234 THE NATURE OF MUSIC 



intelligence and appreciation of music, and are ut- 

 terly valueless to music-theory and music-education. 

 Music itself presents its own peculiar forms and rela- 

 tions, in short, its own peculiar problems to the inves- 

 tigator. However, in his quest for truth the investi- 

 gator is in reality seeking he knows not what unless 

 he equip himself with the first essential requisite to 

 music-research, namely, with an adequate knowledge 

 of what the peculiar forms, relations and problems of 

 music are. After all, the great leading question is : 

 What is music ? And the answer to this question has 

 to be worked out independently by musicians. Music 

 isy and it is futile for physicists to tell us that music is 

 all wrong and should be otherwise. 



The harmonic reports of the chords thus far de- 

 rived plainly show that a chord-root may be a har- 

 monic root or third or fifth; that a chord-third may 

 be a harmonic third or fifth or seventh ; that a chord- 

 fifth may be a harmonic fifth or seventh or ninth: in 

 short, that the self-report of a chord is determined by 

 its relation and is ascertained by harmonic analysis 

 as here set forth. No one, for example, hears the 

 component tones of the diminished seventh-chord 

 {yn^^ in minor) as root, small third, diminished fifth 

 and diminished seventh : we all hear them as 3, 5, 7, 9. 

 All other chords not based on harmonic roots furnish 

 similar examples. Chords are therefore more than 

 mere combinations of tones differing in structure. 

 Each component tone in a chord reports a harmonic 

 percept. Therefore correctly defined, a chord is at 

 once a combination of tones and a combination of 

 harmonic percepts, Homophony produced the origi- 



