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‘We All Go a Little Mad Sometimes. Haven't You?’ Musical Empathy in Hitchcock's Psycho
Author(s) -
CLIFTON KEVIN
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
music analysis
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.25
H-Index - 18
eISSN - 1468-2249
pISSN - 0262-5245
DOI - 10.1111/musa.12108
Subject(s) - musical , empathy , embodied cognition , gesture , aesthetics , art , psychology , visual arts , linguistics , social psychology , philosophy , epistemology
This essay explores a web of cognised and embodied empathies that emerge while watching Hitchcock's Psycho , focusing on the role of musical empathy as it relates to Marion Crane's story. Drawing on work on empathetic music in film music studies, I explore how the actors, the characters, the musical score and the filmic audience are drawn together by a ‘sigh’ figure, a symbolic gesture that unifies the soundtrack.