ABSTRACT
When Jean-Philippe Rameau published his theoretical writings, the questions he answered were not ones that he alone had posed, as some would imply they were–not only those who had little regard for such obscure speculations, but also those who, following Claude Debussy, placed Rameau the theoretician on a pedestal so high that people and Pythagoras are his sole remaining interlocutors. Theory is an active production, an operation. It is not the humble servant of nature but a fierce master that forces nature to work on its behalf. The symmetrical attitudes of skepticism and respect toward music theory both reflect an identical image of it: theory is not operative. The measure of the reactions that Rameau’s theories provoked offers people the best measure of the force that their various elements exerted. Theory plays on distance: by inserting its levers in a material, it brings elements that were far apart near, and separates those that were touching each other.
