John Stuart Mill and the Philosophy of Music

Music was important in John Stuart Mill’s life. He was an accomplished pianist and a talented improviser. His works include treatments of various philosophical aspects of music, including its metaphysics, its epistemology, the sources and nature of its value, and its aesthetics. Some of his ideas on musical aesthetics are still of interest. This applies to his distinction between those reactions to music that are based on associations with non-musical experiences and those that are based on properties of the music itself. It also applies to his concepts of poetic and oratorical modes of musical expression. In addition to his other achievements, he should be recognized as a philosopher of music.