absolute music

American  

noun

1. instrumental music, as a concerto or string quartet, that draws no inspiration from or makes no reference to a text, program, visual image, or title and that exists solely in terms of its musical form, structure, and elements.

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absolute music British  

noun

1. music that is not designed to depict or evoke any scene or event Compare programme music

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Etymology

Origin of absolute music

First recorded in 1885–90

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Compare meaning

How does absolute-music compare to similar and commonly confused words? Explore the most common comparisons:

• program music vs. absolute music

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Example Sentences

See Examples For:

absolute music

When Korngold returned to absolute music, it was to slay the same old dragons, though atonality had hardly achieved popular acceptance in the interim.

From New York Times ● Nov. 10, 2022

Is it a piece of absolute music, a symphony in the tradition of Bruckner and Mahler?

From New York Times ● Nov. 10, 2022

Besides his film music, Morricone wrote more than 150 concert works, which he considered absolute music, many avant-garde.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 7, 2020

Arcana was completed by 1927, but it still sounds avantgarde, because it makes "absolute music" with a heckelphone, coconuts and more than 120 other instruments.

From Time Magazine Archive

At the time when he appeared, the cause of "absolute" music seemed lost.

From Musical Portraits Interpretations of Twenty Modern Composers by Paul Rosenfeld

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