Essays on Philosophy, Psychology,
Religion, Art, and Music

A. Art & Music

Arthur Koestler and Music Theory (1970 paper, University of Iowa)

Wagner, Art, and Life (1970 paper, University of Iowa)

A Unifying Concept for the "Subjective" and "Objective" Approaches to Understanding the Musical Experience (1970 paper, University of Iowa)

Notes on the Baroque Suite (1974 paper, unpublished) 

A Critical Examination of the Notions of Art as "Imitation of Nature" and "Re-Creation of Reality" (1974 paper, unpublished)

Advice to Would-be Professional Trombonists (presented to International Trombone Workshop, 1979; scroll down from “What They Didn’t Teach Me in Music School”)

Why Union Scale is Killing Our Work—a 1984 Open Letter to Nashville Recording Musicians

On Musical Texture (comments on Gary White's Instrumental Arranging)

On "Perfect Pitch" (reader commentary added)

What's Wrong with Bebop Jazz? (reader commentary added)

The Essence of Art (Objectivity, vol. 2, no. 5, December 1997, special material in the notes added April 2000)

Thoughts on Musical Characterization and Plot: the Symbolic and Emotional Power of Dramatic Music (ART Ideas, 1998)

Kamhi and Torres on Meaning in Ayn Rand's Esthetics (Reason Papers #23, 1998)

Music and Perceptual Cognition (Journal of Ayn Rand Studies, vol. 1, no. 1, Fall 1999, special material in the notes added April 2000)

“…to give us Ayn Rand faithfully”: a Critical Note on the Boeckmann Transcript (originally published March 28, 2000, The Daily Objectivist)

Rockin’ with Rand: Sailing the Turbulent Seas of the Objectivist Aesthetics (Journal of Ayn Rand Studies, vol. 2, no. 1, Fall 2000)

Critical Misinterpretations and Missed Opportunities: Errors and Omissions by Kamhi and Torres (Journal of Ayn Rand Studies, vol. 2, no. 2, Spring 2001)

A Neglected Source for Rand’s Aesthetics (Journal of Ayn Rand Studies, vol. 4, no. 1, Fall 2002)

Art as Microcosm: the Real Meaning of the Objectivist Concept of Art (Journal of Ayn Rand Studies, vol. 5, no. 2, Spring 2004)

Langer and Camus: Unexpected Post-Kantian Affinities with Rand’s Aesthetics (Journal of Ayn Rand Studies, vol. 7, no. 1, Fall 2005)

More Standards to Which We Can Repair (2006)

Brief Comments on (Some of) My Favorite 20th Century Composers (2000)

Henry Pleasants on the Parallels Between Classical and Jazz Music (1974)