What has the thinking of one of the most intriguing philosophers on the verge of Middle Ages and Renaissance, Nicholas of Cusa, possibly to do with polyphonic music, and with us today?
In February 2024 the ensemble Graindelavoix has been invited to Deventer to explore this possible (non-)relation with a concert, lecture and conference. In this episode, Björn Schmelzer investigates the resonances of Cusa's provocative philosophy with polyphony, how both shed a new light on each other, revealing their untimely character, equally relevant for today.
Cusanus is mostly studied by historicistic philosophers, like polyphony through historicist musicology, firmly anchering and particularising them in their own time and context.
What would happen if we focus on how both are at odds with their own time and how this offers us a key for understanding them for the present?
Cusanus’ thinking was taken up in (and of major influence on) German idealism (Schelling, Hegel) and in psychoanalysis (Lacan), be it in a more or less cryptic way. A retroactive reading from the present into the past can help us to see the modernity of Cusanus and the relevance of polyphonic music as well.
The episode is interspersed with plenty of music performed live in the Bergkerk of Deventer. Polyphonic repertoire by Guillaume Du Fay, Arnold de Lantins, Johannes Ockeghem, Johannes Ciconia, a.o., sung by Andrew Hallock, Albert Riera, Marius Peterson, Arnout Malfliet, directed by Björn Schmelzer.
Many thanks to the team of the Bergkerk in Deventer to make these recordings possible and especially to Inigo Bocken for organizing the Cusanus event in Deventer and inviting Graindelavoix.
transcription of this episode can be found here:
https://www.graindelavoix.be/news-archive/read-schmelzers-essay-on-nicholas-of-cusa-and-polyphonic-practice
