ABSTRACT This article responds to the various criticisms raised against my work on the nature and function of music analysis by James Davis in his article ‘Against the New Musical Idealism: Or, Listening for What May Be Otherwise’, Music Analysis , 45/i (2026). I contest Davis's creation of a school of thought – the ‘New Musical Idealists’ – to which I apparently belong and identify his persistent tendency to misread the ways in which I mobilise various philosophical authorities. Above all, I mount a defence of the musical object, insisting that it is reasonable to posit the objectivity of musical properties in Western art music apart from politics and history, whilst simultaneously recognising the historical roles they perform.
Julian Horton (Thu,) studied this question.
Synapse has enriched 5 closely related papers on similar clinical questions. Consider them for comparative context: