ESSAY ON THE PRESENT OF MUSIC

Abstract

This article reflects on the transformations of music’s status as an art form in the contemporary context, drawing on an analogy with Thomas S. Kuhn’s theory of scientific paradigms, as revisited and expanded by Jean-François Lyotard. The central argument maintains that contemporary music is undergoing a rupture with the aesthetic canon consolidated since the eighteenth century, particularly during Romanticism, which defined music as an autonomous art grounded in the composer’s genius, the sacralization of the work, and the establishment of a canonical repertoire. Methodologically, the essay develops a philosophical-theoretical reflection based on a schematic exposition of Kuhn’s stages—pre-science, normal science, crisis, and new science—to interpret historical changes in musical practices. Through this analogy, the study examines how musical expressions such as jazz, rock, popular music, and local traditions have been revalued as legitimate art forms beyond the Romantic paradigm. The article argues that aesthetic plurality and the absence of a single dominant model characterize the current condition of music, in which creation, reception, and evaluation are shaped by diverse cultural contexts. The scope of the essay lies in proposing that contemporary music exists in a post-canonical phase, open to multiple expressive possibilities and no longer governed by a hegemonic aesthetic paradigm.