Eye music

Eye music (often referred to in English by its exact German translation Augenmusik) describes graphical features of scores which when performed are unnoticeable by the listener.

Often the changed "meaning" of the altered notation is enhanced by the music having compositional elements of melody and form such as word painting and canon.

When that single line of notes is inscribed in a graphical shape it becomes eye music, even if the contrapuntal puzzle remains unsolved.

Here, the perverse spelling (whether humorous or annoying to the trained continuo player) is not unusual graphically, but represents a score writing unmotivated except as an inside joke between composer and performer, and is unhearable by the listener.

Cordier's chanson about love Belle, bonne, sage is in a heart shape, with red notes (coloration) indicating rhythmic alterations.

[3] Another work of Cordier, this time inscribed in circles, Tout par compas suy composés ("With a compass was I composed"), goes out of its way to identify itself as eye music.

[10] For example, in the madrigal Senza il mia sole from his Madrigali a quattro, cinque e sei voci (1588), black notes are used for "chiuser le luci" ("close their eyes")[11][12] Reaction by theorists of the time was mixed.

The last examples using a rigorous scoring system rooted in standard practice are the finely turned circles and spirals (as well as a peace symbol and a crucifix) in the works of George Crumb.

Also often seen are graphical or conceptual art works that use the symbols of music notation but are not performing scores at all, such as Erwin Schulhoff's 1919 In futurum (Zeitmaß-zeitlos)[14] and Cornelius Cardew's Treatise.