Consonance and Dissonance

Discussing the characteristic features of the music of Laos, HumbertLaverg e (1934:18) emphasizes the preference for dissonant intervals and chords. By this the author obviously means tone combinations that in conventional Western harmony are considered dissonant. Nothing would be gained by merely criticizing such an inadequate application of Western concepts on Oriental music. What really matters is the question whether it is possible to approach the phenomena of consonance and dissonance in an objective way giving these terms a universally valid meaning. The present paper attempts to give a positive answer to this crucial question. The claim that a Western student of non-Western music must completely lay aside his own musical concepts is only partly justified. As far as consonance and dissonance are concerned, it is indispensable to investigate the nature of these phenomena first within our own culture so as to establish a dependable basis for analogous research in the field of allocultural music. The problems involved encompass two different but complementary facets; the first one calls for a formulation of a satisfactory phenomenological definition while the second one refers to the question of psycho-physiological and psycho-physical interdependence. The two most widely accepted descriptive definitions of consonance and dissonance could best be termed "aesthet-