Sweet Anticipation Quotes

“There is at least one more important violation of expectation that is engendered by twelve-tone music. Recall that people are motivated to attend concerts because of the
sweet anticipation of enjoyment. Most listeners have learned to expect music to evoke a state of pleasure. Apart from the failure to predict musical events, unsuspecting listeners who attend a concert of twelve-tone music may also feel betrayed by the fact that the music fails to evoke much pleasure. Their imaginative anticipation of musical enjoyment will lead to disappointment. No wonder audiences were so disturbed by Schoenberg's music.”
― David Huron, Sweet Anticipation: Music And the Psychology of Expectation

“Many artists have assumed that such knowledge is unnecessary: it is intuition rather than knowledge that provides the foundation for artistic creation. I agree that intuition is essential for artistic production: in the absence of knowledge, our only recourse is to follow our intuitions. But intuition is not the foundation for artistic freedom or creative innovation. Quite the contrary. The more we rely of our intuitions, the more our behaviour may be dictated by unacknowledged social norms or biological predispositions. Intuition is, and has been, indispensable in the arts. But intuition needs to be supplemented by knowledge (or luck) if artists are to break through “Counterintuitive” barriers into new realms of artistic expression (preface)”
― David Huron, Sweet Anticipation: Music And the Psychology of Expectation

“Perhaps the single most important lesson from research on laughing is that laughter is predominantly a social response. Robert Provine estimates that people are thirty times more likely to laugh in the presence of another person than when they are alone. Field studies have established that most laughter is not in response to humor. Social inferiors laugh more in the presence of their social superiors. Social inferiors are also more likely to laugh at the instigation of social superiors than vice versa. For those of us who love to laugh, the scientific research on laughter seems depressing: the principal function of laughter seems to be to dissipate social fears.”
― David Huron, Sweet Anticipation: Music And the Psychology of Expectation