Música e Metafísica em Henri Bergson

Abstract

The purpose of this dissertation is to investigate how music resonates within the philosophical thought of Henri Bergson, as well as to examine the value and function of musical images within his conceptual production. In the first part of this work, our attention has been drawn to the peculiarity of such philosophy, wich, at the same time that prevents from the isolation of abstraction, also resonates with the artistic experience without abandoning the philosophical consistency that its method demands. Thus, avoiding abstraction and intellectualism does not imply homogeneity with the musical field. Up to this point it was needles to know whether bergsonian concepts are appropriate or not for the analysis and interpretation of artistic works as those of the musician Claude Debussy, since it has been possible to put in evidence the resonances or intersections between Bergson's and Debussy's works without appealing for any identification between the philosopher's concept of duration and the musician's sound duration. Therefore, in the second part, it was clear how this singular metaphysics, in order to be consistent with its method named intuition, cannot be a theorizing or speculation on musical art, insofar as it testifies in favor of an extreme commotion with the art that enhances it and suggests it, which enables an enlargement of the frames in which the human condition is inserted. In any case, Henri Bergson did look for a contact with the musical experience, but always highlighting the heterogeneity between the sound art and the metaphysics. There is indeed the search for an extreme commotion with or sympathy for this art, but his philosophy should not a all be reduced to an activity that produces symbols or generalizations which could be used for the analysis of an artistic work or a general theory of art.