sound appeal of the music.最简朴的听音乐的方式就是听乐声给我们带来的纯正的愉悦,这是感官层面。
在这个层面上,我们只听音乐而不用思考打开收音机,一边忙别的事情,一边心不在焉地沐浴在音乐声中这种心不在焉但美妙的身心状态是由乐声的魅力引起的3. You may be sitting in a room reading this book. Imagine one note struck on the piano. Immediately that one note is enough to change the atmosphere of the room——proving that the sound element in music is a powerful and mysterious agent, which it would be foolish to deride or belittle.你也许正在房间里读这本书想象着一种音符敲击在钢琴上瞬间整个房间的氛围都随之变化——这表白了声音在音乐中是强大而神秘的元素,谁讥笑或轻视这一点,谁就显得愚蠢4. The surprising thing is that many people who consider themselves qualified music lovers abuse that plane in listening. They go to concerts in order to lose themselves. They use music as a consolation or an escape. They enter an ideal world where one doesn't have to think of the realities of everyday life. Of course they aren't thinking about the music either. Music allows them to leave it, and they go off to a plane to dream, dreaming because of and apropos of the music yet never quite listening to it.令人奇怪的是,诸多自觉得合格的音乐爱好者在听音乐时滥用了这一层面。
她们去音乐厅是为了忘却自我她们把音乐作为一种安慰或解脱她们进入了一种抱负的境界,在这个境界里她们不必考虑现实生活固然,她们同样也没有考虑音乐音乐容许她们逃离现实,到另一种地方去做梦,由于音乐而做梦,做有关音乐的梦,却从没真正欣赏过音乐5. Yes, the sound appeal of music is a potent and primitive force, but you must not allow it to usurp a disproportionate share of your interest. The sensuous plane is an important one in music, a very important one, but it does not constitute the whole story.的确,音乐的声音魅力是一种强大而原始的力量,但是千万不要让它不合比例地侵占你的爱好感观层面是音乐中重要的一层——非常重要——但并不是音乐的所有6. There is no need to digress further on the sensuous plane. Its appeal to every normal human being is self evident. There is, however, such a thing as becoming more sensitive to the different kinds of sound stuff① as used by various composers. For all composers do not use that sound stuff in the same way. Don't get the idea that the value of music is commensurate with its sensuous appeal or that the loveliest sounding music is made by the greatest composer. If that were so, Ravel would be a greater creator than Beethoven. The point is that the sound element varies with each composer, that his usage of sound forms an integral part of his style and must be taken into account when listening. The reader can see, therefore, that a more conscious approach is valuable even on this primary plane of music listening.没必要在感官层次上再扯远了。
声音的魅力对每一种正常人来说都是不言而喻的然而,不同的发音材料①被不同的作曲家所使用时就变得更加有感染力,所有的作曲者不也许按同一种方式组织材料不要觉得音乐的价值就与她的感官感染力相称,不要觉得最美丽动听的音乐是由伟大的作曲家发明的如果你觉得以上观点也许的话,那么拉维尔是比贝多芬还要伟大的创作者重点是,声音要素因作曲者不同而不同,她对声音形式的使用方式构成她风格的不可分割的一部分在听音乐时,所有这些都必须考虑在内因此,读者可以看到,虽然在听音乐的这个最基本的层面上,也值得采用更故意识地聆听方式7. The second plane on which music exists is what I have called the expressive one. Here, immediately, we tread on controversial ground. Composers have a way of shying away from any discussion of music's expressive side. Did not Stravinsky himself proclaim that his music was an "object", a "thing", with a life of its own, and with no other meaning than its own purely musical existence? This intransigent attitude of Stravinsky's may be due to the fact that so many people have tried to read different meanings into so many pieces. Heaven knows it is difficult enough to say precisely what it is that a piece of music means, to say it definitely, to say it finally so that everyone is satisfied with your explanation. But that should not lead one to the other extreme of denying to music the right to be "expressive".音乐存在的第二层面就是我所谓的表义层面。
谈到这里,我们立即会遇到引起争议的问题作曲家们总是设法避开任何有关音乐表义层面的讨论Stravinsky她自己不也声称她的音乐是一种“物体”,意见自身具有生命的“东西”,除了作为音乐自身存在再没有其她意义了吗?Stravinsky的这种不当协的态度大概源于这样一种现实吧:有如此多的人试图对如此多的作品加以不同的解读天懂得要想用自己的解释精确地、明确地、最后地说清一种作品的意义并让所有人满意是多么困难的事!但是我们并不能因此走向另一种极端,不能去剥夺音乐“表义”的权利8. My own belief is that all music has an expressive power, some more and some less, but that all music has a certain meaning behi。





