Reflections Of An American Composer

Author : Arthur Berger
Publisher : Univ of California Press
Page : 296 pages
File Size : 50,8 Mb
Release : 2002-11-28
Category : Music
ISBN : 0520928210

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Reflections of an American Composer by Arthur Berger Pdf

In this engrossing collection of essays, distinguished composer, theorist, journalist, and educator Arthur Berger invites us into the vibrant and ever-changing American music scene that has been his home for most of the twentieth century. Witty, urbane, and always entertaining, Berger describes the music scene in New York and Boston since the 1930s, discussing the heady days when he was a member of a tight-knit circle of avant-garde young composers mentored by Aaron Copland as well as his participation in a group at Harvard University dedicated to Stravinsky. As Virgil Thomson's associate on the New York Herald Tribune and founding editor of the prestigious Perspectives of New Music, Berger became one of the preeminent observers and critics of American music. His reflections on the role of music in contemporary life, his journalism career, and how changes in academia influence the composition and teaching of music offer a unique perspective informed by Berger's abundant intelligence and experience.

Author : Arthur Berger
Publisher : Univ of California Press
Page : 288 pages
File Size : 46,6 Mb
Release : 2002-11-28
Category : Music
ISBN : 9780520232518

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Reflections of an American Composer by Arthur Berger Pdf

A book of memoirs and essays by notable composer, critic and teacher Arthur Berger. The author writes vividly about the music scenes in New York, Paris, and Boston, and of his work with notable colleagues such as Stravinsky, Copeland, and Virgil Thompson.

Author : College Music Society
Publisher : Pendragon Press
Page : 452 pages
File Size : 45,7 Mb
Release : 2000
Category : Music
ISBN : 1576470709

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Reflections on American Music by College Music Society Pdf

Wright -- "A closed fist" from Spirals (for violin, viola, and cello) / Judith Lang Zaimont.

Author : Nicholas Tawa
Publisher : Indiana University Press
Page : 257 pages
File Size : 51,5 Mb
Release : 2009-03-26
Category : Music
ISBN : 9780253002877

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The Great American Symphony by Nicholas Tawa Pdf

The years of the Great Depression, World War II, and their aftermath brought a sea change in American music. This period of economic, social, and political adversity can truly be considered a musical golden age. In the realm of classical music, Aaron Copland, Samuel Barber, Howard Hanson, Virgil Thompson, and Leonard Bernstein -- among others -- produced symphonic works of great power and lasting beauty during these troubled years. It was during this critical decade and a half that contemporary writers on American culture began to speculate about "the Great American Symphony" and looked to these composers for music that would embody the spirit of the nation. In this volume, Nicholas Tawa concludes that they succeeded, at the very least, in producing music that belongs in the cultural memory of every American. Tawa introduces the symphonists and their major works from the romanticism of Barber and the "all-American" Roy Harris through the theatrics of Bernstein and Marc Blitzstein to the broad-shouldered appeal of Thompson and Copland. Tawa's musical descriptions are vivid and personal, and invite music lovers and trained musicians alike to turn again to the marvelous and lasting music of this time.

Author : Neil Butterworth
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 561 pages
File Size : 49,8 Mb
Release : 2013-10-02
Category : Music
ISBN : 9781136790249

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Dictionary of American Classical Composers by Neil Butterworth Pdf

The Dictionary of American Classical Composers covers over 650 composers active from the 18th century to today. Covering all classical styles, it offers the most comprehensive overview of key composers in the United States available. Entries include basic biographical information and critical analysis of each composer's key works and ideas. Entries also include worklists and bibliographic information. Whenever possible, the entries will have been checked by the composers themselves to assure greatest possible accuracy. This new edition, completely updated and expanded from the 1984 edition, also includes over 200 historic photographs.

Author : Carol J. Oja,Judith Tick
Publisher : Princeton University Press
Page : 528 pages
File Size : 40,9 Mb
Release : 2018-06-05
Category : Biography & Autobiography
ISBN : 9780691186153

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Aaron Copland and His World by Carol J. Oja,Judith Tick Pdf

Aaron Copland and His World reassesses the legacy of one of America's best-loved composers at a pivotal moment--as his life and work shift from the realm of personal memory to that of history. This collection of seventeen essays by distinguished scholars of American music explores the stages of cultural change on which Copland's long life (1900 to 1990) unfolded: from the modernist experiments of the 1920s, through the progressive populism of the Great Depression and the urgencies of World War II, to postwar political backlash and the rise of serialism in the 1950s and the cultural turbulence of the 1960s. Continually responding to an ever-changing political and cultural panorama, Copland kept a firm focus on both his private muse and the public he served. No self-absorbed recluse, he was very much a public figure who devoted his career to building support systems to help composers function productively in America. This book critiques Copland's work in these shifting contexts. The topics include Copland's role in shaping an American school of modern dance; his relationship with Leonard Bernstein; his homosexuality, especially as influenced by the writings of André Gide; and explorations of cultural nationalism. Copland's rich correspondence with the composer and critic Arthur Berger, who helped set the parameters of Copland's reception, is published here in its entirety, edited by Wayne Shirley. The contributors include Emily Abrams, Paul Anderson, Elliott Antokoletz, Leon Botstein, Martin Brody, Elizabeth Crist, Morris Dickstein, Lynn Garafola, Melissa de Graaf, Neil Lerner, Gail Levin, Beth Levy, Vivian Perlis, Howard Pollack, and Larry Starr.

Author : R. James Tobin
Publisher : Rowman & Littlefield
Page : 301 pages
File Size : 48,5 Mb
Release : 2014-07-02
Category : Music
ISBN : 9780810884403

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Neoclassical Music in America by R. James Tobin Pdf

From the 1920s to the 1950s, neoclassicism was one of the dominant movements in American music. Today this music is largely in eclipse, mostly absent in performance and even from accounts of music history, in spite of—and initially because of—its adherence to an expanded tonality. No previous book has focused on the nature and scope of this musical tradition. Neoclassical Music in America: Voices of Clarity and Restraint makes clear what neoclassicism was, how it emerged in America, and what happened to it. Music reviewer and scholar, R. James Tobin argues that efforts to define musical neoclassicism as a style largely fail because of the stylistic diversity of the music that fall within its scope. However, neoclassicists as different from one another as the influential Igor Stravinsky and Paul Hindemith did have a classical aesthetic in common, the basic characteristics of which extend to other neoclassicists This study focuses, in particular, on a group of interrelated neoclassical American composers who came to full maturity in the 1940s. These included Harvard professor Walter Piston, who had studied in France in the 1920s; Harold Shapero, the most traditional of the group; Irving Fine and Arthur Berger, his colleagues at Brandeis; Lukas Foss, later an experimentalist composer whose origins lay in neoclassicism of the 1940s; Alexei Haieff, and Ingolf Dahl, both close associates of Stravinsky; and others. Tobin surveys the careers of these figures, drawing especially on early reviews of performances before offering his own critical assessment of individual works. Adventurous collectors of recordings, performing musicians, concert and broadcasting programmers, as well as music and cultural historians and those interested in musical aesthetics, will find much of interest here. Dates of composition, approximate duration of individual works, and discographies add to the work’s reference value.

Author : Anonim
Publisher : Scarecrow Press
Page : 244 pages
File Size : 45,9 Mb
Release : 1996
Category : African American composers
ISBN : 081083037X

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Choral Music by African American Composers by Anonim Pdf

Lists and describes both published and unpublished choral works by some 100 Afro-American composers and arrangers, encompassing works representing all styles from four-part settings to avant-garde pieces. The bulk of the book is an annotated list of compositions in tabular form, organized alphabetically by composer's name, listing publication dates and number of pages, vocal ranges, type of accompaniment, publishers, and catalog number. Includes a listing of collections, biographical sketches, a discography, and addresses of publishers and composers. Useful for conductors and researchers. Annotation copyright by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Author : Tara Browner,Thomas Riis
Publisher : University of Illinois Press
Page : 383 pages
File Size : 47,6 Mb
Release : 2019-03-16
Category : Music
ISBN : 9780252051159

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Rethinking American Music by Tara Browner,Thomas Riis Pdf

In Rethinking American Music, Tara Browner and Thomas L. Riis curate essays that offer an eclectic survey of current music scholarship. Ranging from Tin Pan Alley to Thelonious Monk to hip hop, the contributors go beyond repertory and biography to explore four critical yet overlooked areas: the impact of performance; patronage's role in creating music and finding a place to play it; personal identity; and the ways cultural and ethnographic circumstances determine the music that emerges from the creative process. Many of the articles also look at how a piece of music becomes initially popular and then exerts a lasting influence in the larger global culture. The result is an insightful state-of-the-field examination that doubles as an engaging short course on our complex, multifaceted musical heritage. Contributors: Karen Ahlquist, Amy C. Beal, Mark Clagu,. Esther R. Crookshank, Todd Decker, Jennifer DeLapp-Birkett, Joshua S. Duchan, Mark Katz, Jeffrey Magee, Sterling E. Murray, Guthrie P. Ramsey Jr., David Warren Steel, Jeffrey Taylor, and Mark Tucker

Author : Bálint András Varga
Publisher : Boydell & Brewer
Page : 276 pages
File Size : 55,7 Mb
Release : 2017
Category : Composers
ISBN : 9781580465939

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The Courage of Composers and the Tyranny of Taste by Bálint András Varga Pdf

Bálint András Varga is perhaps the world's most respected interviewer of living composers. For The Courage of Composers and the Tyranny of Taste: Reflections on New Music, Varga has confronted thirty-three composers with quotations carefully chosen to elicit their thoughts about an issue that is crucial for any serious creative artist: How can one find courage to deal with the sometimes tyrannical expectations of the outside world? The result is an imaginary roundtable at which we encounter fresh, revealing, previously unpublished statements from such world-renowned composers as John Adams, Friedrich Cerha, George Crumb, Sofia Gubaïdulina, Georg Friedrich Haas, Giya Kancheli, György Kurtág, Helmut Lachenmann, Libby Larsen, Robert Morris, and Wolfgang Rihm. Also represented are composers who are becoming more prominent with the passing years -- Chaya Czernowin, Pascal Dusapin, and Rebecca Saunders -- as well as conductor-composer Michael Gielen, festival director Nicholas Kenyon, and music critics Paul Griffiths and Arnold Whittall. In The Courage of Composers and the Tyranny of Taste, composers and other insightful individuals comment on choices made, traps avoided, unforeseen consequences, proud accomplishments, occasional regrets: the whole range of experiences central to artistic creativity. Bálint András Varga isthe acclaimed author of György Kurtág: Three Interviews and Ligeti Homages; Three Questions for 65 Composers; and From Boulanger to Stockhausen: Interviews and a Memoir (all available from University of Rochester Press).

Author : Elizabeth B. Crist
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 272 pages
File Size : 46,9 Mb
Release : 2009-01-12
Category : Music
ISBN : 9780199888801

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Music for the Common Man by Elizabeth B. Crist Pdf

In the 1930s, Aaron Copland began to write in an accessible style he described as "imposed simplicity." Works like El Sal?n M?xico, Billy the Kid, Lincoln Portrait, and Appalachian Spring feature a tuneful idiom that brought the composer unprecedented popular success and came to define an American sound. Yet the cultural substance of that sound--the social and political perspective that might be heard within these familiar pieces--has until now been largely overlooked. While it has long been acknowledged that Copland subscribed to leftwing ideals, Music for the Common Man is the first sustained attempt to understand some of Copland's best-known music in the context of leftwing social, political, and cultural currents of the Great Depression and Second World War. Musicologist Elizabeth Crist argues that Copland's politics never merely accorded with mainstream New Deal liberalism, wartime patriotism, and Communist Party aesthetic policy, but advanced a progressive vision of American society and culture. Copland's music can be heard to accord with the political tenets of progressivism in the 1930s and '40s, including a fundamental sensitivity toward those less fortunate, support of multiethnic pluralism, belief in social democracy, and faith that America's past could be put in service of a better future. Crist explores how his works wrestle with the political complexities and cultural contradictions of the era by investing symbols of America--the West, folk song, patriotism, or the people--with progressive social ideals. Much as been written on the relationship between politics and art in the 1930s and '40s, but very little on concert music of the era. Music for the Common Man offers fresh insights on familiar pieces and the political context in which they emerged.

Author : Nicole V. Gagné
Publisher : Rowman & Littlefield
Page : 545 pages
File Size : 40,6 Mb
Release : 2019-07-17
Category : Music
ISBN : 9781538122983

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Historical Dictionary of Modern and Contemporary Classical Music by Nicole V. Gagné Pdf

The contemporary music scene thus embodies a uniquely broad spectrum of activity, which has grown and changed down to the present hour. With new talents emerging and different technologies developing as we move further into the 21st century, no one can predict what paths music will take next. All we can be certain of is that the inspiration and originality that make music live will continue to bring awe, delight, fascination, and beauty to the people who listen to it. This book cover modernist and postmodern concert music worldwide from the years 1888 to 2018. This second edition of Historical Dictionary of Modern and Contemporary Classical Music contains a chronology, an introduction, and an extensive bibliography. The dictionary section has over 500 cross-referenced entries on the most important composers, musicians, methods, styles, and media in modernist and postmodern classical music worldwide, from 1888 to 2018. This book is an excellent resource for students, researchers, and anyone wanting to know more about modern and contemporary classical music.

Author : Amy Lynn Wlodarski
Publisher : Eastman Studies in Music
Page : 256 pages
File Size : 45,5 Mb
Release : 2019
Category : History
ISBN : 9781580469470

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George Rochberg, American Composer by Amy Lynn Wlodarski Pdf

Based on private diaries, correspondence, and unpublished writings, George Rochberg, American Composer, reveals the impact of personal trauma on the creative and intellectual work of a leading postmodern composer.

Author : Frederick Koch
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 94 pages
File Size : 53,6 Mb
Release : 1983
Category : Music
ISBN : UOM:39015012782770

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Reflections on Composing by Frederick Koch Pdf

Author : Stephen Walsh
Publisher : Univ of California Press
Page : 756 pages
File Size : 50,5 Mb
Release : 2008-03-03
Category : Art
ISBN : 0520256158

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Stravinsky by Stephen Walsh Pdf

Widely regarded the greatest composer of the 20th century, Igor Stravinsky was central to the development of modernism in art. In this revealing volume, the first of two, Walsh follows Stravinsky from his birth in 1882 to 1934.