C) Peter KIVY: The music itself (and its beauty)
The approach of musical emotions by Peter Kivy (1934-2017) is the one that gives more relevance to the music that anyone listens to. Whereas for Davies and Levinson there is a transformation from the expressive (inherent) musical qualities into common or daily emotions, in Kivy's view there is not such a conversion. What music provokes are just different emotions from those, but full-fledged emotions. In Kivy's words, they can be "passionate, low, or great" depending on the piece (2005, p. 147).
EXPRESSIVENESS: In terms of expressiveness, which is not the main focus of Kivy's approach, the expressive components of music are the ones that show common emotions and are audible properties of the music itself. Music is not expressive because it arouses that emotion in anyone (all three agree about this), it is because it either has the same 'contour' as expressive human behavior and the resemblance is appropriate, or it is stipulated as expressive by conventions, possibly made after noticing this resemblance (Robinson, 1994, p. 13). While for Davies this analogy was between musical movement and dynamic behavior of human beings, for Kivy and other theoretics it is more with facial or vocal expressions (Collins, 2021, p. 74). However, music cannot generate these ordinary emotions in the audience. Kivy is absolutely against the belief that sad music saddens or happy music brings joy (2005, p. 131).
THE INTENTIONAL OBJECT: To explain the process that makes us feel touched by music, Kivy makes use of the cognitive theory (2005, p. 133). According to this theory, an intentional object (a cause) is needed to feel an emotion, as well as other elements that constitute emotions like beliefs or physical sensations and responses. The paradigm is not so easy in music, since the intentional object is not so obvious. As Kivy is exploring absolute music, he also leaves aside all the emotivity caused by associations of the listeners, like the sadness provoked by a piece that is already symbolic to someone. These associations escape from the global cognitive theory (p. 135).
Then Kivy (p. 135-136) starts to reflect on what could be the intentional object of the emotional response to music. Kivy's answer is the music itself. His comparison with a daily life example is like this: if when we get angry with a friend the intentional object is our friend, or more specifically, what our friend did to make us angry, the intentional object during the listening to music should be the music, or more concretely, what touches us about music, that in Kivy's opinion could be the beauty of music, how wonderful it is, or as Kivy says in some point, any musical excellence (p. 148).
HOW IS THE MUSICAL EMOTION? A new problem appears when we have to describe or indicate which emotion arises. Kivy wonders if it is indeed an indescribable emotion, near the idea of music ineffability (p. 136). Despite he will give his answer to this question, Kivy is not overly concerned about this difficulty. He advocates that there are a lot of emotions besides the musical ones that are also hard to describe, like how splendid landscapes touch us. We know what moves us, but not so clearly what we are experiencing. Being moved by music signifies for Kivy a real emotion, never an imaginary one, with a significant cognitive component (in Robinson's opinion (1994, p. 18), maybe too much). This real emotion is enthusiasm, a musical stimulus inspired by what we listen to (Kivy, 2005, p. 138).
Kivy still wonders (and prepares himself for a possible objection) if this musical emotion is as intense or pure as an ordinary one. If not, then it would be a feeling or a sensation. But if, by definition, there is an intentional object, and since a high mental stimulation occurs, according to Kivy we are talking about a proper emotion (p. 137-138). At the same time, the principle that states that absolute music lacks meaning seems crucial to Kivy, who clarifies that experiencing music as an imaginary act is not enjoying music per se (Robinson & Hatten, 2012, p. 80).
WHICH MUSIC TOUCHES US? The American philosopher is proud that his theory could explain why not every piece of music touches us: mediocre music does not arouse emotions. For example, musical melancholy on its own does not touch us: it is musical beautiful melancholy that moves us, and as listeners, we feel enthusiasm and not sadness (Kivy, 2005, p. 148). But it is not untypical to hear reactions from the audience explaining that they felt e.g. sadness or joy, the same emotions that the expression of music contains. Kivy connects here with Leonard Meyer's vision, a kind of 'confusion theory'. If the emotional response aroused in the audience is considerably boosted by the musical expressiveness, the first thought for a listener would be to identify his/her emotion as the same expressed in music. Similar to Davies' idea, there is a difference: "A sad expression is different from the expression of someone's sadness" (Robinson & Hatten, 2012, p. 74).
Another possible strong argument for Kivy's proposal focuses on the enjoyment of sad music. According to his theory, we feel enthusiasm instead of sadness when we are moved by sad music. If we felt true sorrow, usually accompanied by unpleasant sensations, it would seem strange why we would like to hear so much sad music (Kivy, 2005, p. 150). And, lastly, Kivy's explanation enables us to say that, since the emotion aroused is enthusiasm, every piece of music, not only the expressive ones, could be touching. Likewise, expressive music could not be moving, if it is not good or beautiful enough (Kivy, 2005, p. 151).