Synopses & Reviews
Written by an experienced drummer and philosopher, Groove is a vivid and exciting study of one of music's most central and relatively unexplored aspects. Tiger C. Roholt explains why grooves, which are forged in music's rhythmic nuances, remain hidden to some listeners. He argues that grooves are not graspable through the intellect nor through mere listening; rather, grooves are disclosed through our bodily engagement with music. We grasp a groove bodily by moving with music's pulsations. By invoking the French philosopher Maurice Merleau-Ponty's notion of "motor intentionality," Roholt shows that the "feel" of a groove, and the understanding of it, are two sides of a coin: to "get" a groove just is to comprehend it bodily and to feel that embodied comprehension.
Review
"For decades, philosophers and theorists of music have been promising an embodied phenomenology of music. Tiger C. Roholt's Groove is an original and insightful essay that makes good on that promise. Roholt challenges analytic and quantificational approaches to rhythmic nuance and argues that grooves are non-conceptual, felt, and understood through bodily engagement. Full of smart musical examples and sound arguments, Groove is much more than just a book on rhythm or drumming. It is a cornerstone for any future phenomenology of music." Brian Kane, Associate Professor of Music, Yale University, USA
Review
"Exploring uncharted philosophical territory, Tiger C. Roholt's smart, thorough account of groove pushes us to rethink the nature of music and musical engagement. Experiencing music is not merely a matter of how it sounds, because how it sounds can be a function of how it feels." Theodore Gracyk, Professor of Philosophy, Minnesota State University Moorhead, USA and author of On Music and co-editor of The Routledge Companion to Philosophy and Music
Review
"Tiger C. Roholt's energetic new study of a neglected but undeniably central aspect of rhythm represents a major step forward in understanding how and why music moves us as it does. Roholt writes both as a philosopher and as a player, which readers will quickly see is a great advantage on this topic, and he knows the value of examples, many of which are thoroughly absorbing in their own right. Roholt describes the motor-intentional process that actualizes the implicit groove of a song, giving us a new appreciation of the embodied character of this kind of aesthetic experience and the 'groove-completing' role of the listener. A wonderfully interesting study." Garry L. Hagberg, James H. Ottaway Jr. Professor of Philosophy and Aesthetics, Bard College
Review
"Featuring elegant, lucid, and accessible prose, Groove underscores how musical notions — whether aesthetic, affective, perceptual, or philosophical — can only be explained fully with respect to bodily experience. This imaginative book is challenging, provocative, thoroughly argued, and sparkling with interdisciplinarity." Charles Hiroshi Garrett Associate Professor, Musicology, University of Michigan, USA and editor of the Grove Dictionary of American Music , 2nd ed.
About the Author
Tiger C. Roholt is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Montclair State University, USA. A professional musician prior to embarking upon his academic career, Roholt earned his Ph.D. in Philosophy at Columbia University. His recent essays have appeared in The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism and Contemporary Aesthetics. He is author of Key Terms in Philosophy of Art (Bloomsbury Academic, 2013).
Table of Contents
Chapter 1. Musical Nuance
Chapter 2. Perceiving
Chapter 3. The Body
Chapter 4. Groove
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