Humor in music : possible applications of humor theory to music

Abstract

Starting from the belief that music is a sign system set into a precise network of cultural relations, we will survey the cultural values given to music as a semiotic system, focusing above all on the possible use of humor in music. We will discuss methodological issues and provide concrete analyses of different compositions in a excursus in Western humorous traditional in order to explain the use of certain comic devices in music. The first part of the work will be dedicated to a historical and theoretical survey of the possible relation between speech, music and sound as cultural values, trying to identify the socially codified cultural functions of music. We will deal with the main approaches to music based on linguistic principles, with particular emphasis on those elaborated by Nicolas Ruwet, Jean-Jacques Nattiez, Gino Stefani, and Dero Tarasti, focusing above all on the notion they have borrowed from Charles S. Peirce's semiotic model and from Algirdas J. Greimas's generative linquistic. After having described and possible relationships between music and language, we will borrow Gino Stefani's Model of Musical Competence (MMC), we will try to apply Speech Act theory in music, showing how Grice's four maxims can work in music, and how they can be broken producing humorous effects. Thus, we will examine how the resources of verbal humor described by Attardo in the General Theory of Verbal Humor may function in vocal and instrumental music through an historical excursus in Western classical music tradition.