Sò far tranquillo ogni turbato core ». L’attuale dibattito filosofico su musica ed emozioni

The relationship between music and emotions – and, in particular, the ability of music to arouse moods and affects – has been recognized since ancient times. After some brief historical reference to the way in which the question was addressed up to the Modern Age, the article focuses on the contemporary debate on musical expressiveness. In particular, three theories are taken into consideration: the ‘arousal theory’, that takes up the traditional idea of musical expressiveness depending on the feelings aroused in the listener; the ‘contour theory', that elaborates on the idea that music is able to express emotions thanks to the resemblance between music and human behaviour; the 'person theory', that, by means of integrating aspects of the first two proposals, reworks the eighteenth-century ‘expressivist’ model, arguing that there is no expressivity (not even musical expressivity) without a (maybe imaginary) subject expressing itself