ABSTRACT
This chapter proposes three questions as the starting point for an examination of musicology with regards to efficient communication: questions about scope, predictive accuracy and simplicity. The interaction between perceived 'familiar' and 'unfamiliar' elements are then used in examples from computational analysis, ethnomusicology and popular music studies to explore the three questions and to examine issues of communication within those three example outputs. This chapter proposes the use of this kind of thinking for a systematic approach to the study of musicology as a discipline, with the purpose of providing people with tools to help them negotiate their way through musicology and developing a systematic approach to a philosophy of musicology. Music and Familiarity provides a broad and inclusive topic area, with the opportunity for each contributor to define the relationship between their research and the theme in a variety of ways. Information as a concept defined and explored by Brillouin does not involve any notion of value or meaning.
