逐渐澄明的存在 Existence, Growing Clear

Lecture: Aesthetics Seminar at the Shanghai Conservatory of Music

沈葉 SHEN Ye, August 23, 2026, 14: 00 – 17: 30

摘要 Abstract

这次演讲应上海音乐学院美学研习班邀请而准备。准备期间，沈葉向音乐理论家韩锺恩先生及其同事和学生征集问题，共得到12组。这些问题都关心韩教授所说的音乐作品的工艺结构，即作品中的理性组织及其内部关系。

沈葉从这些问题延展到更大的音乐与哲学领域。核心的关切是人的存在，特别是存在状态的生发和变化。本演讲不试图进入某一哲学体系内部，而是以作曲中的经验、感受、理性、组织与存在状态为参照，回应若干哲学问题。通过观察创造性的工作过程和结果，本演讲质疑结构是预定的或先验的这一观念，也质疑工具理性、目的论，以及对偶然与流变的绝对化。在创造性工作中，一个个有着细微差异的个体可以自觉地相互联结，同时保持彼此的差异，而不是被新的无意识所主宰，或被困在共同认同的幻象中，而其实质是原子化的孤立。由此，在人对存在的思考中，音乐艺术可以带来一种语言或理论推理所不能提供的澄明性。

This lecture was prepared at the invitation of the Aesthetics Seminar at the Shanghai Conservatory of Music. In preparing it, Ye Shen invited questions from music theorist Zhong’en Han and his colleagues and students. They contributed twelve sets of questions. All concern what is referred to here as the technological structure of a musical work: its rational organization and internal relationships.

From this starting point, Ye Shen moves into broader questions of music and philosophy. The discussion centers on human existence, particularly on how its various states emerge and change. The lecture does not seek to work within any particular philosophical system. Instead, it addresses several philosophical questions by drawing on experience, feeling, reason, organization, and states of existence as encountered in the act of composing. Examining both the process and the results of creative work calls into question the idea that structure is predetermined or a priori, as well as instrumental rationality and teleology. It also challenges attempts to treat contingency and flux as absolute. In creative work, people can consciously form genuine, reciprocal connections without losing the subtle differences that distinguish them. They need not be governed by new patterns of unconscious thought and action, or trapped in the illusion of a shared identity that amounts, in reality, to atomized isolation. Music can thus offer a form of clarity about existence unavailable through language or theoretical reasoning.

十二组问题 Twelve Sets of Questions

第一部分人如何去听？ Part I: How Do We Listen?

问题1 Question 1

（王心来）Xinlai Wang

理论是在“发现”作品结构，还是在“建构”作品结构？
Does theory “discover” the structure of a work, or does it “construct” it?

问题2 Question 2

（仇雪淳）Xuechun Qiu

当代音乐发展至今日，是否正在趋向于纯声音的挖掘？还是一种氛围感的追求？是否已经离美越来越远？如何界定当代音乐的美？当代音乐的发展空间或前景又该如何把握？
Has contemporary music come to focus increasingly on exploring sound itself, or on creating a sense of atmosphere? Has it moved ever farther away from beauty? How should beauty in contemporary music be defined? How should we understand the possibilities and prospects for its further development?

问题3 Question 3

（刘睿昕）Ruixin Liu

我的耳朵坏掉了吗？
Is there something wrong with my ears?

问题4 Question 4

（阚冬雯）Dongwen Kan

音乐作品的“工艺结构”究竟是依据声学原则，还是特定文化养成的听觉习惯？如果“工艺结构”的最高境界是让技术痕迹彻底隐退，让听者完全沉浸于纯粹的情感或声音幻象之中，那么拆解结构，逻辑分析是对这一工艺的深刻揭示？还是对艺术魅力的暴力肢解？
Is the “technological structure” of a musical work ultimately based on acoustic principles, or on listening habits formed within a particular culture? If the highest achievement of such a structure is to conceal all traces of technique and immerse the listener completely in pure emotion or an illusion of sound, does dismantling the structure through logical analysis profoundly reveal its craft, or violently dissect its artistic appeal?

第二部分音乐作品的结构和工艺 Part II: The Structure and Craft of Musical Works

问题5 Question 5

（韩锺恩）Zhong’en Han

如何通过理论（无论是作曲技术理论，还是表演艺术理论，或者音乐学理论）去观测审视作品的工艺结构？
How can theory, whether a theory of compositional technique, performance, or musicology, be used to observe and examine the technological structure of a work?

问题6 Question 6

（黄易）Yi Huang

工艺结构出自作曲家之手，每个时代都将个性与进步奉为圭臬。那么，人工智能时代，什么是作曲家的不可替代性？怎样的工艺结构能被称之为进步？学院派一度抛弃可听性的所谓进步，会不会背离了音乐的元概念？
Technological structures are created by composers, while every age treats individuality and progress as guiding principles. In the age of artificial intelligence, what makes composers irreplaceable? What kind of technological structure can be considered progressive? Could the academy’s supposed progress, which at one time abandoned accessibility, have departed from the fundamental concept of music?

问题7 Question 7

（梁昊）Hao Liang

当代音乐创作的音响资源和工艺结构原则，基本上仍然停留在20世纪70年代左右。整体上呈现为，“量”上的持续扩张，“质”上尚未有明显的突破，并且逐渐出现了一种音响工艺的共性趋势，您如何看待这种现象？
The sonic resources and principles of technological structure in contemporary composition have largely remained at the level of the 1970s. Overall, they have continued to expand in quantity without any clear breakthrough in quality, while a shared tendency in sonic technique has gradually emerged. How do you view this phenomenon?

问题8 Question 8

（刘佳玲）Jialing Liu

当我们运用某种理论观照音乐作品的工艺结构时，如何判断自己是在借助理论发现作品自身的结构逻辑，而不是从作品中选择材料来印证既有理论？如果一种理论只能解释作品的部分现象，那么这种解释究竟为理解作品的独特性、听觉经验或创作机制增加了什么？评价一次理论分析是否有效，是否存在相应的标准？简而言之，我们是在用理论理解作品，还是在把作品变成理论的例证？
When we use a particular theory to examine the technological structure of a musical work, how can we tell whether theory is helping us discover the work’s own structural logic, rather than merely selecting material from it to confirm an existing theory? If a theory can explain only some aspects of a work, what does that explanation add to our understanding of the work’s uniqueness, listening experience, or creative mechanisms? Are there criteria for judging whether a theoretical analysis is valid? In short, are we using theory to understand the work, or turning the work into an example of the theory?

问题9 Question 9

（杨淇棋）Qiqi Yang

当代音乐创作中，序列、集合等数理体系搭建起音乐作品深层的工艺结构，但严谨的组织逻辑很难转化为听众可感知的音响结构。站在作曲创作的立场，文本理性结构和听觉感性体验的落差是否无法规避？在对当代音乐作品进行工艺结构的理论观照时，应该以何种路径弥合创作逻辑与听觉感知的断层？
In contemporary composition, mathematical systems involving series, sets, and related methods establish the deep technological structure of a musical work, yet their rigorous organizational logic is difficult to translate into a sonic structure perceptible to listeners. From the composer’s perspective, is the gap between the rational structure of the musical work and the sensory experience of listening unavoidable? When examining the technological structure of contemporary music through theory, what approach might bridge the divide between compositional logic and auditory perception?

第三部分逐渐澄明的存在 Part III: Existence, Growing Clear

问题10 Question 10

（韩世纬）Shiwei Han

在您看来，音乐作品的工艺结构究竟是在哪一个环节，或是在哪一刻生成或确定下来？主要想探讨工艺结构的先验性问题以及与之相关的美的价值定位。因为音乐作品的工艺结构也许是在作曲家的创作过程当中逐步生成，而又在聆听者的聆听过程当中逐步被摧毁，然后重构。那我们现在对于音乐作品工艺结构的理论关照究竟是对于工艺结构的传递、重建还是创造？
In your view, at what stage, or at what moment, is the technological structure of a musical work generated or determined? This question is primarily concerned with whether technological structure is a priori, and with the related question of where the value of beauty lies. The technological structure of a musical work may gradually take shape during the composer’s creative process, only to be gradually dismantled and then reconstructed as the listener hears it. Is our present theoretical examination of a work’s technological structure therefore an act of transmission, reconstruction, or creation?

问题11 Question 11

（王之易）Zhiyi Wang

当下许多现当代音乐作品脱离传统曲式、和声的分析体系，结构偏向碎片化、开放性的状态，所以我想问：
Many modern and contemporary musical works fall outside traditional analytical systems of form and harmony, and their structures tend to be fragmentary and open. I would therefore like to ask:

传统作曲技术理论对这类作品的工艺结构分析，是否仍具备观照价值？Do traditional theories of compositional technique still have analytical value for the technological structures of such works?
我们应当如何更新自己的理论分析视角，去识别、解读这类新式作品的工艺结构？这类新结构又是依托何种逻辑、手段搭建而成？How should we update our theoretical perspectives to identify and interpret these new kinds of technological structure? Through what logic and means are such structures constructed?
作为研究学习的学生，我们应该怎样把工艺结构分析与作品意义阐释有机结合，从而避免技术分析与人文解读脱节，而形成的“两张皮”状态？As students and researchers, how can we integrate the analysis of technological structure with the interpretation of a work’s meaning, avoiding a split between technical analysis and humanistic interpretation?

问题12 Question 12

（王佳骏）Jiajun Wang

在您的创作中，有没有某个具体的设想（比如某种美学观念、文化命题或哲学思考）曾经让您在工艺上做出了一个自己都意外的决定？这个决定可能不是计划内的，而是理论思考在某个瞬间启发了您对音色、织体或结构的新想象？
In your own creative work, has a particular idea, such as an aesthetic concept, cultural proposition, or philosophical reflection, ever led you to make a technical decision that surprised even you? The decision may not have been planned. Perhaps, at a particular moment, theoretical reflection opened up a new conception of timbre, texture, or structure.

假设“理论关照”与“工艺结构”这对概念本身，是否就已经是一种西方音乐学的二元预设？在作曲者自身语境下，在“体用”传统与当代创作之间，我们是否必须借用这套话语才能言说自身？您作为熟知并深度参与当代音乐创作的作曲家，在创作中是否体验过这套话语对您本身听觉经验的“翻译暴力”，即为了被理解，不得不将某些独特的声音逻辑强行纳入主客二分、能指所指的框架？您如何应对，或者，您是否认为这种张力本身正是“当代性”的起点？
Could the conceptual pair of “theoretical examination” and “technological structure” itself already constitute a dualistic premise of Western musicology? Within the composer’s own context, and between the tradition of essence and application and contemporary composition, must we borrow this discourse in order to articulate ourselves? As a composer deeply familiar with and involved in contemporary music, have you ever experienced the “violence of translation” that this discourse imposes on your own auditory experience: that, in order to be understood, you have had to force certain distinctive sonic logics into frameworks of subject and object, or signifier and signified? How do you respond to this? Or do you regard this tension itself as the starting point of contemporaneity?