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Ruwet on musical analysis
Methods of analysis in musicology (1966)[going from the message to the code, i.e. in analysis] The work of the analyst then consists of deconstructing and manipulating the corpus (all given messages) in various ways in order to derive the units, classes of units, and rules of their combination which together constitute the code. [...] Once the code has been deciphered, a reverse procedure allows the generation of messages from this code [...].
[...] A code consists essentially of two parts: inventories of elements, and rules of their combination and operation. Now, analytical models tend to favour the inventory, whilst neglecting the question of rules.
[...] it remains the case that explicit discovery procedures, even if partially insufficient, are indispensable, if only to guarantee that the synthetic model will not change into a normative system.
[...] consider the present state of musicology from the perspective of the distinction between the two models [analystic and synthetic]. a) that the theoretical problem of this distinction has never been raised; b) that no analytical model has ever been explicitly elaborated; c) that musical analyses [...] do not formulate the discovery criteria on which they depend.
Nicolas Ruwet
