Can music be narrative? After reading the "Little Wizard", the answer seems to be there. To a certain extent, music can assume the function of narration, and Dukas wrote and completed the composition based on the fairy tale "The Magician's Apprentice" when he wrote this song. Moreover, after being repackaged by visual images, the music seems to have really come to life, telling every detail without any difference. Haha, is this really the case?
In fact, I also want to believe that music can be narrative. My reason, I believe it is also the reason of many people. Since the composer creates the music according to the plot of the story, the music is telling a story. Look at "Little Wizard", look at those famous title music works. However, if you don't let me watch "Fantasia", don't tell me what the music is called, and just play music to me, I can't tell this story 80% of the time, let alone the details of Mickey Mouse with an axe and a broomstick. So, what is going wrong?
In fact, we can look at it from another perspective. The idea that music can be narrated has a presupposition in itself, that is, to use narration as an indicator. Since words and discourse can be competent for it, then music, which is also the art of time, should also be competent. Western music has existed for a thousand years. Music first appeared as an auditory inspiration to help memory when reading Christian hymns. It is meaningless and even unpleasant. This situation lasted for 800 years. Until the first half of the 18th century, music rhetoric, that is, the study of how music can produce speech effects, was still embraced by a large group of composer theorists. But at the same time, "rebels" like Mozart Beethoven began to work in the field of pure music, symphonies, concertos, quartets, they finally brought long-lost glory to music. Music can be listened to "purely". Without the support of written discourse, music can still exist. This idea eventually became a consensus in the 19th and 20th centuries. Therefore, without pictures and images, I can also appreciate the "Little Wizard" and every piece of music in "Fantasia", and I can also feel the beauty of music.
However, taking the "little wizard" as an example, the story that the composer Dukas used to conceive was obviously "made" into the music by him, but if you listen to this work with the consciousness of "pure music", I can listen, but where did the story go? In fact, the debate about whether music can be narrated continues to this day, and musicologists have also put forward various theories to explain the problem. Some people think that although music cannot resemble romance, it has a "weak narrative" nature. What is weak narrative? It is a weakened imprecise but not wrong narrative. Music can make people feel excitement and sadness. If excitement is followed by sadness in a piece of music, then I should interpret it in terms of the gathering and separation of lovers. Similarly, if humor is followed by deepness, I might say that this piece of music has an allegorical effect. Therefore, music can provide us with some valuable information like language. The concept of weak narrative is easier to understand if the concept of music format is taken into consideration. Each sonata-style music contains a narrative model of "conflict → resolution", which is the most typical weak narrative. Of course, music has its unique structure, which is sometimes thousands of miles away from language. But I have to admit that music does share a number of mysterious treaties with other artistic varieties. Besides, people listen to music, it is impossible not to associate anything, even if they don't think about it, they will instinctively respond to auditory stimuli, such as nodding and snapping their fingers to the beat.
Weak narrative is just an explanation, there are others, many. Music is a special kind of art. Interpreting it completely according to the ideals of narrative or pure music will damage it, and then affect our appreciation of it. There is no absolute model for understanding music, and no theory can be perfect once and for all. "Fantasia" actually did help us better understand the music, with the help of pictures and storylines.
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