Emotion manifests as a result of a composer’s strive towards balance. When the composer achieves an equilibrium with the sound in his composition and the state of his life thus far, the difference between that sound and the listeners’ state is (possibly) manifested as emotion in the listener. (IMhO). An overt attempt to elicit an emotional response in the “general public” isn’t worthy of art and should be saved for jingles, politics and porn. (so there)
I don’t think there’s an issue with whether or not emotion is expressed (or rather received) as much as whether one is intending to express a specific emotion. For instance, in the studio, when one (well, me) connects two sound together, or sculpts something in a particular way, the focus is on how that sound works in respect to the rest of the sounds around it; not in whether or not it is representative of a certain feeling (other than the feeling that those sounds “fit”). My personal opinion is that the emotional content may come from the emotional state in which the composer resides while those choices are being made.
Sound and form was the intent. Emotional content may (or may not) result.
On the road, talking to another composer about bike speed. There was a map with Brum and Bham on it. One was a few miles back, one was a long ways forward. The road forward was the one in discussion, and basically all that had to be done was to “put my back in it”. Finding the gears took a while but eventually speed picked up. As the road round over some hills, a lake or large river revealed itself covering the bridge at the bottom. I used the speed of the downhill run in an effort to cover as much distance as I could before getting water braked. I flung the bike against the rocky shore and used the fingerholds in the rock to pull myself and the bike up, and started to climb. It looked like more road might be over and around the bend, but I couldn’t tell if it led back to the road I was on before the flooded pass.
