[1] At a practical level, this means making appropriate use of dynamics, phrasing, timbre and articulation to bring the music to life.
As a result, the aim of a piece of music was to produce a particular emotion, for instance joy, sadness, anger or calm.
The harmony, melody, tonality, metre and structure of the music worked to this end, as did all the aspects under the performer's control such as articulation and dynamics.
[5] As Johann Joachim Quantz wrote, The orator and the musician have, at bottom, the same aim in regard to both the preparation and the final execution of their productions, namely to make themselves the masters of the hearts of their listeners, to arouse or still their passions, and to transport them now to this sentiment, now that.Baroque composers used expressive markings relatively rarely, so it can be a challenge for musicians today to interpret Baroque scores, in particular if they adopt a historically informed performance perspective and aim to recreate an approach that might have been recognised at the time.
[7] The rhetorical approach to music begged the philosophical question of whether stirring the listener's passions in this manner was compatible with Aristotle's idea that art was only effective because it imitated nature.
Some writers on music in the 18th century stayed closely true to Aristotle, with Charles Batteux writing that the sole unifying principle of taste and beauty was the reproduction of the ideal form that lay behind natural things.
[11] This emphasis on emotional communication was supported by an increasing confidence in using more complex harmony, and by instruments and ensembles capable of greater extremes of dynamic.
[13] "Most people like music because it gives them certain emotions such as joy, grief, sadness, and image of nature, a subject for daydreams or – still better – oblivion from “everyday life”.