There can be no question that the word was from the first intended pejoratively. The implication of the word, that it represented not just a departure from the norm, but a rejection of it (its force being roughly equivalent to "anti-musical") strongly suggests that the only other widely-used "a-" word (at that time; "amoral" was popularized much later) with a similarly pejorative significance would have come to mind among the first users (and readers) of the word "atonal." Whether whoever first coined it specifically intended this connection is both unknowable and irrelevant; that the two words would have, ca. 1900, strongly resonated off each other cannot, IMO, be doubted.Serious question, not rhetorical: Was the word really modeled on "atheist" specifically, and not all the various other "a-" words (asexual, amoral, asymmetrical, etc.)? If it wasn't, then I think your implication overreaches. mdl
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Andrew Stiller
Kallisti Music Press
http://www.kallistimusic.com
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