Metaphor and Reality

The history of what is called classical music -- program-music or musica-seria (serious music) might serve as better terms-- shall be used herein for analysis. Properly, classical music covers only the period from the death of Bach in 1750 to the start of Beethoven's third period in 1815, both dates being quite arbitrary. This musical genre bears scrutiny because it has a history of thousands of years, compared with modern genres like jazz, pop or rock. Many popular musical genres developed only in the past century when music distribution exploded via electronic media, both wireless and physical technology such as audio tape, compact discs and web files.

Originally, music developed along folk and religious traditions until 600 or 700 years ago, when a professional secular branch emerged for musica-seria, first for the consumption of the nobility and then as popular entertainment. In most of its many branches, specifically what we call classical and jazz, music evolved in style, form and scope as well as on the intellectual thread -- in complexity, abstraction, tonality, chord structure and later in counter-point, dissonance, instrument tone quality, sound processing, storing, atonality, distribution and reproduction. With the farther integration of civilizations in modernity, the mixing of musical styles, electronics and the rise of intelligent machines, music might indeed be embarking on a new era.