LIFE IS MUSIC: A case study of a novel metaphor and its use in discourse

Following Blending Theory, this article analyses a novel metaphor LIFE IS MUSIC which formed a leitmotif of Daniel Barenboim’s BBC Reith Lectures of 2006. The main focus is on the means and techniques employed by Barenboim, and his use of “verbo-musical” metaphors in particular. Because it goes beyond verbo-pictorial modes of representation, the proposed study of verbo-musical metaphors in a dynamically evolving discourse constitutes a new contribution not only to studies of multimodal metaphor in actual language use, but also to debates on conceptual nature of metaphor, “(metaphorical) thinking for speaking”, and language and cognition.