"Tonality, Atonality and the Ainulindalë", Reuven Naveh

[Ibrîniðilpathânezel]

Though I tend to believe that Tolkien did not intend the Ainulindale to have a literal sonata structure, I can easily see how the form might be considered analogous. But I also tend to disagree with the statement:

The music of the Ainur is clearly supposed to be abstract, celestial music played in the Void and intended for Ilúvatar's ears; thus it certainly does not resemble any music known to humanity today or in any previous era.

Why not? The physical world is simply the Music made manifest; Iluvatar taught Ulmo the most about music, and his music is neither abstract nor celestial (as I recall, Ulmo taught music to the Elves at some point). Moreover, the Music was not played in the Void; it was played in the Timeless Halls, which are not the same thing. Yes, I do imagine that however it sounded in its original form, it would not have been played upon instruments as we know them; until their entry into Ea, physicality was apparently unknown to the Ainur. But then again, the instruments we do know were made in a world that IS the Music in physical form, and I don't know why they would be utterly alien to one another. My belief is that rather than being unlike any music ever known to humanity, the Ainulindale probably would be strangely familiar to ALL music ever known to humanity, for ultimately, it was the root, the blueprint of the world we know, and no doubt had in it all kinds of music possible within this world. Listening to the Music of the Ainur, I think we would hear an impossible -- yet utterly possible -- combining of all musical forms in one Master Work. And that Music is yet unfinished.