21 multiple choice and 1 short essay for an exam(media and theories

Stu~ 1111 P'1/(osophtj avu(i 9>01'U! Sc:_;~

vere. q { 1q 4 t),

1See lhe papl!r 0£ Herta "Herzog in thls issue.

;,;

l\: ~~t~· ::~"> .-,:{ ...

~·' -.,_·

-+~~·-. ~

,;

: "I

On Popular Music

On Popular Musfo. ·

By T. W. Adorno.

With the assistance of George Simpson.

I. THE MUSICAL MATERIAL.

The two spheres of music;.

17

-· · Popular music, which produces the stimuli we .are here investi· gating, is u~ually characterized by its difference from. serious music. This difference is generally taken for granted and is looked upon as a difference of levels considered so well defined•that most people

. regard the values within them as totally independent.of one another . . . We deem it necessary, however, first ·of all to translate these so·

... _· called levels into more precise terms, musical as well as social, '· which not only delimit them unequivocally but throiv light upon the · whole setting of the two musical spheres· as well.

-,"; One possible method of achieving this clarification· would he an. historical analysis of the division as it occurred "ill music ,production and of the roots of the two main spheres. Since, however, the present study is concerned with the actual function of poptilar ·music in its present status, it is more advisable tO-!OllOW the line. pf characteriza·

Ji.£!1 oi_Jh~_PE_~~on.i_~non itsel_f as it is given today-- tharitOtrace it back to its origins. This Islhe more justified as the. division into the

. two spheres of music took place in Europe long before American popular music arose. American music from its inception accepted

. the division as something pre·given, and therefore the historical · ... background of the division applies to it only indirectly; Hence we

seek, first of all, an insight into the fundamelltal characteristics of . ·popular music in 'the broadest sense ..

- A clear judgment concerning the relation of serious music to popular music can be arrived at only by strict .atte ion... to- the fundamen.ta~. char~~sti~_p.Q;.ula_r lllil~~ s andardizaµon. 1 ? __ The

~. _"l'he baa!c u:aportance of sta.ndar_dizatlon has. not, altogether eSCaped the attention '- of ctrrrcnt literature on_ popn1ar m?s1c. .,-Oe ehie( · difference -between a popular song

and a stan~ard,; _or_ aenous, 110ng like Mandalay, _Sy~a, or Tues,-_- is that the melody, and !be lyno of a~popula.r number are constructed wuhfn a ·definite·'pattern ·or structural ~ form. wher~ the poem,. or lyric, of a st~dard numb;r has no strUctural eonfinementa, • and the 11u111e le free to interpret the meaning and feeling of the words without following; a M:t pattern or fonn. Putting it another way, the popular song is· 'custom built.' while

" (footnote continr,u:d ·on ne.u page) ·

l

•• k.

18 T.· W. Adorno

whole structure of popular music is standardized, even where the attempt is made to circnmvent standardization. ).St~ndardization extends _from the most gene~tures to the mo~! specific ones.

\Best known 1s the rule thatilie chorus consists of thirty-two bars and '· .. ,)that the_:cange is limited .. t<:> one-o,tave and one note. The ge11erai

~pes<;f hits 'i are also~dized: not only the dance types, the / ngi~hose pattern 1s u:nae;_:stood, but also the "characters"

)

such as mother son.gs, home songs, nonsense or "novelty':~ sotigs; pse::_do-mrrse'}:' ;.h.ymes, lax:ients_ for a los.t.girl. M. o~t i':'1portal!! of· all, ilienarmomc cornerstones of·each·hit~the .b.~gmnmg and the

\ end of each part-must beat out the standard scheme:-fhis scheme, l- erriphasizes the most prithitive harmonic facts no matter what ha-s-. 1 harmonically intervened. Complications have no consequences. :I'hls

I. inexor·a· Ole device guarantees that regardless of what aberrations·. occur, the hit will lead back to the iiamefamiliar ··experie11~e, and \ nothing fundamentally novel will be ,introduced. .

The details themselves are standardized no less than the form, and a whole terminology exists for them such as break, blue chords, dirty notes. Their standardization, however, is somewhat different from that of the framework. It is not overt like the latter but hidden behind a veneer of individual "effects" whose prescriptions ,are handled as the experts' secret, however open this secret may be to musicians generally. This contrasting character of the standardiza·

_ "'"-;, tion o.f i_he whole an~ p. art provides a rough, preliminarL~ting for I th.!!J'.ifoct upon the listeuer,

The primary effect of this relation between the framework and the detail is that the listener becomes prone to evince sironger "re· actions to the part than to the whole. His grasp of the whole does not lie in-the- living experience of this one concrete piece- of music he. has followed. The. whole is pre-given and pre-~ccepted, even before the.actual experience of the music starts'; therefore, it is not likely to influence, to any great extent, the reaction to- the details,

the standard song aUows the composer freer play of imagination and interpretation." (Abner Silver and Robert Bruce, How to Write and Sell a Song Hit, New York, 1939, p. 2.) The autbors fail, however, to realize the externally super·imposed, -commercial character o! those patteriis which aims at canalized reactions or, in the, -language of the regular announcement of one particular radio program, ~t "easy listening." - They co_nfuse the mechanical patterns with highly organiz~tl, strict art form!!,! "Certainly there are few !JlOte stringent verse forms in poetry~ than the sonnet, and yet the greatest poets of all lime have woven undying beauty within its small and limited frame. A Composer has just as much opportunity ·for exhibiting his talent and gehius in popular songs as in more 1:1erious music" {pp. 2-3),· Thus the standard pattern of popular music appears to them vinually on the same level aa the law of a fugue. It is this contamination which makes the insight in10 the basic standardization of lJOpular music sterile. It-ought-to be added that what Silver and Bruce call a "standafd song" is.just the opposite of what we mean by a standardized.popular song. .

l~>· . . ' . ".~~;:: On Popular Mus1c 19

•• ,";<-...

. "-'except to glve them varying degrees of emphasis .. Details which occupy musically strategic positions in :the framework-the begin-

::, ning.of the chorns or hs reentrance after the bridge--have a better .. _ · chance for recognition and favorable reception than details not so

::::,"situated, for instance, middle bars of the bridge. But this situa· . : \::'·:1fonal nexus never interferes with the scheme. itself. To this limited

.':" situational e)\tent the detail depends upon the whole. But no stress '· is ever. placed upon the whole as a musical event, nor does the struc-

ture of the whole ever "depend upon the details. · · .. .'..:. Serious music, for comparative purposes, may be thus charac·

-~l-~- . ·• ~:--- . ' . ''. tenzeu: . ~·::~.,~Every detail derives its musical sense from the concrete totality_

,o{ ihe piece which, in turn, consists of the life relationship of the detaiY, and never of a mere enforcement of a musical scheme.) For example, in the introduction of the first movement of Beethoven's Seventh !iymphonr the second theme (in C-major) gets its true meaning only from the context. Only through ... the _whole .. does it acqUire .it~ part~cular lyrical and expressiv:~ quality,-that is, a wli01e built up ofl!Svecycoiil:rl!Sl with the canius firmus·like char·

. acter of the first .theme •.. -Taken in isolation the second theme would be disrobed ·1;;· insignificance. Another example may be .found in

·!lie beginning of the recapitulation over the pedal point of the first . movement of Beethoven's "Appassionata." By following the preced· ing uutburst it achieves the utmost dramatic momentum. By omitting the exposition and development and starting with this repetition, all is lost:

Nothing corresponding to this can happen in popular music. It 'would· not affect the. musical sense if any detail were taken out of 'the context; the listener can supply the "framework" automatically,

.. since it is a mere musical automatism itself. ·The beginning of the chorus is replaceable by the beginning of iruiumerable other cho· i:uses. The i;lterrelationship among the elements or the relationship of the elements to the whole would be unaffected. In Beethoven pPSition is important only in a living relation between a concret~ totality and its concrete parts. In popular music, position is abso· lute. Every detail is substitutable; it serves its function only as a cog- in a machine. · . .

. .!he n;ere establishment of this difference is not yet sufficient, . It ll! possible to ob1ect d!at- the far reachmg standard: schemes an( types of popular music ara bound up with danc.;) and"therefore are also a.pplica:ble to dance·derivatives in serio~s m1:1sic,Tfor ~"<ampte, the nu;iue~to an~ scherzo of ,the classical Viennese School. It- may be ·mamtamed either that !Ins part of serious musk is also to be

;

r-"'~''

lS.

·k.

20 T. W. Adorno

comprehended in terms of detail rather than of whole, or that. if the whole still is perceivable in the dance types in serious music despite recurrence of the types, there is no reason why it should not be perceivable in modem ·popular music.

The following consideration provides an answer to both objec· tions ·by· showing the radical differences even where serious music

pmploys dince·types. According to current. formalistic views the I.scherzo of(!l_eethoven's Fifth Symphony ),an be regarded as a highly stylized minuetto. What Beethoven takes from the traditional min· uetto scheme in this scherzo is the idea of outspoken contrast between a minor minuetto, a major trio, .and repetition·:of the minor minuetto; and also certain other ·characteristics such as the emphatic three-fotirths rhythm often accentuated on the first fourth and, by and large, dance-like symmetry in the sequence of bars and periods. But the specific form-idea of this movement as a concrete totality ·

( _.tl'ansvaluates the devices borrowed from the minuetto _ ~cheme. The

. whole movement is conceived as -an introduction to --the finale in order to create tremendous tension, not only by its thre_litening, forea boding expression hut eveit more by the very way in which its formal development is handled. J · · · \' The classical minuetto scheme required first the appearance of the main theme, then the introduction of a second part which may lead to more distant tonal regions-formalistically similar, to he sure, to the "bridge" .of today's popular music~and finally the re· currence of the original part. All this occurs in Beethoven. He takes up the idea of thematic dualism within the scherzo part. But he forces what was, in the conventional minuetto;- a mute and mean· ingless game-rule to speak with meaning. He achieves complete consistency between the formal structure and its_ specific content, that is to say, the elaboration of its themes .. The whole scherzo part of this scherzo (that is to say, what occurs before the entrance of the deep strings in c:major that marks the beginning of the trio), consists of the dualism of two theme_s, the creeping figure in the strings iind the "objective," stone·like answer- of the wind instru·. ments. This dualism is not developed in a schematic -Way· so that first the .phrase of the strings is elaborate(!, then the answer of the winds, and then the string theme is mechanically repeated. After

' the first occu+rence of the second theme in the horns, the· two .essen· tial elements are alte1nately interconnected in_ the manner of ·a dialogue, and the end of the scherzo part is actually marked, not by the first, hut by the second theme which has overwhelmed the first musical phrase . . ~,,,

Furthermore, the repetition of the scherzo after the._lrio is scored

.- ,._ ·"· . ., ...... ~-~· ~: -~.

On Popular Music 21

so differently that it sounds like a mere shadow of the scherzo and . assumes that haunting oharacter whi9h vanishes ouly with the affirmative entry of the Finale theme.~ The whole device has been made dynAmic. Not only the themes, hut the II!usioal form itself have been subjected to tension: the same tension·whicl:i is already manifest within the two-fold structure of the first theme .that con· aists, as it were, of question and reply, and then even more manifest within the context between the two main theme•. The whole scheme bas become subject to the inherent demands of thls particular move· ment. J · ·,, --./di_/_{_,~

(To sun1 up the difference: in Beethoven and -in-~·good Serious .-~;--:-;; /~"; · music in generau=we are not c~ncerned here with bad s'erious music \' ( £.,,, . . which may he as rigid and mechanical as popular music-:-f.the detail virtually contains the whole and leads to the exposition of ihe whole, while, at the same time, it is produced out of the conception .of the whole.if In popular music the relationship is fortuitous .• ) The detail has no bearihg on a whole, which appears as an extraneous frame· work. Thus, the whole is never altered by. the individual event and therefore remains, as it were, aloof, imperturbable~ and UilllOticed throughout the piece. At the same time, the detail is mutilated by a device which it can never influence and alter, so that the detail re .. mains inconsequential. A musical detail which is not permitted toV develop becomes a caricature of its own potentialities. ) '

Standardization.

The previou{discussion shows that the difference qetwee~ popu; . lar and serious music cari be grasped in _more preC-is.e· terms than those referring to musical)evels such as "lowbrow al;ld highbrow," "simple and complex," "na.ive and sophisticated.") ·For example, the difference between the spheres cannot he adequatdy expressed in terms of complexity and simplicity. All works of the earlier Viennese classicism are, without exception, rhythmically simpler than stock arrangements of jazz. Melodically, the wide intervals of a good ~any hits such as .'.'Deer. P~u~ple~' -~~. :",~U?:is~-?.et~n~~'·' are more difficult to follow per ;e: tL"l' :ii:ost tp._el_o.4iei;:o•;.fpi; .e"'111)Pl',', Haydn, which consi_st mainly Of circumsc:r~piion.s.q~ ~J?.i~ triads, and second steps. Harmonically, the supplY,: of ch~r!fs:,u! .tli~ so-called classics is invariably more limited than.that.0£.an.y mµ:rent Tin Pan Alley composer who draws from Dehnssf,··llive.l, ;,;rid even later J sour:es. S~nd~rdizatiop and non·standardl~B.tion are the key COil•,,?. : i:fast1ng terms· for the difference,_ .. ···---·- .. ---- .. ·-·····---·-·---·~ -·-

\., __ ~tru.t.t_f!-!.~?.Jta,T}:_dardization aims at staTI-dard .~E:.g_fup~d Listening to popular music is-iiiBiilpuTaiea-niifOiilyby its promoters, hut as it '

,.

•• k.

22 T. W. Adorno

were, by the inherent nature of this music itself, into a system of response·mechanisms wholly antagonistic to the ideal of individuality in a free, libr:al society. This has noihing to do with simplicity .and complexity. (._In serious music, each musical element, even the simplest one, is "itself," and the more highly organized the _work is, the less possibility there is of substitution among the details.) In hit music, however, the structure· underlying the piece is abstract, exist- · ing independent of the specific course of the music. This is basic to the illusiOn that certain complex harmonies are more -easily wider .. standable in pcipular music than the same harmonies in. serious music. \For the complicated in popular music never functions as "itself" but only as a disguise or embellishment behind which the scheme can always be perceived.) In--jazz the ainateur listener· is capable of replacing complicated rhythmical or harmonic formula~ by the schematic ones' which they represent and which they still suggest, however advetjturous they appear. The ear deals ~ith the·

· difficulties of hit music ~y achieving slight substitutions derived from the knowledge of the patterns. (The listener, when faced with the complicated, actually heai;s only the simple which it represents and perceiv"i' the complicatea only as a parodistic distortion of the simple./

No such mechanical substitution by stereotyped patterns is pos'. sible in serious music. Here even the simplest event necessitates an effort to grasp it immediately instead. of summarizing it vaguely accorQ,ing to institutionalized prescriptions capable of producing only institutionalized effects. Otherwise the music is not "undero sti?od." Popular music, however, is composed in such a way 'that the process of translation of the unique irito the norm is al~eady planned and, to a certain extent, achieved Within the composition itself. .

T)le composition hears for the listener. This is how popular m.usfo di.V)'.StS the listener ~f his Spont~neitJ:' and promote.s con~itioned_ reflexes. \Not only does 1t not reqmre his effort to follow its con·

· cret.e. .s;t~pm;. it actually ghies hill'. models. under which a-;,ything wncrete.still· temalning.may b6.•ub•umed. The schematic .lmild·up dictates the way in. which, he must listen while, at the sam.!3' time, it makes a?1y e.if..o~t in lisL~ing Unnecessary. )Popular mtJ.Si?-~!-'.'p_r.~:.~,1 digested" jn ~.way: s\tongly resembling theiad-or''digests."· of

-·-·printed material. JU-s·this s,tructure of contemporary popular•music; which in_ the .last analysis, accoµnts for those changes of. listening habits which we shall later disciiss.

~ So far s_tandard~zation of popular music has been consider_ed· in structural terms-that is, as an inher.ent quality without exvlicit.

~:- ·· On Popular :Music 23 .i.!-~t" ~ ~~ . . . . .

.. 'reference to the. process of produ.ction <>.r _to· the underlyi.ng causes . for standardization. Though all mdustrial ·mass production neces-

·.'. Sarily eventuates in standardiz~tion, the production of popular ')music can be ~lled "indµstrial" ?nly in its pr?mo~ion and .disti;ibu- i. iion, whereas the act -of prod~cm_g a song-hit sti.11 _rem~ms m a

. ··.;:handicraft stage •• -The-production of popular music 1s highly cen·· .hra~d in its:·~nomic or~anization, ~u~ ~till "indivjdualisiic". in

... i!S social mode :of-production. The dms1on of labor among the t;,:Comp_oser, harmonizer,_ ~nd ___ arranger is not indUstrial but rather .'·.·pretends industrialization, in order to look more up·to·date, whereas

. ; it has actually adapleil industrial methods for the technique of its ~- ,'·'promotion. 1t would not increase the costs of production if the ,;• ·il~various composers of hit ·tunes did not follow certain standard pat· • · '.'terns. 'Dierefore, we must !look for other reasons for structural

~·standardization-very· different reasons from those which. account · .. lor the standardization of motor cars and breakfast foods. ) :;·~. @it;.ton offers a lead for coming to grips with.the basic reasons 'for iL e musical standards of popular music . were originally developed by a competitive process. As one partic)llar song scored

. ,;--& great ~s; hundreds of others sprang up ~mitating the success- ~-iul_.-one. ·The most: successful pits, types, and "ratios" between

. \elements were imitated, and the process culminated in. the crys- . ftallization of standards .. Under centralized conditions such as. exist <~today these standards have.become ~'frozen."1 That is, they have \Peen taken over by cartelized agencies, the final results of a com' . )''P.,titive process, and rigidly enforced upon material-to be promoted. ·,Non-compliance with the rules of the game became the basis for ;exclusion. The original patterns that are now standardized evolved

·~.:~ a_ mor; or les_s competitive way. Large·scale economjc concentra- '~tion institutionalized the standardization, and made it imperative.

, ::flui. a resultp iiil!!>~!i~~ J>y _rugged indivjd"!'Jists _ have_..been ~ut­ . µa.<ed. The standard patterns have become,mvested ·with the Im·

,))ilunity of hignes.,_;."the King can do no Wrong.'~ This. also accounts ~for revivals in popular music. They do not have the outworn char- ·facter of •tandardi:!:ed ·products manufactured, after a given pattern. ~.The breath of free cdmP.etition is still alive within them. On the oth!'r hand, the fam~ils old ~ts which. are revive~ set the patterns

-~\,!hich have become Standardized. They are the golden age of the ,·, ; game-rules. , . .

i:~.~,Thia "fr~g" of standard~ i~ socially enforced 1'pon the agen-

, '!;:e Mu Hod<~<lln~, Zei~hri/• /U; Sotiai/";Chung, •ol. Vlll'.19S9, p. ll5. ~!ti[;;·~·.~ - . . . . . . -

-j~·:!•:-:.

: ·If/~:·: . ~

/

;, ' .. "

·"''

r

s.

k.

24 T. W. Adorno

cies. themselves. Popular-music must simult~!l~9Jl•lyJneeLtw:o de· , mands: One is fof~t_1E'~ at prov~li:e. the Tistener's attention. The Oilier is for the milter to fall w1thm the-ti! ry of what the musically rmtrained listener would. ca~tnatura '_ music: that is, the sum total of all the conventions and ma ia formulas in music to which he is accustomed ·arid which iie-·~ega;ds -~~ 'the inherent, simple language of music itself, no matter how late the development might be which prod,uced this natural language. This natural Ian·.

( guage for the American listener stems from his earliest m. usical experiences, the nursery rhymes, the hymns he sings in Sunday school, the little tunes he whistles on his way home :from school.- All these are vastly more important in the formation of. musical language· than his ability to distinguish the beginning of Brahms' Third Symphony from that of his Second. Official musical culture is, to a large extent, a mere superstructure of this underlying musicar language, namely the major and minor tonality and all the tonal relationships it implies. But these tonal relationships of the primi· tive musical language set barriers to whatever does .hot conform to them. Extr~vagances are ~olerated only insofar as they can be recast into this so-called natural language.

In terms of consumer-demand, the standardization of popular ~ ·' ., ' music is only the expression of this dual desideratum imposed upon

it by the _musical frame of mind of the public,~that it be "stimu. latory" by deviating in some way from the established "natural," and that it maintain the supremacy of the natural against such deviations. The attitude of the audience toward the natural language is -reinforced by standardized production, which institutionalizes desiderata which originally might have come from the public.

( Pseud~-i~i~id;;;i~~;~·:;} The paradox in 'me·· desiderata~timufatory and 11atural-ac·

counts for the dual character of standardization itself. Stylization of the ever identical :framework is only one aspect of standardization. Concentration and control in our culture hide themselves in their very manifestation. Unhidden they would provoke resistance. There· fore the illusion and, ~o a certain extent, ,even the reality of in· dividual achievement must be maintained• The maintenance of it is grounded in material reality itself, for while administrative control over life. prpceSses is concent"rated, ownership is -still diffuse.

In the sphere of luxury pr~duction, to which popular music helongs and in which no necessi!ies of life are .. immediately involved, while, at the same time, the residues of individualism are most alive there in the form of ideological categories· ·such; as taste and free

. ?.}'.:- . :: 1~~i-':. . On Popular Music · 25

: _\~~ ·. .------ ··.··.choice, it is imperative to.hide standardizat~o~. T_?e-"back,vard~ess"

. of musical mass producho-?1..' the ~~ct that 1t is still on a handicraft level and not literally an mdustnal one, conforms perfectly to that

: necessity which is essential from the viewpoint of cultural big _ . business. If the individual handicraft elements of popular music :.;{:were abolished altogether, a synthetic means of hiding stand.ardiza.

. ':?; tion would have to be evolved. Its elemeq.ts 3.:fe even now in M/ 'existence.

The necessary correlate of musical standardization is pseudo· individualization. By pseudo-individualization. we mean endowing

::'cultural mass production with the halo of free choice or open mar-. /-: ket on the basis of standardization. itsel.t Standardiza\ion of song :;. hiti! keeps the customers in li11e. by _doiqg_tJ.!~i.i::__listening.for them, 1.·· . ': i1,~_j_!._!te.re. Pseudg-ind.ixi.dualiza.ti.Q!,1, for its .. part,. ~eeps them in . , line by making them forget that what they listen· .tc;i is already ·· listened to for them~ .or ~'Pr~:djgest.eQ." · .- · ' · ___,

· TheIDost ··drRSliC example of sb.~dardization oi. ·p~esumably ~c individualized features is to be found in so-called improvisations. -·1, Even though jazz musicians still. improvise jn Practi~e, their im~

··> provisations have become so "normalizeq" as 'to en'B.hle a whole :; terminology to be developed to express the stand.ard. deviCes. of in· · : ~:dividualization: a terminology which in turn. is· ballyl\ooell' by jazz '11' publicity agents to foster the myth of pioneer artis~nship and at the

.g-: same time flatter the fans by apparently allowing them to peep }: behind the curtain and get the inside story. This p&el!do·individuali· '- zation is prescribed by the standar.dization of the framework. The . ·latter is so rigid that the freedom it allows·for. any. sort of improvisa·

·. tion is severely delimited. Improvisations-passages. where span· .. taneous action. of individuals is permitted ("Swing it boys")-are

: confined within th~ walls of the harmonic and metric scheme. In a · :: great many cases, such as the ~'break'l qf pre·s~ing jazz: the musical '.'function of the improvised detail is determined completely by the scheme: the break can be nothing other than a disguised cadence.

·.:;Hence, very few possibilities fo:r actual improvisation remain, due · · lo !h.~ necessity of merely melodically circumscribing the same un· ' de~lymg harmonic functions. Since these possibilities were very qwckly exhausted, stereo~~ng of improvisatory details speedily ~ed. Thus, standardizabon of the norm enhances in a purely .~cal way standardization of its own deviatiott-pseudo·in-

'<~clividnalizati" . w = . .· '.'}~':Thi~ sub~rvience of. improvi~a.tion to . .'standardization .explains . two main "?"'<>-P•J:"cholog?_cal qualities of popular' music. One is the . fact tlu!t the detail remams openly connected. with the underlying ,~~e so tliat the listener always feels on safe ground. The choice .

·." ··_;p: ¢;'..,·'.· '. ...

~. 0

·k.

-y

.• ff-.

I '

L,

)

26 T. W. Adorno .

in individual alterations is so small that the perpetual recurrence of the same variations is a reassuring signpost of the identical behind tl\!>m. The other is the function of "substitntion" -the ini. • provisatory features forbid their being grasped as musical events in themselves. They can be received only as embellishments. It is a well-known fact that in daring jazz arrangements worried notes, dirty tones, in other words, false notes, play a conspicuous role. They are apperceived as exciting stimuli only because.they are 'cor· • rected by the ear to the right n

0 ote. This, however, is only an extreme

instance of what happens less conspicuously in all individualization in popnlar music. Any harmonic boldness, any chord which does not fall strictly within the simplest harmonic scheme deman~s being apperceived as ."false," that is, as a stimulus which- Carrjes with it the unambiguous prescription to substitute for it the right detail; or

· rather the naked scheme. Understanding popular mµsic means obeying such commands for listening. Popular music commands its own listening-habits. _

____.l'here is another type of individualization claimed in terms_ of kinds of popular music and differences in name-bands. The types · of popular music are carefully differentiated iµ production. The listener is presumed to be able to choose between them. The most widely recognized differentiations are those between swing and sweet and such name-bands as Benny Goodman and Guy Lombardo. The listener is fIUickly able to distinguish tM types of music and even the performing band, this in spite .of the fundamental identity of the material and the great similarity of the pre~0ntatiol1S apart from their emphasized distingnishing trade·marks. This label)ing technique, as regards type of music and band, is pseudo·individuali· zation, but of a sociological kind outside the realm of strict musical technology. It provides trade-marks of identification for differentiat· ing between tlie actnally undifferentiated.

_!'.9~l~r._rn1l§i'l.J?~.i:!lme.s _a __ multiple-choice .. qµeslionnaire., There are two main types and their derivatives from which to choQse. The 'listener is encouraged by the inexorable presence .of these types psychologically to cross-out what he dislikes and check what he likes. The limitation inherent in this choice and the clear-cut' alternative it entails provoke like-dislike patterns of behavior. This mechanical dichotomy breaks down indifference; it is imperative to favor sweet or swing if one wishes to continu~ to listen to popular Inusic.

On Popular Music

II. PJIBSENTATION OF THE MATERJAL, Minimum req~irements.

'----· 27 -_/ ~.· .

.. The structure of the musical material requires a technique of. 'I~ own by which it is enforced. This process may be roughly de· fined as"plugging." The term "plugging" originally had the nar- row meaning of ceaseless repetition of one particular hit in order to make it ~'Successful." We here use it in the broad sense, to Signify a coatinuation o~ the inhe;ent proce~ses o.f composition and 'arrangement 9f the mus1~al material. Plugg'.ng a~ms to brea~ down the resistance 'to the musically ever-equal or identical by, as it were, ·closing the avenues of escape from the ever-equal. It leads the listener to become euraptured with the inescapable. And .thus it

.ds to the institutionalization_ and standardization of listening :hits themselves. (Listeners be6ome so accustomed to th~ recur~ ,ce of the same things that they react automatically) The stand·

ardization of the material requires a plugging mechanism from outside, since everythjng equals everything else to such an extent 'that the emphasi~ on presentation which is provided by plugging ... ust substitnte for the lack of genuine individuality in the material.

.e listener o'f normal musical intelligence who hears the J(undry ';otif of "Parsifal" for the first t.ime is likely to recognize 'it when

is played agai;) because it is unmistakable and not exchangeable 'r anything ~lse. ~f the same listener were (con.fronted with ·nir

lverage song.bit, h~ would not he able to distmguish it from any )ther unless iMVe"ie'' eated so often that he would be forced to _:emember it.1~epeti~ves a psychological importance Which it I._ bonld otherwi~eve;vhtv~. Thus plugging is the inevitable com_j ·l~ent of standardization.1 · · _ -

·Provided the material fo.Jfills certain minimum requirements) . givc:.n song) Caii)be plugged and' made a success) if there'is ~d~- '' te•tie-up between publishing liouses, name bands, radio and

.. oving pi~':ll' Most important is the following requirement: ·o be plugg".'11.. a song-hit must have at least one feature by which . / can~- d~guished. f:o~ any other, and yet possess the complete J<

_ • rentioI!lllity; an? trmah.ty of all others) The actual criterion by ~"!> a song ts Ju?ged worthy of plugging is (paradoxical. ·_ The · pubfuher Wants a piece of music that is fundamentally the same as

the other curr~t '?ts. and simultaneously fundamentally diffe;ent :!.!'~'."")Only !£ it 1s the 1111me does it have a chance of being • • ~ ~rtdng of th.e -pluggiiig mechanism on the American scene ~f popular

, Ill-full ~etail .in a ~tudy by Duncan MacDougald. the present atudy ftoelf 1iot,ha theort:;ncal discussion of some of the more general aspects of the ,..ent o - e_ matc:nal. '

l

r ~ ~

....

28 T. W. Adorno

sold automatically, without requiring any effort on the part. of the customer, and of presenting itself as a musical institution. And only ii it is d.i_fferent can it be distin!C'ished from other songs,-'-a require- ment for hemg remembered ana hence for being successful.

Of course, this double desideratum cannot be fulfilled. In the case of actual published and plugged songs, one will generally find SQl)le sort of compromise, sotnething which is by and large the same .,, and hears just one isolated trade·mark which makes.it appear to be • original. The distinguishing feature must not. necessarily be mel- odic,1 but may consist of metrical irregularities, particular chords or particular sound colors.

G~mor.

A further requirement of plugging is a certain richness and roundness of sound. This requirement evolves that feature in the whole plugging mechanism which is most overtly bound up with advertising as a business as well as with the_ commetc~alization of entertainment. It is also particularly r~presentative of the inter· relationship of standardizatiop. and pseudo-individualization. ·

It is ~l glam~ those innumerable passages in song ar· rangements whlclrafjpear to communicate the "now- w~ presene' attitude. The--musicaLJ!ourishes which·accompany MGM's roaring lion whenever he opens his ma]estic mouth are analogous to the non· leonine sounds of muskal glamor heard ovler the air. · · Glamor-mindedness may optimistically be regarded as a mental construct of the success story in which the hardworking American settler triumphs over-;!inpassive nature, which is finally forced to yield up its riches. However, in a world that is no longer a frontier world, the problem 0£ glamor cannot be regarded · as so· easily soluble. Glamor is made into the eternal conquerbr's song of the common man; he who is never permitted to conquer in life conquers in glamor. The triumph is actually the self-styled triumph of the

1Technical analysis must add ·certain reservations to any acceptance of listener reactions at their face value in the case of the concept of melody. Listeners to popular music speak mainly about melody and rhythm. sometimes abou\i instrument&· tion, rarely or never about b8l'mony ·and- form;, J-Within the_ standard-_: scheme of popular music, however, melody itself la by no means autonomous in the sense of an independent line developing in the horizontal dimension of music. Melody is, -rather, a function of harmony. The so-called melodies in popular music are generally arabesques, dependent upon the sequence of harmonies. What appears to the listener_ to _be pri· marily melodic is actually fundamentally harmonic, its mefodic structure a mere derivative.

It would be valuable to study exactly what laymen call a melody. It would probably turn out to be a successiQn of tones related to one another by simple and easily under• standable harmonic functioila, within the framework of the eight bar period. There is a large gap between th~ layman's idea of a melody and its strictly musical connotation.

,, ..

On Popular Music 29

business man who announces ·that he will offer the same product at a lower price. . . . .

. . The conditions for this function of glam~r are entirely different ~ · 1rom those ,of frontier life. They al'ply to the .mechanization of · Jibor and to the workaday life of the. masses. B.ogdom has her~e 80 great that.2nly .. the brightest .. cokrs_.have.any. ch_ance __ oJ bemg

~!tedout ofihe general dralmess. yet, it is just those violent colors "' which-heai.Wiiiiess· io· the omnipotence of me<;i)anical,, industrial

production itself. Nothing co11ld he more stereotyped. th,an the pink· ish red neon lights which abound in front of shops, mdving picture / theatres and restaurants. By glamorizj!\g,.they.attra.ct at\~n.tj9n. But the means by which they are used fo"overcome humdrum' reality are more humdrum than rlle reality itself. That which aims to achieve glamor becomes a more uniform activity than. what _it seeks to glamorize. If it were really attractive in itself, it would. have no

·more means of support than a really original popufar·composition. · It would violate the law of the sameness of the putatively. unsame. . The term glamorous is applied to those faces, colo~s; sounds which,

by the light they irradiate, differ from the rest. Rut all glamor girls . look alike and the glamor effects of popular music are. equivalent

to each other. . · AB far as the pioneer character of glamor is concerned, there is

an overlapping and a change of function rather than--~n innocent aurV:ival of the past. To be sure, the world of glaJ1ior-is a show, akin to shooting galleries, the glaring lights· of the circus and deafening brass bsnds, As such, the function ·of glamor may have

. originally been associated with, a sort of advertising which· strove '.; artificially to produce demands in a social setting not yN entirely ::,permeated by the mar~et. The post.competitive capitalism of the

'lpresent day uses for its own purpos~s device,• of a ~till !inma:ure · ·,1,1econon;y. fhus, glamor has a hauntmg quality of .h1stonc revival ·,~!" radio, comparable to the revival of the .midway cirC\IS barker ; m. today's radio barker who implores his unseen aud\ence not to

. tfail to sample wares and does so in tones which arouse hopes beyond ·;~th!' capacity of the commodity to fu!fill. __ All gla~Js ... h.oµrid .. up--·--

'2,'Wlth some sort of trickery. Listeners are nowhere more tricked by . ;~!"'Piila_r muswilian ln- lts glamorous passages. F]ourishes and ~jubilations express triumphant thanksgiving for the music· itself- '-;/' aelf;mlogy of its own achievement in exhorting the -listener to

·!':exultatt.on and of its identification with the aim of the agency in ;,.Promoting a gre~t event. However, as this event does not take place · apart from its own celebration, the _triumphant -thanksgiViitg offered ;, 1!P by the music is a self.betrayal. It is likely to make itself felt as '~""'"

k':

v

30 T .. W. Adorno

such. unconsciously in the listeners, just as the child resents the adult\ praising· the gifts he made to the child in the same words

. which the child feels ii is his own privilege to use.

Baby talk.

(:

It is not accidental that glamor leads to child.behavior. Glamor, .

. which plays on the listene:r-'s desire for strength, is concomitant with

musical language which betokens dependence.1 The children's -jokes, the purposely wrong orthography, the use of children.'s ·ex· pressions in advertising, take the form of a musical chililren's language in popular music. There are many examples of lyrics characterized by an ambiguous irony in that, while affecting .a children's language, they at the same time display contempt of the adult for the child or even give a derogatory or sadistic meaning to childrei:i's expressions ("Goody, Goody," "A Tisket · a Tas~et," "London Bridge is Falling Down," "Cry, Baby, Cry"). Genuine and pseudo-nursery rhymes are combined with purposeful altera· tions of the lyrics of original nursery rhymes in order to make them commercial hits. .. .

The music, as well as the lyrics, tends to affect such a children's language. Some of its principal characteristics arel unabating repe· tition of some particular musical formula comparable to the attitude of a child incessantly uttering the same demand ("I Want to Be Happy");' the limitation of many melodies to very few tones, com· parable to the way in which a small child speaks before he has the· full alphabet at his disposal; purposely wrong harmonization• re- sembling the way in which Sf!lall children express themselves in in· correct grammar; also certain over-sweet sound colors:, functioniniS like musical cookies and dandies. Treating adults as children 'is· involved in that i;epresentation of fun which is aimed at relieving the strain of their adult responsibilities. ·Moreover, the children's language serves to make the musical product "popular" with the subjects by attempting to bridge, in the subjects' consciousness, the distance between themselves and tlie plugging agencies, by approach- ing them with the trusting attitude of the child aski11g an adult for the correct time even though he kno~s neither the strartge man nor the meaning of time.

Plugging the whole field. The plugging of songs is only a part.of a mechanism and obtains

its proper meaning within the system as a whole. Basic to the system 11'he most famdus UterarY e:r:.ample of this attitude is "Want to shee th~ wheels go-

wound" (JOhn -Hahberton, Helen's Babies, New York, p. 9 ff). :One- could -eaail,r imagine a "noveh'y" $Ong being based upon that phrase.

~

.. : On Popular Music . 31 ·.

~-the plugging of styles and personalities. The plugging of certain 'ity!es is exemplified in the word swing. This term has neither a de.finite and nnambiguous meaning nor does it mark a sharp dif- !ference front the period of pre-swing hot jazz . up to the middle 'Urlrties. The lack of justification in the material for the use of the ·'elm arouses the suspicion that its usage is entirely due to plugging

,. -in order to rejuvenate an old commodity by giving it a new title. >imilarly plugged is the whole swing terminology indulged in by

,jazz journalism and u~ed hy ji'.l~rbugs,. a terminology ;vhich, a~cord- .. • g to Hobson, makes Jazz m_us~c!ans wince! The less'lnherent m the

.aterial are the characteristics plugged by a pseudo.expert ler- mology, the. more are such auxiliary forces as announcers . and 1nlnientaries . needed. . There is good reason to believe that this journalism partly be-

:ong5 immediately to the plugging mechanism, insofar as it depends .pon publishers, agencies, and name bands. At this point, however, sociological qualification is pertinent. Under contemporary eco-

.omic condhions, it is often futile- to look for "corruption," beCause 'Ele ar.l' ~ompe]~.!i t~ .. 1>~v.e_y9l.U11tarily_ in ways one expected

iem -iobenave in only w_hen _!liey:_l!ere pa.icl for ii. The journalists ·ho take p!!rl in the promotion of a Hollywood "oomph.girl" need

. ot be bribed at all by the motion pictu~e industry; The publicity iven to the girl by the industry itself is in complete accord with .e ideology pervading the journalism which takes it up. And this eology has become th.e audience's. The match appears to have

'!) made .in heaven. The jour_nalis!l!_s11.eak !fith.1111hoµghJyQi~§~--- Once a certain level ofeconomic backing for plugging has been ceached, the plugging process transcends its own causes and becomes lri"autonomouS social force. r Above ~ll other elements of the plugging mechanism stands the 1lugging of personalities, particularly of band leaders. Most of the eatures actually attributable to jazz arrangers are officially credited

tJ:e. conductQr; arrangers, who _are probably the most comJietent us1c1ans _in· the United. States, often remain in obscurity, like :Cnario writers, in the movies. The conductor 'is the man who im- .ecliately faces the audience; he is close kin to the actor who . press~· the. public either by qis joviality·.and genial manner or' by 1\'i"to~1aj gespire•. ~t is the face-to·face ;elation with the conductor· .. ch makes 1t possible to transfer to him any achievement. . . .,. FUrt!1er, the leader al)d his band are still largely regarded by

.. . audience as bearers of- improvisatory spon.taneity. The more

i. WW°ildet Hoh&o~, American ]a'Z'Z JUusic, p. 153, New York,-1939'. ~,:i.. . .:/. ;.:

I; ,-.

··:.:~ ', ~t.; ~::

•

l"" .... r- ~~, .··~······

32 T. W. Adorno

actual improvisation disappears in ihe process of standardization and ihe more it is superseded by elaborate schemes, the more must ihe idea· of improvisation be maintained before the audience. The ar· ranger remains obscure partly because of the necessity'!or avoiding ihe slightest hint ihat popular music may not be improvised, but must, in most cases, be fixed and systematized.

. ID. THEORY ABOUT THE USTENER. Recognition and acceptance. .--·--~ . ,.,.,..-- ............

Mass liste. ning habits today gravitate about~~. i J, Popular. music and its plugging are focused on ihis~~b1tuauon, The basic· principle behind it is ihat one need only ~eat-sOniething until it is recognized in order to make it accepted. This applies -to the standardization of ihe m~terial as well as to its plugging. What is necessary in order to understand. ihe reasons for ihe popularity of the current type of hit music is a the9retical analysis of the -processes involved in the transformation bf rePetition into recognition and of recogiiiiiOn in!o acceptance.

The ··;~~cept of recognition, h9Wever, may ~ppeaf to be too un· specific· to explain modem mass listening. It can be .argued ihat wherever musical understanding is concerned, the factor of reCogni· , tion, being one of ihe basic functions of human knowing, must play an important role. Certainly one understands a Beethoven sonata only by recognizing some of its features as being abstractly identical wiih oilier~ which one knows from fo_!lll~rience, and hY. linking . them up wiih ihe present experience. The idea ihat a Beeihoven---. sonata could be understood in a void without relating it to elements of musical language which one kno~~!'d recognizes-would be absurd. What matters, however, is ~s reco~ized. ·What does a real listener recognize in a Beethoven sonata ?e certainly recog· nizes the "system" upon which it is based: the major-min9r tonality,

· ihe inter-relationship of keys which determines modulation, the dif- ferent chords and their relative expressive value, cerµlin melodic ·formulas; and certain structural patterns. (It would be absurd to deny that such patterns exist in serious music. ·But their- function is of a different order. Granted all this recogn,ition, it is still not suf' · ficient for a comprehension of ihe musical sense.) (All ihe tecog· nizable elements are organized in good serious music hy a concrete and unique musical totality from which they derive their particular meaning, in the same sense as. a word in a. poem derives its meaning from ihe totality of ihe poem and not from ihe everyday use of ihe word,) alihough ihe recognition of this everydayness of the word

;,; · On Popular )lfosic 33 .;.. . ;.<,. ·7 be ihe necessary presupposition of any understanding of ihe

. The musical sens~ bf any piece .of music may indeed be defined as-ihat dimension of ihe piece which cannot be grasped by· recog· 'ioition alone, by its identification wiih some\hing one knows. )It can 'l>C built up only by spontaneously linking ihe known elements}--a reaction as spontaneous by ihe listener as it was spo)ltaneous. by ihe :Cotnposer'*in qrder to experience the inherent -novelty· of the com· J>os.itionJ The musical sense is the New-something which cannot be traced back to and subsumed under ihe configuration of ihe known, but which springs out of it, if ihe listener comes to its aid.

f.'Jt i~ pr~cisely ihis r~lationship be~een ihe re?~gnized and ihe , new which 1s llestroyed 1n popular music. Rec~gng~_beco!!)~~- a.n ·'end instead of a means. (The recognition of ihe mechanically familiar \in a hit tune leaves noihing wl)ich can be ·grasped as new by a linking of ihe various elements.! As a matter of fact, ihe fotlc be-

. tWeen the elements is pre-giveri in popular: music as much as, or even to a greater extent than, the elements are themselves. Hence, ·recognition and understanding must here coincide, whereas in serious music understanding i~ ihe act by which universal recognition leads

·:·•.;,. -the emergence of something · fundamentalfy new. IW appropriate beginning for investigating recognition in re-

of any particular song hit may be !llade by drafting a scheme ich. divides the experience of recognition into its different com·

rµents. Psychologically, all the factors we enumerate are inter~ ·oven to such a degree ihat it would he impossible to separate ihem ~m- one another in reality, and any temporal oi-der given them

·ould be highly problematical. Our scheme is directed more toward --!O. different objective elements involved in the experience of ~£og· ~ than toward ihe way in which ihe actual experience feels to · icular individual oi· individuals. ·

.e components we consider to be involved are ihe following: ·~ .· ...

. a) Vague r.em"'!'1>rance. : ~, . • b) .Aclual identification. . \ c) Suhsnmption by label. 'd) Self-reflection on ihe act ohecognition. · e) Psychological transfer ·of recognition-auihority to the · ~··object. · . ·~. . . \

The more or less vague experience of being reminded of some::-· ' ("I must have heard this somewhere"). The St;;;;diirdization of ma~ sets ihe stage for vague tememhranc~ fo practically every

111Ilce each tune is reminiscent of ihe general pattern and of

c

- ·; I

_ .s/ (\

T. W. Adorno

every other, An aboriginal prerequisite for this feeling is tJie exist· ence of a vast S!!pply of tunes, a~ incessant stream of popular music which makes it impossible to remember each and every particular song. r:-:-..____

b) The moment of actual ic!~!!tiAcation-the actual ·~ it''.: experience. This is attained when vaglle remembrance is seaiCh· lighted by sudden awareness. It is comparable to the experience one has sitting in a room that has been darkened when sudaenly the elec· tric light flares up again. By the suddenness of its being lit, the familiar furniture obtains, for a split second, the appearance of being novel. The spontaneous realization that this very piece is "the same as" what one heard at some other time, tends to suhlate, for a moment, the ever.impending peril that something is as it always was.

It is characteristic of this factor of the recognition experience that it is marked by a sudden break. There is no gradation ·between tjle vague recollection and full awareness but, rather, a sort of psycholog· ical "jump." This component may be regarded as appearing some· what later in time than vague remembrance. This is supported by consideration of the material. It is probably very difficult to recognize most song hits by the first two or three notes of their choruses; at least the first motif mus~ have been played, and the actual act of recognition should be correlated in time with the apperception-or realization-of the first complete motifical "Gestalt" of the chorus.

c) The element of subsumption: the interpretation of the "that's it" experience by an experience such as "that's the hit 'Night and Day.'" It is this element in recognition (probably bound up with the rememb~nce of the title _trade·mark of the song or the first words of its lyrics')) which relates recognition most intimately to the factor of s.oCial ~c'king, · '

The foost immediate implication of this component may be the following: the moment the listener recognizes the hit as the so and so -------

1The interplay of lyrics and music in popltlru:: music is similar to the interplay of picture and word in advertisi.ng. The picture provides the sensual stimulus, the Words add slogans or jokes that tend to fix the commodity in the minds of the public and to "subsume" it under definite, settled categories. The replacement of ,the ,purely instru·

1 mental ragtime by jau which had strong :vocal tendencies from the beginning, and the \. gene.ral decline of purely instrumental hits, are closely re1a~ed to the increased impor· - tance ·of the advertising Structure of popular music. The example of "Deep Purple"

may prove helpful. Thi& was originally a little-known piano piece. Its sUdden success was at least pattly due to the addition of trade-marking. lyrics.

A model for this func1io11al change exists in the field of -raised entertainment in the nineteenth century. The first prelude of Bach's "Well Tempered: Clavichbrd" be~ came. a "sacral"· hit when Gounod conceived the fiendish_ idea of extracting a rµelody from_ the sequel.of harmonies and combining it with the words of.the "Ave Maria." Thie procedure, meretricious from its vety inception, has since been generally accepted i? the field of viusiG,al commercialism,

On Popular Music ---·-)

\ 35 ~._ ;;.~~- .-/

at is, as s~!)iing_established .. and known .nol·merely.Jo,~ .e-he feels safety in numbers and follows the crowd of all those

·ho have heard the song before and who are supposed to have made its reputation. This is concomitant with or follows hard upon the heela 'of elemelit h). The connecting reaction consists partly in the revela· ,.lion to the listener that his apparently isolated, indiviaual experience 'of a particular song is a collective experience. The ;moment of. iden· 'fication of some socially established highlight often has a dual

meaning: one not only identifies it innocently as being this or that, 'subsuming it under this or that category, but. by the very act .of identifying it, one also tends unwittingly to identify oneself with the 'objective social agencies or with the power of those individuals who made· this particular event fit into this pre·existing category and thus .·"established" it. The very fact that an individual is capable of identifying an object as this or that allows him to take vicarious part 1n the institution which made the event what it is and to identify him; self with this very institution.

d) The element of aelw!!ection on the act of identificadon. ("Oh, I know it;· this !><elong~~-me.") This trend can be properly understood by ·considering the disprop()r!ion between the h_uge num· her of lesser-known songs and ilie few established. ones. The in· dividual Who feela. drowned by the stream of music feels a sort. of triumph in the split second during which he is capable of identifying ilomething. Masses of people are proud of their ability to recognize . aiiy music, as illustrated. by the widespread habit of humming or :Whistling the tune of a familiar. piece of music which has just he.en mentioned, in order lo indicate one's knowledge of it, and the evident°. ·complacency .which accompanies. such an exhillition. ¥ :By the Identification ·and subsumption of the present listening .,experience under ~e category ".this is the hit so artd So, H this .!ill._ Jie.:omes all object to $e listener, something fixed and permanent. I, This transfol'I)lation of experience into object-the fact that by recog· Vl nizing _a PleeeOrriilis1c one has command over •it and can rep~oduce

·'._;..~it from pne's owrt ·memory-make~ it mQre prOprietahle than eV.er. -~~-It Das.two ccinsplCuous characteristics of property: .permanence and »::~· !'eing.subject.to. t)ie l>))'l!~r's arbitrary will. The permanence aonsists ::.,~,l, !11 the fact that if one renl~niliefs a song ancl cari recall it all the ~met .. 1 1f\. lt ~nno.f b .. ~ ex~ropriate~ •. The other ~lement, tpat of co~trol over

• , : n;us1c, consists m the ah1hty tq evoke 1t presumably at will at any ; . ~ :give~ moment, to cut it short, and to treat it whimsically. The · · . ~t IDUstcal properties are, as it weret at the mercy of their owner. In

'_:;_}{ 0t~er to clarify this element, it may be appropriate to point to "fle ·;:;-

0 its ~eme though by no means rare manifestations. Many people,· y~;~. ;>

~~~ '.' lr~1-::_.

v·fl'c· · ·1;,'",' "lt~>r.~"

'

\ ..

_::s· ,-;/

.,,,

36 T. W. Adorno

when they whistle or hum tunes they know, add tiny up-beat notes which sowid as though they whipped or teased the melody. Their pleasure in. possessing the melody takes the form of being free to misuse it. Their behavior toward the melody is like that of children whci pull a .dog's tail. They eve!' enjoy, to a certain extent, making the melody wince or moan. ·

e) The element of "psychological transfer": "Diimn it, 'Night

I and Day,' is. a goo··. Q. one!" Thi.' sis the tendency .to tr"l!.sfer·th· e·.· grat. ifica·. tion.~£.'ownership).~ .. th.e ~hlec~.!t,•elf and to attrihute..to~lns of llki>;.1>"reieter!,ce,.or oliiectxv~qualify, the enjoyment of ownership

. which ?!!!:_ha.L~ttained. The pro_ce~s oftiansfer is"eiiliance.1 by plugging. While actnally evoking the psychic processes of recogni· tion, identification, and ownership, plugging simultaneously pro- motes the object itself and invests it, in the listener's consciousness, with all t!;ose qualities whi~h in reality are due largely to the mechanism of identification. The listeners are executing the bider tO transfer to the music itself their self-congratulation on their owner• ship.

It may be added that the recognized social value inherent in the song hit is involved in the transfer of the gratification of ownership to the object which thus ·becomes ''liked." The labelling process here comes to collectivize the ownership process. The listener feels flat- tered because ·he too owns what everyone owns. By owiling an ap· predated and marketed hit, one gets the illusion of value. This illusion of value in the listener is the basis for the evaluation of the musical material. At the moment of recognition of an establ\shed

/• hit;~ pseudo-public utility comes under the hegemony of the private listener. The musical owner who feels "I like this particular hit . (because I know it)" achieves a delusion of grandeur comparable tO · a child's daydream about owning the railroad. Like the riddles in an advertising contest, song hits pose only questions of recognition

· which anyone can answer. Yet listeners enjoy giving the answers because they thus become identified with the powers that be.

It is obvious that tliese components do not appear in consciousness ·as they do in analysis. As the divergence between the illusion of private ownership and the reality ,of public ownership is a very wide one, and Rs everyone knows that what_ is written "Especially £Or Y Ou" 'is subject to the clause "any copyfag of the words or music of this· ,sorig or any portion thereof makes the infringer liable to prosecution under the United States copyright law," one may not regard tltese processes as being too unconscious either. It is prob~bly co!rect to assume that most listeners, in order to comply with what they regard as social desiderata and to prove their "citizenship," half.humorously

On· Popular Music 37

,.oin" the conspiracy1 as caricatures of their own_ potentialities and .:J ppress bringing to awaren~ss the operative mechanisms by insisting :;: themselves and to others that ·the whole thing is only good clean Jun anyhow.

; The final component in the recognition process-psychological transfer-leads analysis back to plugging. Recognition is socially 'effective only when backed by the authority of a powerful agency. That is, the recognitim;i·constructs do not apply to any tune but only io "successful" tunes,-success being judged by the backing of cen- · ·tral agencies. In short, recognition, as a social determinant of listen· ing habits, works only on plugged material. A listener will not abide . the playfog of a song repeatedly on the piano:.' ·pfayed-over.iliearr-

,.{l);,l:'itiiffoleratecf with joy all through its heyday. . ,g(~\ The psi:chol_ogic~l mechanism here involye~ Il)a y be tho~ght of . ,'W,,, as funct10nmg m this way: If some song-hit 1s play~d agam and ·~l~--agilin on the air, the listener begins to think Ulat it is already a sue· \{\~.cess. This is furthered· by the way in which plugged· songs are an· ~li~ nounced in broadcasts, ofte~ f;1 the c~a.ract.eristi?- 'form of "You ":'ill J~.now hear the !~test smash hit. Repe.t1t1on itself IS accepted _as a s1_gn . V

. ,~jj_ of its popularity. 2 · ---· • .. - .. .. '. · ·· · .. - 11, ~-:Wu· - - -V.: [:ffi.i. ... _ . Popular niusic and "lei$ure tiine." ... ~\; So far the analysis has dealt with reasons for the acceptance "of./:::'

\:;i~.~~~anY particular song hit. In order to understaiid w~y this ~bole....trpe) -'."'{;~;,_of music rnainfftine its bold on the masses, some consider hons-of-a'" .:j~~~,more general kinfl may be appropriate.

·: . ?·1.:~: .~ The·frame of mind to which popular m·usic originally appealed, ·:~Won which it feeds, and which it perpetually reinforces, is simul- ·::1~{ taneously one of distraction _aE<l_i!!att'!.Il.ti9_n. (Listeners are distracted I ). : .. ~~;.,from !11e d~mand~reaiity by entertainment which does not demand CJ ir.~:,~ttention either.') . ·:>;~·: The notion of distraction can be propei·ly understood only within · , -.:; : .1ta social setting and not in self-subsistent terms of. individual psy- . ,--; .cholqgy. Pistraction is bound to the present. mock.of. production,

, lo t'.'e ~ationalized and mechanized process of labor to whkh, directly or md1rectly, masses are subject. This mode of productfon, which .engenders fears and anxiety about unemployment,.Joss of income,

... : _war, has its "non·productive" correlate in entertainment; that is,

'·'·-·:~~ ~f. Hadley Ciintril and Gordon Allp~rt, The Psychology of Radio, New York, 1935 · ad.-~e. sarne _propaganda trick can be found more explicitly in the fie1d of radio

hearT:hng of commodities. Beautyskin Soap is called "famous .. · since the listener has agree t el na,~e of the soap over the· afr innumerable times before and therefore would n:fer

10 ° it~s ame." Its fame is only the sum-total o! these very announcements which

r,, Jf;;

/ 38 ) ' / T. W. Adorno -···· ·--

re!~~tion:· whi~h._go_~~ _not~~nvolve the effort of concentration at all. People... want io have fun. A fully concentra;ed and conacious ex. perience of art is possible only to those whose lives do .not P\I! such

l-<!'-_s.trnln::Oii:.them t)iat in their spare time they want relief froi:n..both ~oniaild'eff.;'ib.imul4_g_'!Q.~~)y. The whole sphere-ofcheap com-

.1 mercial ~nt<L~fnm'l_nt_ reflects. this dual desire;-It induc~(reTaxation ,, l , because it is patterned and pi:~:d~ested. Its being patterned and pre• V:; -~ 1 L _../ I digested serves withm the psycho ogica.l household of themas,es to )c.\,(', /. l sp. are ,them .th ... e__effort ?f _that participation {.e. v. e.~ ~n}is.tenin. g. or oh· .. ~I ~ \ servat1on) without which there can be no re5"ptiv1fy ro-'\rt. On the

r ~1<, 'i{

,

,.... ... ,,-"'

, ' .,_ -f .--1-

i other.hand, thest~ey P~cl'l.P.~r~ e~_eJrym the.liore· · .J dom __ of mechanized labor. "·--~

'l:The promoters of commercialized entertainment exonerate them. selves by referring to the fact that they are g_ivi!lg _t_h_e .. ?ll!l•~es wh"!. they want. This is an ideology appropriate lo commercial purposes: the,fess.the mass discriminates, the greater the possibility of selling cultural commodities indiscriminately.· Yet this ideology of vested interest cannot be dismissed so easily. It is not possible completely

/; to deny that mass·consciousness can be molded by the operative agencies on.ly because the masses "want this stuff."

· But why do they want this stuff? In our present society the masses themselves are kneaded by the •J'me mode of production as the arti· craft material foisted upon them.\ Thi;.. customers of musical entertain· ment are themselves objects or, ~ndeeO,-e~?cJucts' of ~-e ~-~~LIDMhan:. isms which deter!!Jine Jfuo.p.roduction .. Q..\. popular-rimsi9_,i,Jheir spare time serves only to reproduce their working capacity) It is a means instead- of an end. The power of the process of production extends over the time intervals which on the surface appear to be "free.~"They want standardized goods and pseudo·individualization, because their leisure is an escape from work and at the same time is mold~d after those psychological attitudes to which their workaday· ·world ex· elusively hlrbitilates them) Popular music is for the masses a per· petual busman's holiday. Thus, there is justification for speaking of a pre·established harmony today between production and con· sumption of popular music . ._The people clamor for what they are ,._

going to get anyhow.' l''j 0

, tl,~·;:pr~~~~tlo~ 0 ~£~ili~-~e'fy-~i1i~~d=-~~'.itm~~. hi~';;-°;;';;':~~!>1~i:;~~ ·. -.j.·

To be sure, the way in which they must work on the assembly line, in : the factory, or al office machines denies people any novelty. They •, seek novelty, but the strain and boredom associated with actilal work 1: leads to avoidance of effort in that leisure-time which offers the only ~­ chance for really ne.w experience. As a st,hstitute, they crave a ~J

On Popular Music 39

~op~l~;~~\ls;:·.;,,mes to offer iL Its stimulations are ~et iWI'lli'tbe inability to vest effort in the ever-identical. This meansJ- 'boredom again. It is a circle which makes escape impossible. The impossibility of escape causes the wide-spread ~~itil~e of inattention . toward popular 111us1c. «The moment of recogmtion is that of effort·

. less sensation. The sudden attention attached to this moment burns :.-itself out instanter and-relegates the listener to a realm of inattention «and distraction .. On the one hand, the domain of production ~nd t phigging presupposes distraction and, on ~e other, produces it. i•. In this situation the industry faces an inaoluble problem. It must t~ouse attention· by means of eVer~~ew prod~cts, but this· attention ; spells their doom. If no attention is given to the song, it cannot be

·'sold; if attention is paid to it, there is always the possibility that ' people will no longer accept it, because they know.it too well. This

partly accounts for the constantly renewed effort to. sweep the market ; with new products; to hound them to their graves; then to repeat the ,. infaiiticidal· maneuver again and again. r

, , On_ th~ other hand, distraction is not only a presupposition but •.",also· a prbauct of popular music. The tunes themselves lull the .:J :; listener-.to in_auentiol!!_ They tell ~im not to worry for fi8W111 !10~'~{ ~iss ~nything.1 .....

... The .social cement.

·~ · It ~s .safe to assume .that{music. listened to with a general ini. .. : attention which is only interrupted by sudden flashes of recognition is · not foll,o,l!ecl-as a ·sequence of experiences that have a clear-cut mea_n· ing of their own, grasped in each instant and related to all the prece· deni and subsequent '!'Olnents.J One may go so far as to suggest that

: most listeners of popular m~ic do not understand music as 'a•. Ian; guage in itself. If.they did it would be vastly difficult to explain' how they could tolerate tl1e incessant supply of largely undifferentiated material. What, then, does music mean to them? The answer is-that

: .the language that is( music is transformed by objective .proc~sses : •'£. :into a language which they thinkis their own,-into "-language which ··.j\ ~erves aS a: receptacle for th~ir institutionalized wants.) The.less music: ,' i•;.". ts a languag~ Sui gener:is to them, the more does it become established ~tt:. as. such a reGCptacle. The autonomy of musi~ is replaced .by a / /!',"'' · mere socio-psychological. func'.ionlMusic .today is largely ~ social , . . ·>ii---.,,c=em;=:::en:t:'.'..,'.:/.::And : the meanmg listeners attribute to a matenai;-tlie-

,i' .... '<i:.

. h.11'.he atthude of diatraCtion is not a completely universal ·one,· Particularly youngsters i he 0 ~nveat popular music with their own· feelings are n_ot yet completely blunted to all. e14ecta. ·The w~Ole problem of age .Jevels with regard to popular music, however,·

4 1

beyo'!d the. scope of the present study. Dem~graphic problems, to(l,·must remain out o ton_lnderation. ·

~c(~{ ®~-

I

40 T. W. Adorno ( inh~re~t logic of which is inaccessible to ti:rn, is above all~ means by which they achieve some=psyc!iicara · stment to the mechanisms

r;V'>4,J:C~ 1 c <-. 7 of· present-day life.~ lhlS ,"adju~tinent:' m erializ~s in two d. i. ereti.t I /! f} , ways, Cotrespond1ng ~8.J.or.-S -psychological types· of .mass

ti Oi!/ iqfyA£(,\,f- - behavior toward nu:iiilein--§(neral and popular music in particular, (} the "E.4rtl!mically obedient'.'. type and the "emotional" type.

- 1ndividuals'·of the rhythmically obedient type are mainly found . among the youth-the SO·called radio generation. They are mo~t susceptible to a process of masochistic adjustment to authoritarian collectiv_is~ The.type is not restricted to any one political attitude.: The adjustment to anthropophagous collectivism is found as often among left-wing political groups as among right.wing gro'Ups. Jn. deed, both overlap: repression and crowd-mindedness overtake the followers of both trends. The psychologies tend to meet despite the surface distinctions in political attitudes.

1 This comes to the fore in popular music which appears to he aloof.· 1-

from political l?artisanship. r.t may he noted that a mo~erate. lef.t.ist j,1 theatre production such as "Pms and Needles" uses ordmary 1azz· as f its musical medium, and that a communist youth organization adapted ;· the melody of "Alexander's Ragtime Band" to its own lyrics. Those ~ who ask for a song of social significance ask for it through a medium which deprives it of social significance~ The use of lnexorahle pop-u: lar musical media is repressive per se. -Such inconsistencies indicate that political conviction and socio·psychological structure hy no , means coincide. _, t:;

This obedient type is the rhythmical type, the word rhythmical 'I: bein~ ~used in its everyd. ay se~se. Any r;iusi~al exp.erience of th._is I' type IS based upon the undedying, unabal!ng lime unit of the muS1c, _ -its "'beat.'' To play rhythmically means, to these people, to play · : in such .a waY that even if pseudo·individualizations--counter-accents and other "di:ffereJttiations"-.occur, the relation to the ~ound metre is preservedi To be musical means to them to he capable of following'

· given rhythniical patterns without being disturbed by "individualiz- ing" aberrations, and to fit even the syncopations into the basic time units. This is the way in which their response to music immediately expresses thei_r desire to obey:) However, as the sta:idardized--m~tre ~l of dance must_c and of marchmg suggests the coordmated battalions !; of a meqhanical collectivity, obedience to this rhythm. by overcoming the responding individuals leads them to conceive of themselves as agglutinized with the untold millions of the meek who . must be sim· ilarly overcome. Thus do the obedient inherit the •·rtb~ .-

yet, if -one looka at the serious compositions which correspond to ' this categ_ocy of m;ass listening, one fuids one very characteristic fea· ~--,,

i 4 .t1

- ----~~

0

- - I On Popular Music ____ ____!,~ . {' ture: that.of disillusion. All these composers,.among-the~avinsky_:

.<i{:f; · ·arid~ ·Hinde;!l_ith;:have e~pressed a.n. ~!anti·rqn;antic':Jeeling:--TheY ·_: ... ~\ dlmectatihusical ,~dapt~tlon ~o r,;a+,1ty,-a re!1-l~ty.1:111~er8,tqod by them

I .. in termo of the machine age. {The renunciation of dream1ng by ./ /·:· tbe~e coml?osers is an index tha.t listeners ar~ ready to replace dream· ~ · ing by ad1ustment to raw reality, that they reap new pleasure from their acceptance of the unpleasant)They are disillusioned about any possibility of realizing their own dreams in the world in ;which

1 they

Jive, and conse(!Uently adapt themselves to this world, TheY' take! what is calle( a realistic attitude and attempt to harvest consolation

_ ., ,/. by identifying themselves with the external social forces which they -·~Jr.· think constitute the "machine·age.'} Yet the ·very· disillusion upon

:~'.?:.-.-~(: • which their coordination is based is there to m11r their pleasure. The :,~;,,'·: cult of the machine which is represented by unabating jazz beats :~Vi::. : involves a self·renunciation that CallJlot but take- root in the form of ,:_\*;;' a fluctuating ':"'e~siness so'."e;vhere in the perso?ality o~ the ob~d.ient. ~~1.t:·. For the machine is an end 1n itself only under g1ven.:soc1al cond1txons, ."' ;; r,;:;-where men are appendages of the machines on which they work.) ~·.~:~~ \ ~e adaptation to machine music necessarily implies a renunciation ( _J, _ .of one's own human feelings and at the same time a fetishism of the 1· · :F~•- . machine such that · its instrumental character becomes obscured d'tf thereby.) _ -------:__,

· :~.:-, As .to the other, the "emotional" ty:p_~....there ls some justi~cation ,:1 ::-'. for!inking it with a type otmoviespectator: The kinship is with th~ ~~'.; poor shop girl '."ho derivea l?'atifica~i-"!l by ide~tjfi~ation .with Gin~er ~"~~~t"i

·:_:.;~:".!, Rogers, who, with her beautiful legs and uns~lhed character, marries_: r~~Nf:-Z s the boss. Wish.fulf!llment is considered the gujding principle in th. ·

_,,,, social psycho!Ogf'Of-tnoving. pictures and siriiilarly in the pleasure ;~~~-~· obtained lr.om_emotional, .erotiC .music. This explanatioil,' hoWevei-, ~~- is only superficially ~ppropriate. . _

· •i':.P. Hollywood and Tm Pan Alley may be dream factones. But they -·:'.:'.i'-.' do not merely ~upply categorical wish.fulfillment for the girl behind ·:;_.-:· the counter. She does not immediately identify herself with Ginger ~·§>\ Rogers marrying. What does occur may be-expressed as follows: i.'J;··.;1: when-the audience at a sentimental film or sentimental music become ·:',;' -~.!~r-~_c_:iJ j!l~_Qy~_rwhe_l_mi_ng possibility of ·happiness, they dare to

CO!!tess..io. themseli~·- whiij__th<o_Yhole''iifilerorconterhporarylife oi:_din~rily_f_<>!_bids_thern__t~a~mit,_ __ ~a~fy',::_l§_a.(\~~actu~J1ili~Y~l!.o ~~~.Pi~A ~at IS supp~sed to be ''."IS~·fulli!lment is only the scant liberation that occurs w11h the reahzahon .that at last one need not deny oneself the happ,iness of knowing that ·one is unhappy and that one co-uld be happy.) The experience of the shop girl is related to that of the old woman who weeps at the wedding services

~ .·,.

h .•. · l lCcL\,, ~ = r >i\-1- ;v._;{/ ''L - " IA \j, YJ)jij/~{.1, \' 1/·1 I (

~ )

;/

42 T. W. Adorno

of others, blissfully becoming aware of the wretchedness of her own life. Not.even the mos.I gullible individuals believe that eventually everyone will win the sweepstakes.\ The actual function of sentimen. tal music lies rather in the temporary release given to the awareness that one has missed fulfillment;

The emotional listener listens to everything in terms of late roman• ticism and of the musical commodities derived from it{whicl} are already fashioned to fit the needs of emotionai listening. They con· sume music in order to be allowed to weepJ~They are taken in hr, the_ musical expression of frustration rather than by that of haJ?pinesS) The influence of the standard Slavic melancholy typified by Tchai~ kowsky and Dvorak is by far greater than that of the most "fulfilled" moments of Mozart or of the young Beethoven. The so·called releas· ing element of music is simply the opportunity to feel something. But the actuafcontent of this emotion can only be frustration~Emotional music has become the image of the. mother who says, ' Come and weep, my. child." It is katharsis for the ~sses, but katharsis whieh

...___ 1· keeps.them all the more firmly in line. ne wh ~t ·~~~-.. / ', 7 II resist any mar~ than on~_wbo-ma~~.s.~ ... ~~c. at permits its listen·

,~ ·, · ~~confession of 1'.'e1r unhap~by-mell!!l'..of \" -~ _ th~f!..~to-Jh~~~?-~pen~~e .. / ·

Ambivalence, spite, jury.

The fact that ihe psychological "adjustment" effected by today's mass listening.is illusionary and that the '~escape" provided· by popu· Jar ,music. actually subjects the individuals to the very same social powers. from which 'they want to escape makes itself felt in the very attitude of those masses. What appears to be ready acceptance and unproblematic gratification is actually of a very complex nature, covered by a veil of flimsy rationalizations. Mass listening habits today are ambiv.alent. This ambivalence, which reflects upon the whole question of popularity of popular music, has to be scrutinized ·.in order to throw some light upon the potentialities of the situatiO,!I,, .. It may be made clear through an analogy from the visual field. Every moviegoer and every reader of magazine fiction is familiar with the effect of what may be called the obsolete modern: photographs of fam_ous danc~~s who \vefe considere~ _ alluring twenty years ago, revivals of Valentino. films which, though the most glamorous of their day, appear hopelessly old.fashioned. This effect, originally dis· covered by French surrealists, has since become hackneyed. There are numerous magazines today that mock fashions as outmoded, al· though their popularity dates back only a few years and although the

., ~~·'

On Popular -Music 43

very women who appear ridiculous in the past styles are at the same time regarded as the peak of smartness in present-day fashions. The riuiiditr. wit~ w~ich the ~od~l11 b~~omes. obsolete. has. a very_~i.g· nfjg!llllJIDPlicallon.( lt leads to the quesuon whether the change of

'.'e'l!ect can possibly be due entirely to the objects in themselves, or :whether the change. ml\st he adeast .Partly accounted for by the dis• •position of the.masses) Many of these who today laugh at the Babs. , Huttoti of 1929·not only admire the Babs Hutton of 1940 but were. . thrilled by her in 1929 also. They could not how scoff at the Barbara . , '·Hutton of 1929 unless their admiration for her (or her peers) at that:·

time contained in itself elements ready to tilt over into its opposite·' 'when histoi:ica!ly provoked. The "craze" or frenzy for' a particular . fashion ·contains within itself the latent possibilify of fury> · The same thing occu.rs ln popular music. In jazz jollr:nalism it is known as "corniness."(Any rhythmical formula which'is out-dated,

. n~ matter how "hoe' . it is in itself, is regarde~ . as ~~diculous and therefore either flaily rejected or enjoyed with the smug feeling that

·~··the fashions now familiar ~o the listener are superior._·' . One cbuld--not possitily offer any musical criterion for certain

musical formulas today considered tabu because ·they are corny- : such as a sixteenth on the do,wn beat with a subsequent dotted eighth. " They need not 'be 'Jess· sophisticated than any of the so-called swing

form.ulas. It is· even likely that in the pioneer days of jazz the rhythmical improvisations were less schematic and·· more comp]e~ than they are t6day. Nevertheless, the effect of corniness exists and makes itself f6lt very definitely. . ,

An adeqi:iate explanation that can. be offered even without going into questions that require psychoanalytical interpretation is the

. ·following:( Likes that have been enforced· upon listeners provoke .cc'revenge the:.moment the pressure is' relaxed. They oompensate for. )'their "guilt"' in having condoned the worthless by making fun of it. '.).But the pressure is relaxed only as often as attempts are made to .\ foist something "new" upon the public. Thus, the psychology of the

·!"'my effecqnepro.duced again and again and is likely to continue mdefinitely.) ·

j.\i( . pu; a!'fibivalence H!ustrated by the effect of corniness is due to I the treillendous increase of the disproportion between the individual ,, ·,\.:~~·the social'power. An individual person is faced ·with an in·

.-;;t;." . dlVldud son? which he is app~rently free either to accept or reject. J{;: :~Y Uie .plug.~mg and support given the song by powerful agencies, he J'I'- ls dep:1ve~ of the freedom of rejection which.he might still be capable ~~~:t_ of ma1nta1ninp: toward the individual Sotlg~ (TO di~like the song is·no- e ;;,;,r longer an expr~ssion of subjective taste hut.rather a rebellion against

~)~,'·· :(;._\!·'.:~ ~:~:'~ .'··

.

/~rJ

\~~

44 T. W. Adorno ·

• the wisdom of a pulilic utility and a disagreement with the millions of people who are assumed to support what the agencies ·are giving them. Resistance is regarded as the mark of bad citizenship; .as inability to have fun, as highbrow insincerit}',)for what normal person can set himself against such normal lUlisic?

. . Such a quantitaiive increase of influ.,,;ce beyond certain limits, however, fundamentally alters the composition of individuality itself. A strong·willed political prisoner may resist all sorts of .pressure until methods such as not allowing him to sleep for several weeks are introduced. At that point he will readily confess even to crimes he has not committed. Something similar takes place with the listeher's resistance as a result 0£ the tremendous 'l!cl•g1JitY .. o.f force !JP.e!:'!!_ing

~ .P.Q!'.l him. Thus, the disproportion between the strength of an)' in· a~vidual a. nd t!'e co.n~entrated social struc.t~re h2~ .. ~ht .t~o be. a~n..._ . him destr_o,ytl1§~!:ce and at the same uml,~sc1ence _;, or his will to resist at .all. When pop\l)_ar. music.is repeate~_to.~sµch

a degree that it does n6t any.longer appear to be a device but . .rather .an-i~~~!~~t~~fe!il~!ii~f the "natural WOi-ld, reSistance assume~_ a djf. ferent aspect because \li"eunilyoflndividuality begins to craek. This of course does not imply absolute elimination _of resistahce._ But it is driven into deeper and deeper strata of the psychological structure. Psychological energy must be directly invested in order to overcome resistance. For this resistance does not wholly disappear in yielding to external forces, but remains alive within the individual and still survives ·even at the very moment of acceptance. Here- spite hecomes drastically· active.

It is the most conspicuous feature of the listeners' ambivalence toward popular 'music. T.Ji.ey shield. their preferences from any imputation that they are manipulated. Nothing .is more unpleas· ant than the.confession_of dependence. The shame aroused by adjustment fo injustice forbids confession by the ashamed. Hence, they tum their hatred rather on those who point to their depel)dence than on those who tie their bonds.

The transfer '!f resistan0e skyrockets in those spheres which seem to offer an escape from the material forces of repression in our ~'Ociety and which are regarded as the refuge of individuality .. In the field of entertaihment the freedom of tsste ·is hailed as.supreme. To con· fess that individuality.is ineffective here as well as in practical life would lead to the suspicion that individuality may have disappeared altogether; that is, that it has been reduced by standardized behavior patterns to a totally abstract idea which no longer has any definite content. The mass of listeners have been put in complete readiness

"f'

On Popular Music 45

! to join the· vaguely realized conspiracy directed without inevitable .malice against them,.to identify themselves with the inescapable, and to retain ideologically that freedom which has ceased to exist as a

: • res!ity. The .hatred of the deception is transferred to the threat of . realizing the deception and they passionately defend .their own atti· ,. fude since it allows them to be voluntarily cheated. ~·. The- material, to ·be accepted, nec~ssitates this spite, t~o. Its (. commodity·character, its domineering standardization, is not so hid- ·'· den as to be imperceptible altogether. It calls for psychological ·,· action on the part of the listener. Passivity alone is not enough. (The Jistener,.must force himself to accept. . > ,./Spite is;n\ost apparent in the case of extreme adherents of popular ; n\uf_i.i-jtfterbugs. . .

Superficially, the thesis about the acceptal)ce. gf !hdrn'.sc:apable seerris to indicate nothing more than the ·relinquishing of spontaneity:

· the subjects are deprived of ariy residues of free will with relation to p·opu1ar music and tend to produce passiye reactions to what is given thefu and to b~come mer~ centers of s.cicially c~nditi.oned reflexes.\ The en1omolog1cal termu1tterbug.;underscores this. Ut refers to an :

. insect who has the jitters, who is attracted passively by some given \ \ stimuli.Is, su'.ch as. ~ight. The compari_son of m.en with insects be· \/ ': to~l"Ill'I the recognition that they have been deprived of autonomo.':1~d < Wl I./ .

But this ides requires qualifications. They. are already present in the official jitterbug terminology. Terms like the latest craze, swing frenzy, alligator, rug-9utter, ind~cate a tre~ that _g<J_e_s ~eyo.1'~·so~j_a_!_Iz_ conditiOned reflexes:\fur)'.) No one who has ever.attenoed a·jitterbug Jamboreeol: dlscusseci :;;;iih jitterbugs curr~nt issues of popular music

C: can overlook the affinity of_t~~jr e11thusiasm .to Jury, whfoh may first he directed againsnhe-critics of thefrJdols· but which may tilt over against the idols themselves. This'. fury .cannot be aocounted for simply by the passive acceptance of-tlle given. It· is e~sential to ambivalence that the subject not simply .react passively. Complete passivity demands unambiguous acceptance ... ·However," f!eith.er the 'ii .~/ material itself nor observation of the. listeners supports the assump·

""· i .. · ~ion of sue~ unilateral acceptance. ~i.mply relin .. qu. ish. ing resistance ~, ~.:;-~.: is not sufficient for acceptance of the 1nesca pable. . ft ilr'' . Enthusiasm for popular music requires wj1fuLxes9lution by :tr

1 ·'' listeners, who. _must transform the external Order tO ·which µiey are

subservient into an internal order. The endowment of musical com· modities with libido energy is manipulated ·by the.ego. This manipu· lation is not entirely unconsc~ous therefore .. I~ inaY be assumed ·that among those jitterbugs who are· not experts .. 8.nd· ~et are enthusiastic

,,, ."f!

~~.,

11 ;<(

"'Th:fi ·~

':-f

i ., •; ,I

!<f!l'·';. ~ ,)" . ~-)··<

\, .. rr . - \ \ ,. ' \ \'. - .

46 T. W. Adorno

a]lout Artie Shaw or Benny Goodman, the attitude of "switched .on" enthusiasm prevails. They "join the ranks," but this.joinh1g does not only imply their conformity to given standards; it a!So implies a .decision to conform. The appeal of the music publishers fo the public to "join·the ranks" manifests· that the decision is an act of will, close to -the surface of consciousness. 1

.• The whole realm of jitterbug fanaticism and mass hysteria about popular music is under the spell of spiteful will decision. Frenzied enthusiasm implies not only ambivalence insofar as it is re~dy 10 tilt

· over into real fury or scornful humor toward its idols but also the effectuation of such spiteful will decision. The ego in forcing en· thusiasm, must over-force it, since "natural" enthusiasm Would· not suffice to do the job and overcome resistance. It is this elem~nt of deliberate overdoing which characterizes frenzy and self-conscious' hysteria. The popular music fan must be thought of as going his w.ay firmly shutting his eyes ,and gritting his teeth in order to avoid devia. lion from what he has )decided to ack!\owledge. A clear and calm view would jeopardize pie attitude that has been inflicted upon hitn and that he in turn tri~s lo inflict upon himself. The original will decision upon which his enthusiasm is based is so superficial that the slightest critical consideration would destroy it unless it is strength. ened by the craze which here serves a quasi-rational purpose. '

Finally a trend ought to be mentioned .which manifests itself in the gestures of the jitterbug: the tendency toward self-caricature which appears to be aimed at by the gaucheries of the jitterbugs so often advertised by magazines and illustrated newspapers. The jitter· bug looks as if he would grimace at himself, at his own enthusiasm and at his own enjoyment which he denounces even while pretending to enjoy himself. He mocks himself as if he were secretly hoping fo.r the day of judgment. By his mockery he seeks to gain exoneration

(

for the fraud he has committed against himsdf. His sense of humor makes everything so shifty that he cannot be put--or, rather, put himself--on the spot for any of his reactions. His bad taste, his fury,

. .,_ )his. hid~en ~esistan~e~-h~_i~sincerity, his latent ?o_nte.mpt f~r himsel~i "--------' /( eve_i:y;hmg-is::i:lirake.d::Dy ___ li_1!_11_l.2f':hrul therewith n.eutralized. Thul

' Interpretation is the more justified as it is quite unlikely that the ceaseless repetition of the same effects would _-allow for genuine · merriment. No one enjoys a joke he has heard a hundred times.'

1 0n_the back of the sheet version of a certain-hit, 0there appears the appeal: "Follow

Your ·Leader, Artie Shaw." · 'One hit goes: "I'm -Just a Jitterbug." · . 'It wouJ.cl be worth while Jo approach this problem experimentally by taking motion

pictures of• jitterbugs in action 11cnd later examining them in terms of. gestural psychol• ogy. Such.1an',experinlent could ·also yield-valuable results with regard to the qu~tion

· · ' (footnote continued on next Pfl&C)

·' --.:, .'If ~-·

~\ i:,

,g •. .,

~;

~;·,

~I , '~J {r

On Popular Music 47

There is an element of .fictitiousnes~ in all enthusiasm about · papular music, Scarcely ~ny jitterpug is thoroughly ihysteric~l. ahoµt .wing or thoroughly fascmated by a performance; In addition to·

· some genuine response to rhythmical stimuli, mass hysteria, fanati· cism and fascination themselves are partly advertising slogans after

·'which the victims pattern their behavior. This self-delusion is based · ; upan imitation 'and even histrionics. The jitterbug is the actor of his ; own enthusiasin or the actor ofthe enthusiastic front page model pre· ·· sented to him. He shares with the actor the arbitrariness of his own :: interpretation. He can switch off his erithusiasrrl as easily and sud·

denlY as he turns it on. He is only under a spdl of his own· making. But the closer the will decision, th~ histrionics, and the imminence

of self-denunciatio'n' in the jitterbug are to the surface of conscious· ness, the greater •is the possibility that these tendenc\es will break through in the mass, and, once and for all, dispense w,ith controlled pleasure. • They cannot be altogether the spineless lot \>f fascinated insects the'y are called and like to style themselves. Th~y need their will~ if only in order tO down the_ all too conscious pre:fuonition that something is "phori)'" with their pleasure. This transformation of their will indicates that will is still alive and that under certain cir· cilmstances it may ·he strong enough to get rid of the superimposed influences which dog its every step.

·In the present siiuation it may he appropriate for these reasons- which are only examples of much broader issues of mass psychology ....:.to ·ask to what extent the whole psychoanalytical distinction be· tween the conscious and the unconscious is still justified. Present-day nlasS'i-eactions are very thinly veiled from consciousness. It is the par~dox "of the.situatign that it .is almost insup0rably difficult to break thrpugh ·thiS'thin veil. Yet(truth is subjectively no longer so uncon· scious as it is expected to be. This. is borne out by the fact that in the political praxis of authoritarian regimes the frank lie_ in which no one actually believes is. more. and more replacing the "ideologies" of yesterday which ha.d the ,power to convince those who believed in them. Hence, we ·cannot content ourselves with merely stating that spontaneity has been replaCJld by blind acceptance of the enforced material. Even the beliefthat people today react like insects and -are degenerating into mere centers of socially conditioned reflexes, s(ll! belongs to the fa9ade. Too ·well does it serve the purpose of those . . .

. ' of how musical stitpdards- and "deviations" in popular music are apperceiVed~ If one y.-ould t_ake sound. tracks -shnultaneously with the motion piC?tures one could find out 1.c. how far the.' jitterbugs react gesturally to the syncopations they pretend to be crazy ~ut and how hsr they. respond_ simply to the ground beaus. If the latter is the•case n would furn,j.sh an~thi::l:-indc:x for the fictitiousness ·Of this whole .type of ~renzy.

'

~/

_;,;;;,_

i1 .;

'i '

·\

48 T. W. Adorno

who prate about)lie New Mythos and the irrational powers of com· '' munity. · Rathe:\_ ~pontaneity is consumed by the tremendous effort i

Vwhich eac,h individual has to make in order to accept what is enforced .· upon hinj--an effort ·which has developed for the very reason that·., the veneer veiling the controlling inechanisms has become so thin. ~

(in order to become ·a jitterbug or simply to "like" popular music, it does not hy any means suffice to give oneself up and to fall in line passively. To become transformed into an insect, man needs that • energy whfoh might _P!l~~!!_lt~chi~e ~s transforma~ion into a ma_n.)ll'

,,, .<'[.'".Jc

p ,t6-111 }/ 1 ~';"'y\•J, '1 ..

( 1 " ,,.LJ "'°'' ' ) , JI i;:;i-..:-1 \I'-'; -~ , , , I