Editing Musical analysis (section)

===Nonformalized analyses===
Nattiez distinguishes between nonformalized and formalized analyses. Nonformalized analyses, apart from musical and analytical terms, do not use resources or techniques other than language. He further distinguishes nonformalized analyses between impressionistic, paraphrases, or [[hermeneutic]] readings of the text (''explications de texte''). Impressionistic analyses are in "a more or less high-literary style, proceeding from an initial selection of elements deemed characteristic," such as the following description of the opening of [[Claude Debussy]]'s ''Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun'': "The alternation of binary and ternary divisions of the eighth notes, the sly feints made by the three pauses, soften the phrase so much, render it so fluid, that it escapes all arithmetical rigors. It floats between heaven and earth like a [[Gregorian chant]]; it glides over signposts marking traditional divisions; it slips so furtively between various [[musical key|keys]] that it frees itself effortlessly from their grasp, and one must await the first appearance of a harmonic underpinning before the melody takes graceful leave of this causal [[atonality]]".{{sfn|Vuillermoz|1957|loc=64}}{{incomplete short citation|date=October 2021}}

Paraphrases are a "respeaking" in plain words of the events of the text with little interpretation or addition, such as the following description of the "Bourée" of Bach's ''Third Suite'': "An [[anacrusis]], an initial phrase in D major. The [[figure (music)|figure]] marked (a) is immediately repeated, descending through a [[interval (music)|third]], and it is employed throughout the piece. This phrase is immediately elided into its consequent, which modulates from D to A major. This figure (a) is used again two times, higher each time; this section is repeated."{{sfn|Warburton|1952|loc=151}}{{incomplete short citation|date=October 2021}}

"Hermeneutic reading of a musical text is based on a description, a 'naming' of the [[melody]]'s elements, but adds to it a hermeneutic and [[Phenomenology (philosophy)|phenomenological]] depth that, in the hands of a talented writer, can result in genuine interpretive masterworks.... All the illustrations in Abraham's and Dahlhaus's ''Melodielehre'' (1972) are historical in character; [[Charles Rosen|Rosen]]'s essays in ''[[The Classical Style]]'' (1971){{sfn|Rosen|1971}} seek to grasp the essence of an epoch's style; Meyer's analysis of Beethoven's ''Farewell'' [[Sonata (music)|Sonata]]{{sfn|Meyer|1973|loc=242–268}}{{incomplete short citation|date=October 2021|reason=Which Meyer 1973?}} penetrates melody from the vantage point of perceived structures." He gives as a last example the following description of [[Franz Schubert]]'s ''Unfinished Symphony'': "The transition from first to second subject is always a difficult piece of musical draughtsmanship; and in the rare cases where Schubert accomplishes it with smoothness, the effort otherwise exhausts him to the verge of dullness (as in the slow movement of the otherwise great A minor Quartet). Hence, in his most inspired works the transition is accomplished by an abrupt ''[[wikt:coup de théâtre|coup de théâtre]]''; and of all such ''coups'', no doubt the crudest is that in the Unfinished Symphony. Very well then; here is a new thing in the history of the symphony, not more new, not more simple than the new things which turned up in each of Beethoven's nine. Never mind its historic origin, take it on its merits. Is it not a most impressive moment?".{{sfn|Tovey|1978|p=213|loc=vol. 1}}