History of music Books
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Franz Schubert: Music and Belief
Book SynopsisA fresh appraisal of Schubert's nature and beliefs, deriving from close study of his works. Remarkable new study...Its central submission, that we have hitherto disregarded or misinterpreted the most profound intuitions of a unique composer, certainly carries conviction. And even after one reading there are already musical passages that this Schubert enthusiast finds himself hearing in quite a new way. Bayan Northcott, BBC MUSIC MAGAZINE The old stereotypes of Schubert as Bohemian artist and unselfconscious creator have been replaced over the past half-century with a picture of a difficult man in difficult times. The author aims to redress the balance, concentrating firstly on works where Schubert's beliefs are clearly expressed (masses, other religious music, songs amounting to Geistliche Lieder). This also prompts an examination of instrumental masterpieces [Unfinished and Great C Major Symphonies, and the Wanderer Fantasy], which show that Schubert's religious side encompasses awe and terror as well as wonder. Schubert's 'complete voice' is thus clearly heard, rather than the sombre one currently emphasised in both literature and concert. LEO BLACK is a former BBC chief producer for music.Trade ReviewRemarkable new study. -- Bayan Northcott * BBC MUSIC MAGAZINE *A thoroughly convincing study of the music, beautifully and unpretentiously written... Excellent study does memorable justice to the composer. * CLASSIC FM *An important and absorbing addition to the canon of Schubert literature. * GRAMOPHONE *[This] book is an invaluable addition to Schubert studies, not only as a treasure trove for the academic, but also for the performing musician.... The author is clearly a musicologist of the highest order, but he also proves to be a philosopher of insight and generosity, and it is here that his genius lies.... Leo Black has written a masterpiece and a monument. Robert Tear in * THE OLDIE *There is much that is interesting and original in this book. * MUSIC & LETTERS *
£22.49
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Beyond the Notes: Journeys with Chamber Music
Book SynopsisWe knew from her recordings that Susan Tomes is a superb chamber player; now we know that she's a superb writer too. Michael Church, INDEPENDENT In this widely acclaimed volume, Susan Tomes, a rare example of a leading musicianwho writes about the craft of performance, describes her experience of twenty years of rehearsal, concerts and recording. We knew from her recordings that Susan Tomes is a superb chamber player; now we know that she's a superb writer too. Michael Church, INDEPENDENT She is as sensitive an observer and as subtle a writer as she is one of our finest chamber musicians...This is a book that should be read by practising musicians and music-lovers alike: here's one performer who really can communicate in words as well as music. JAMES JOLLY, GRAMOPHONE Susan Tomes's bookgives you an intensely illuminating picture of the life of a pianist...she is a brilliant writer...Just as she magnetises with her playing, so too with her words. EDWARD GREENFIELD, GUARDIAN In this widely acclaimed volume, Susan Tomes, a rare example of a leading musician who writes about the craft of performance, describes her experience of twenty years of rehearsal, concerts and recording. Her performing life has been centred on chamber music and the need to communicate it fully to an audience hungry for meaningful musical experience. She was a founder member and the pianist of both Domus and the Florestan Trio, award-winning groups at the top of their field. Part One is a series of diaries describing their travels and performances: Domus in the 1980s with its own portable concert hall, struggling to create the conditions for informal but intense concert performances, and the Florestan Trio, currently one of the world's finest piano trios. Part Two is a collection of thought-provoking essays about teachers, making records, practising and rehearsing, audiences, earning a living, and the particular challenges of being a concert pianist. Beyond the Notes gives an unusually candid view of the complexities of a life in music. SUSAN TOMES, alongside her packed concert schedule, is a frequent contributor, on music and other subjects, to a number of publications.Trade ReviewA delight and a revelation...She writes with Schubertian intimacy, modesty and grace. -- Boyd Tonkin * INDEPENDENT *This book reveals [Tomes'] talents as a writer, too, one with a capacity for imaginative enquiry and a gift for the telling phrase... as natural and compelling a communicator in words as she is in music. * BBC MUSIC MAGAZINE *Professional musicians will sigh with recognition at page after page; readers...will have their eyes opened to the realities of the performer's life. I found the book absolutely enthralling. * CLASSICAL MUSIC *For more words on music, consider a wonderful book by pianist Susan Tomes of the Florestan Trio...Just reissued in paperback, Beyond the Notes is fascinating reading for anyone interested in the life of the touring concert artist. Her words are intimate and insightful, and her gentle frankness charms as she chronicles the role of the collaborative pianist. -- Susan Isaacs Nisbett * ANN ARBOR NEWS *
£21.24
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Citation and Authority in Medieval and
Book SynopsisEssays - collected in honour of Margaret Bent - examining how medieval and Renaissance composers responded to the tradition in which they worked through a process of citation of and commentary on earlier authors. Essays in honour of Margaret Bent. The chapters of this book probe the varied functions of citation and allusion in medieval and renaissance musical culture. At its most fundamental level musical culture relied on shared models for musical practice, used by singers and composers as they learned their craft. Several contributors to this volume investigate general models, which often drew on earlier musical works, internalized in the process of composers' own training as singers. In written theoretical musical pedagogy, conversely, citation of authority is deliberate and intentional. The adaptation of accepted wisdom in theoretical treatises was the means by which newer authors stamped their own authority. Further kinds of citation occur in specific musical texts, either within the words set to music or in the music itself. The diverse functions of citation and allusion for the creator, reader, scribe, performer and listener are here given due consideration. In doing so, this volume is a fitting tribute to Margaret Bent, whose pedagogy, publications, and presence are honoured in this Festschrift. Contributors: SUSAN RANKIN, GILLES RICO, CHRISTIAN THOMAS LEITMEIR, BARBARA HAGGH, LEOFRANC HOLFORD-STREVENS, ANDREW WATHEY, KEVIN BROWNLEE, ALICE V. CLARK, LAWRENCE M. EARP, VIRGINIA NEWES, JOHN MILSOM, DAVID HOWLETT, REINHARD STROHM, THEODOR DUMITRESCU, CRISTLE COLLINS JUDD, BONNIE J. BLACKBURNTrade ReviewRecommended reading for scholars and students of old music and music theory. * NOTES *This collection will stand for many years to come as [a] beacon to future learning. * EARLY MUSIC TODAY *Table of ContentsIntroduction: Learning, Citation and Authority in Musical Culture before 1600 - Suzannah Clark and Elizabeth Eva Leach 'Naturalis Concordia vocum cum planetis': Conceptualizing the Harmony of the Spheres in the Early Middle Ages - Susan K Rankin 'Auctoritas cereum habet nasum': Boethius, Aristotle, and the Music of the Spheres in the Thirteenth and Early Fourteenth CenturiesCenturies - Gilles Rico Types and Transmissions of Musical Examples in Franco's Ars cantus mensurabilis musicae - Christian Leitmeir Ciconia's Citations in Nova musica: New Sources as Biography - Barbara Haggh-Huglo Fauvel Goes to School - Leofranc Holford-Strevens Auctoritas and the Motets of Philippe de Vitry - Andrew Wathey Fire, Desire, Duration, Death: Machaut's Motet 10 - Kevin Brownlee Machaut Reading Machaut: Self-Borrowing and Reinterpretation in Motets 8 and 21 - Alice V. Clark Declamatory Dissonance in Machaut - Lawrence Earp 'Qui bien aimme a tart oublie':Machanut's Lay de plour in Context - Virginia Newes 'Imitatio', 'Intertextuality', and Early Music - John Milsom Apollinis eclipsatur: Foundation of the Collegium musicorum - David R. Howlett De plus en plus: Numbers, Binchois and Ockeghem - Reinhard Strohm An English adoption of the Burgundian chanson - Theodor Dumitrescu Learning to compose in the 1540s: Gioseffo Zarlino's Si bona suscepimus - Cristle Collins Judd The Eloquence of Silence: Tacet Inscriptions in the Alamire Manuscripts - Bonnie Blackburn
£76.00
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Parry to Finzi: Twenty English Song-Composers
Book SynopsisThe works of twenty composers from the golden age of English romantic song, major figures - Parry, Stanford, Vaughan Williams, Quilter, Ireland, Gurney, Warlock and Finzi - studied alongside the lesser-known. Constantly illuminating. JOHN STEANE, GRAMOPHONE The composers in this book represent the outstanding songwriters from what we can now see as the golden age of English romantic song. As well as the major figures - Parry, Stanford, Vaughan Williams, Quilter, Ireland, Gurney, Warlock and Finzi - there are chapters on lesser-known composers, such as Denis Browne and Charles Orr. Detailed consideration is given to three songwriters who have sufferedunaccountable neglect, Arthur Somervell, Armstrong Gibbs and Herbert Howells, and there are chapters on Elgar, Delius and Holst, whose reputations were made in other fields but whose contribution to English song is nevertheless important. Also taking their rightful places in the book are Frank Bridge, Arnold Bax, George Butterworth and E.J. Moeran. Each chapter begins with a discussion of its composer's song-output and of the poets and poetry he sets, and goes on to give an account of the influences on him and the hallmarks of his style; the songs are then discussed in detail, focusing on the major works. The text is illustrated with musical examples and there is a comprehensive bibliography and index. TREVOR HOLD was a composer and poet who wrote extensively on English song. His setting of Laurie Lee's 'Day of these Days' won the English Poetry and Song Society/English Music Society 2002 GoldenJubilee Song Competition. He died in January 2004.Trade ReviewHold brings a composer's sensibility to his task, notably in his analytical discussion, and fully understands the nature of the marriage effected, and the difficulties involved, in the song-composer's art of blending poetry with music. He is a real companion on his reader's journey of discovery... The text [is] unfailingly readable and astute in judgement. * JOHN TALBOT, BRITISH MUSIC SOCIETY NEWSLETTER *First-class...one of the most important treatises on the subject yet written...[Hold] writes superbly, urbanely and - more important - carefully...Highly recommended. * THE SINGER *Constantly illuminating. * JOHN STEANE, GRAMOPHONE *This deeply considered, beautifully produced book...will be the standard work on the subject for the foreseeable future. * MUSIC & VISION *
£26.99
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Bax: A Composer and his Times
Book SynopsisCompletely revised and updated from recently discovered archive material, Lewis Foreman's classic biography is the essential handbook to Bax and his contemporaries. Lewis Foreman's classic biography of the composer Arnold Bax (1883-1953) was first published in 1983. Documenting the life and times of a remarkable figure whose life touched a wide circle in England and Ireland, it was notable for having many of Bax's friends and contemporaries as sources, most of whom have since died. It also informed the remarkable revival of Bax's music and reputation which has taken place over the last twenty years. Now completely revised in the light of much new material including the huge archive of the pianist Harriet Cohen, Bax's mistress, which has only just become available for research, it is a notable portrait of a unique musical milieu. Bax's extensive musical output is now comprehensively recorded and widely known and here all the music is discussed from first hand acquaintance with all the revivals and recordings. This is the essential handbook to Bax and his period. LEWIS FOREMAN is a freelance author and advisor to record companies.Trade Review[Foreman's] big Bax biography...is surely his central achievement...The book established itself at the outset as the standard work on one of the most important and least understood British composers of his time...The new edition makes [it] more indispensable than ever. -- Calum MacDonald * BBC MUSIC MAGAZINE *Baxians everywhere owe Lewis Foreman a profound debt of gratitude and newcomers can rest assured that he is an absorbing and painstaking biographer...mandatory reading. -- Andrew Achenbach * GRAMOPHONE *A more wide-ranging study of Bax and his work than ever before...This book is a tour de force and the fitting culmination of a lifetime's dedicated research. -- Julian Haylock * CLASSIC FM MAGAZINE *One of the great biographies of an English composer just got even better. May it snare still more converts to this betwitching composer. * CLASSICAL MUSIC *For its contribution to the ongoing documentation of an extraordinary period of British musical creativity it is invaluable. * BRITISH MUSIC SOCIETY NEWS *Foreman's latest effort is essential reading for anyone with an interest in Bax. * JOURNAL OF THE SOCIETY OF MUSICOLOGY IN IRELAND *Highly recommended. * CHOICE *Table of Contents1883-1900: The Backround 1900-1905: The Royal Academy of Music 1905-1909: Many Influences 1909-1910: Ireland and Russia 1910-1911: Marriage 1912-1914: Rathgar and London 1914-1916: The Great War 1916-1918: Harriet Cohen 1918-1920: Peace and Success 1921-1923: Triumph 1924-1925: Crisis 1926-1928: New Directions 1928-1929: Dreams and Reality 1930-1932: Going Northern 1933-1936: Past Fifty 1937-1939: `I can't grow up' 1939-1945: The Second World War: Storrington 1945-1953: Last Years After 1953: Decline and Revival Appendix A: Dermot O'Byrne Appendix B: King Kojata Appendix C: The Happy Forest by Herbert Farjeon Appendix D: Bax's Symphonies at the Proms Appendix E: Felix Aprahamian's Foreward to the First Edition [1982]
£40.50
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Elgar the Music Maker
Book SynopsisAn expert and informative appraisal of all of Elgar's works - from his juvenilia to the unfinished 3rd symphony - by the author of the acclaimed Gerald Finzi. The new Diana McVeagh book on Elgar is first-rate, wrote Gerald Finzi of her earlier study of the composer, published in 1955. In the completely new Elgar the Music Maker she harvests five decades of thoughts about his music, scrutinizing the biographical details that have since been discovered and using them to assess the ways in which they affect the compositions. Diana McVeagh explores Elgar's complex personality and his compositional methods, his style and his relationship to his contemporaries, yet it is the music - still played, recorded, loved and discussed as much as ever- that remains her prime focus. Each of Elgar's works is discussed, balancing information and appraisal, from his juvenilia to his unfinished Third Symphony. Diana McVeagh provides a compelling and accessible companion to the music of one of England's greatest composers. Musicians, scholars and CD collectors alikewill find much to enjoy in Elgar the Music Maker. Diana McVeagh is the author of the highly acclaimed Gerald Finzi: His Life and Music [2005]; of the entries on Elgar and Finzi for The New Grove Dictionaryof Music and Musicians [1980, 2001]; and of the Finzi entry in The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography [2004].Trade ReviewDeserves to be read widely, and we should be grateful to Diana McVeagh for producing an immensely readable and always wise handbook to Elgar's oeuvre. * MUSIC & LETTERS *The analysis...is observation, discovery of what this music is. You're led to it by feeling, and back to feeling it returns. That is the essential way of good music criticism, and this book is full of it. -- John Steane * GRAMOPHONE *In associating events of the times with almost all of Elgar's works, McVeagh wears her encyclopedic knowledge lightly: her prose is clean, charming, and clever, and her forays into theory/musicology are brief and to the point...A congenial companion for those who know little about Elgar; a worthy quick read for the knowledgeable. Highly recommended. * CHOICE *McVeagh's critical method intertwines description and comment, and it serves her, and the reader, well. -- Julian Rushton * ELGAR SOCIETY JOURNAL *McVeagh's book, the concentrated essence of a lifetime's care for his music, has much to tell us about even the most familiar scores. -- John Warrack * INTERNATIONAL RECORD REVIEW *McVeagh is also able to make it clear how much she loves and admires the music without making any extravagant claims on its behalf. It's hard to imagine a more sane approach...the insights...keep coming. -- Stephen Johnson * BBC MUSIC MAGAZINE *Effortlessly readable, fresh prose. Almost every page has some gem of illumination...An essential listener's companion. -- Julian Haylock * CLASSIC FM MAGAZINE *Diana McVeagh has produced another gem of a book...a hawk's eye view of Elgar, the subject matter richly distilled...its arrival cheered me immensely in the midst of what has been a rather bleak 150th anniversary year. -- Richard Osborne * THE OLDIE *McVeagh is indeed an intelligent guide here: her writing is both informed and immaculate. * BRITISH MUSIC SOCIETY NEWS *One thoroughly good result of this Elgar year...This is neither a biography nor a technical analysis, but McVeagh has hit on the perfect way of combining the best features of both...There is no superimposition of alien theories or of special interests, and there are no perverse reinterpretations. The last few pages deal with Elgar's posterity and end with a beautifully balanced study of Elgar's personality. * TLS [Hugh Wood] *This little book is solid gold. * NABMSA Newsletter *Table of ContentsThe Making of an Enigma 1857-1899 To the Greater Glory of God 1899-1909 The Symphonist The Music of Wartime 1914-1920 The Last Years 1920-1934 Coda
£22.50
Boydell & Brewer Ltd John Stainer: A Life in Music
Book SynopsisThis comprehensive re-evaluation of John Stainer's life and work demonstrates that there was a great deal more to admire beyond The Crucifixion. The thoroughness of the research is impressive, based on profusion of sources, many of them little used until now.... A text that carries great authority, plus (almost equally important) a new and generously annotated list of Stainer's works both musical and literary. At last, Stainer has got his due, once and for all.'NICHOLAS TEMPERLEY, Professor of Music Emeritus, University of Illinois. One of the most important musicians of the Victorianera, Stainer is known for his considerable influence as a composer of Anglican liturgical music, and his corpus of secular works - madrigals and songs - presents many surprises. He was a brilliant organist, a fine scholar, theorist, pedagogue and teacher - multifarious attributes which this study elucidates and understands as part of his wider musical personality. Stainer's life is a story of extraordinary social mobility. From lowly origins he rose to become organist of St Paul's Cathedral and Professor of Music at Oxford. Yet after his premature death in 1901 he suffered almost immediate neglect except for the popularity of a handful of works, among them I saw the Lord and The Crucifixion. In rehabilitating Stainer and the crucial contribution he made to musical life, this book examines the breadth of his work as a composer, and the important role he played in the regeneration of sacredand secular musical institutions in Victorian Britain. JEREMY DIBBLE is Professor of Music at Durham University. His previous books include studies of Parry and Stanford and he is the author of numerous articles on British music. He is currently working on a dictionary of hymnology.Trade ReviewIlluminates an important aspect of a key figure in the Victorian musical world, some of whose music is still performed today. Dibble demonstrates convincingly that more of it should be performed and that there are neglected masterpieces from Stainer's hand. In short, this is a well-written and richly documented biography. * YEAR'S WORK IN ENGLISH STUDIES *As the second contribution to Boydell's new monograph series, Music in Britain, 1600-1900, this book is a welcome and readable addition. * VICTORIAN STUDIES *A wide-ranging, deeply engrossing book on a hitherto unfashionable figure central to English musical ,life in the 19th century. -- John Steane * GRAMOPHONE *Scrupulously detailed research and a fine advocacy demonstrate a...far more widely-ranging figure than one perhaps might expect...If anything could spark a Stainer revival, it would be this book. * BBC MUSIC MAGAZINE *What Dibble offers...is simply the most detailed, most thoroughly researched, most rounded life of Stainer there has yet been. * CLASSICAL MUSIC *[This] critical biography will not only remind readers of John Stainer's remarkable work and life but also go some way towards reinstating him as one of the originals in church and sacred music. * LIBRARY REVIEW *A timely reminder of Stainer's significance. * NOTES *Dibble...does do Stainer proud in setting out his many achievements...It will be the standard text for a long time. * MUSICAL TIMES *Table of ContentsA Musical Youth: St Paul's Cathedral (1) 1840-1857 `I saw the Lord': Ouseley and Tenbury 1857-1859 `Drop down, ye heavens, from above': Oxford (1) 1860-1872 Reform and National Renown: St Paul's Cathedral (2) 1860-1872 H.M. Inspector of Schools and The Crucifixion 1882-1888 `Love Divine, all loves excelling': Oxford (2) 1889-1901 List of Works Bibliography
£85.00
Boydell & Brewer Ltd The Pursuit of High Culture: John Ella and
Book SynopsisThis monograph investigates the promotion and consumption of high musical culture among leisured society in Victorian London, by focusing on the activities of the concert manager John Ella and his Musical Union. This monograph investigates the promotion and consumption of high musical culture among leisured society in Victorian London, by focusing on the activities of the concert manager John Ella and his Musical Union [1845-81], an eminent, long-lived institution for chamber music, much fêted across Europe in its day. It combines a biography of Ella with a social-economic history of the Musical Union, its players, repertoire and audiences, and sets them against the gradually shifting contexts for London concerts, chamber music and cultural life. Ella's extraordinary life story, which began in provincial, artisan-class obscurity and ended in the upper echelons of London society, shapes thenarrative. Such themes as entrepreneurship, concert management, taste shaping, music appreciation and elite social networks are discussed throughout, as is the curious interplay between the desire to 'sacralize' chamber music, especially Beethoven's, on the one hand, and the need to survive amid the increasing commercial imperatives of London concert life on the other. CHRISTINA BASHFORD is Assistant Professor of Musicology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.Trade Review[B]ashford's book expertly relates her thorough documentation of Ella's life and professional activities to the broader social, cultural, and musical Victorian context, offering us a model example of how good scholarship can make even one enabler of music, relevant all of music and Victorian culture. * NABMSA Newsletter *[This] study not only meets a need in Victorian cultural history but prompts applications to our day...of interest to anyone working on nineteenth-centiry performing arts, in Britain or elsewhere. * VICTORIAN STUDIES *The first of its kind...As such it takes its responsibility very seriously, and as a consequence it does not disappoint...It is a model of modern musicological biography, and for that Christina Bashford is to be highly praised. -- Bennett Zon * MUSIC & LETTERS *Table of ContentsIntroduction: The Case for Ella From Leicester to London, 1802-29 Successes, Frustrations, Ambitions, 1828-44 Establishing the Musical Union, 1845-8 Consolidation and Expansion, 1849-57 New Spaces, 1858-68 Adapting to Survive, 1868-79 Endings (1880-88) and Legacy
£93.53
Boydell & Brewer Ltd The Operas of Benjamin Britten: Expression and
Book SynopsisThis controversial analysis of Britten's operatic works demonstrates how he used music to explore his most private concerns. Claire Seymour examines ways in which Britten's operas explored and articulated the inherent ambiguity and latent sexuality of music, particularly song, and suggests that they may illustrate his search for a public "voice" which would embody, communicate, and perhaps resolve his private beliefs and anxieties. She demonstrates how the delicate balance between private and public communication, and the tension between art as self-expression and art as moral resolution were key concerns in Britten's music. Analyses of Britten's operas from Paul Bunyan to Death in Venice, the three Church Parables, and several of the "children's operas" offer evidence that, for Britten, opera was the natural medium through which to explore, express and, paradoxically, repress his private concerns.Trade ReviewA wide variety of ideas within two covers. * GRAMOPHONE *Among the more interesting expositions of Britten as man and composer. Recommended. * CHOICE *Intelligent and informative on a number of levels...[Seymour] does much to clarify the nature and extent, the range and consistency, of Britten's artistic achievement. * BRITISH MUSIC SOCIETY NEWSLETTER *A source of some solid enjoyment. * MUSICAL TIMES *
£24.69
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Music as Social and Cultural Practice: Essays in
Book SynopsisEssays dealing with the controversial concept of the "work", and how far social and cultural practices are integral to it. The linking theme of the essays collected here is the intersection of musical work with social and cultural practice. Inspired by Professor Strohm's ideas, as is fitting in a volume in his honour, leading scholars in the field explore diverse conceptualizations of the "work" within the contexts of a specific repertory, over four main sections. Music in Theory and Practice studies the link between treatises and musical practice, and analyses how historicalwritings can reveal period views on the "work" in music before 1800. Art and Social Process: Music in Court and Urban Societies looks at the social and cultural practices informing composition from the late Renaissance until the mid-eighteenth century, and interrogates current notions of canon formation and the exchange between local and foreign traditions. Creating an Opera Industry focuses on how genre and artistic autonomy were defined in operas from diverse eras and countries, explaining the role of literature and politics in this process. Finally, The Crisis of Modernity treats nineteenth-century music, offering new models for "work" and "context" to challenge reigning theories of the meaning of these terms. CONTRIBUTORS: AMNON SHILOAH, ANNA MARIA BUSSE BERGER, MARGARET BENT, EDWARD WICKHAM, BONNIE J. BLACKBURN, DAVID BRYANT, ELENA QUARANTA, OWEN REES, ALINA ZORAWSKA-WITKOWSKA, ELLEN T. HARRIS, CHRISTOPH WOLFF, NORBERT DUBOWY, MICHAEL TALBOT, MELANIA BUCCIARELLI, FRANCESCA MENCHELLI-BUTTINI, BERTA JONCUS, MICHEL NOIRAY, MICHAEL FEND, EMANUELE SENICI, FEDERICO CELESTINI, PAMELA POTTER, GIOVANNI MORELLI, JANET SMITHTable of ContentsLaudatio - Pierluigi Petrobelli Anonymous Arabic Treatises on Music: Lost Legacies, Hidden Answers - Amnon Shiloah Compositional Practices in Trecento Music: Model Books and Musical Traditions - Anna Maria Busse Berger Trompetta and Concordans Parts in the Early Fifteenth Century - Margaret Bent Recording for Posterity: Some Reflections on the Memorialising of Early Renaissance Music - Edward Wickham How to Sin in Music: Doctor Navarrus on Sixteenth-Century Singers - Bonnie Blackburn Traditions and Practices in Fifteenth- and Sixteenth-Century Sacred Polyphony: The Use of Solo Voices with Instrumental Accompaniment - Elena Quaranta Traditions and Practices in Fifteenth- and Sixteenth-Century Sacred Polyphony: The Use of Solo Voices with Instrumental Accompaniment - David Bryant `The City Full of Grief': Music for the Exequies of King Philip II - Giovanni Alberto Ristori and his Serenate at the Polish Court of Augustus III, 1735-1746 - Alina Zorawska-Witkowska `Cantate, que me veux-tu?' or: Do Handel's Cantatas Matter? - Ellen T. Harris Two Koechel Numbers, One Work - Christopher Wolff Identity and Poetic Style: The Case of Rosmene by Giueseppe Domenico de Totis - Norbert Dubowy How Operatic is Vivaldi's Juditha triumphans? - Michael Talbot Venice and the East: Operatic Readings of Tasso's Armida in Early Eighteenth-Century Venice - Melania Bucciarelli Literary Motifs in Metastasio's and Jommelli's Ciro riconosciuto - Francesca Menchelli-Buttini Producing Stars in Dramma per musica - The Pre-revolutionary Origins of `Terrorisme musical' - Michel Noiray Pieces into Works: Chrubini's Substitute Arias for the Théâtre Feydeau - Michael Fend At the Tavern with Manzoni and Verdi: I promessi sposi and the Dramaturgy of La forza del destino - Emanuele Seinci The Acoustic Proximity of Temporal Distance: Auratic Sonority in Mahler's Leider eines fahrenden Gesellen - Federico Celestini Creating a Concept of `Nazi Musicology' - Pamela Potter Et in Arcadia adhuc: Observations on the Continuing Evolution of the `Pastoral Idea' - Giovanni Morelli Reinhard Strohm: List of Publications - Janet Smith
£95.00
Boydell & Brewer Ltd The Songs of Edvard Grieg
Book SynopsisComprehensive survey of Grieg's 180 songs, considering particularly questions and issues of performance. Edvard Grieg's 180 songs mirror his artistic and personal development more intimately than any of his other music, yet are still the least known part of his output. This definitive appraisal, now revised and updated, discusses every song, including those left only in manuscript and sketches at the composer's death, set against the background of his life and times. It also deals with the poetry set, often chosen to reflect his current situation, and the poets, several of whom, including great figures of the day such as Ibsen and Bjornson, were his friends and colleagues. Grieg frequently bemoaned poor translations and indifferent performances, and the various editions and translations, from first publication to the present day, are also discussed, together with his own ideas for interpretation. Musical examples and analysis are included to give a closer understanding of Grieg's word-setting and harmonic development, although their performance is always kept paramount. BERYL FOSTER is a graduate of London University and studied singing in Colchester and at the Royal College of Music. As well as all the usual repertoire, since 1980 she has made a particular study of the songs of Grieg and other Norwegian composers, giving recitals, lectures and workshops in Britain, Norway, Germany, the Netherlands, Italy and China. She is also a private teacher andfestival adjudicator.Trade ReviewAll is admiration for a study which, as well as fulfilling those old cliches 'essential' and 'important', is most readably written. More than being just a guide to the songs, it becomes en route one of the most perceptive, and detailed, books in English on the composer yet published. * GRAMOPHONE *Beryl Foster's authoritative study can claim to be the most thorough investigation of this repertoire yet to have appeared in English, and is likely to remain the standard work on the subject for many years to come. -- Robert Layton * TLS *Beryl Foster's Songs of Edvard Grieg is a wonder...her scholarship and musicianship are writ large throughout its pages. -- Lionel Carley * ANGLO-NORSE REVIEW *Table of ContentsFolk-song to Art-song Translation and Interpretation `Lillegrieg' `Melodies of the Heart' `A balanced mind, a spiritual vitality...' `The claim of the ideal' `...awakened from a long, long trance' `The Mountain Thrall' `The Goal' Travels and `Travel Memories' `Homecoming' Haugtussa `Music's torch, which ever burns...'
£23.74
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Thomas Tallis and his Music in Victorian England
Book SynopsisA survey of the huge importance of Thomas Tallis, the `Father of Church Music', on Victorian musical life. In Victorian England, Tallis was ever-present: in performances of his music, in accounts of his biography, and through his representation in physical monuments. Known in the nineteenth century as the 'Father of English Church Music', Tallis occupies a central position in the history of the music of the Anglican Church. This book examines in detail the reception of two works that lie at the stylistic extremes of his output: Spem in alium, revived in the 1830s, though generally not greatly admired, and the Responses, which were very popular. A close study of the performances, manuscripts and editions of these works casts light on the intersections between the antiquarian, liturgical and aesthetic goals of nineteenth-century editors and musicians. By tracing Tallis's reception in nineteenth-century England, the author charts the hold Tallis had on the Victorians and the ways in which Anglican - and English - identity was defined and challenged. Dr SUE COLE is a research associate at the Faculty of Music, University of Melbourne.Trade ReviewCole has provided a useful and innovative model for further approaches to the study of earlier music. This book is thus to be recommended not only to admirers of Tallis, but to all with an interest in the history of English music. * FONTES AR TIS MUSICAE *[Cole] pursues an intriguing trail [...]. Students of Tudor church music will find much scholarly detail in Cole's vignettes. Anyone with an interest in the Victorians will enjoy learning about this interaction of national, religious and cultural identity, and glimpse the sense of adventure that some of them felt in the quest for musical treasure from England's glorious past. * TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT *This book is a cause for rejoicing.Cole's central narrative [is] compelling.a tremendously important, stimulating book which reconfigures one's sense of the English musical landscape and it should spark new directions in Tallis scholarship. * EARLY MUSIC *A valuable addition to the small body of literature on Tallis. * CHURCH MUSIC QUARTERLY *I recommend [Cole's] contribution to the available literature on Tallis wholeheartedly. -- Peter Phillips * MUSICAL TIMES *The arguments raised in this book are complex...yet Cole sets them out clearly and cogently. She has a knack for untangling complicated issues...this book is a pleasure to read. * MUSICOLOGY AUSTRALIA *A fascinating, scholarly study which causes the reader to challenge his or her own received knowledge...as much a great read as it is a learned book, and I cannot praise author or publisher highly enough for its timely publication. * CHOMBEC News *Exceptional in its care, comprehensiveness and logic. Insofar as reception history is a matter of uncovering the cultural politics that shaped the musical values we have inherited, it is difficult to imagine a job better done. * JOURNAL OF VICTORIAN CULTURE *Table of ContentsIntroduction `It is here that we must look for Tallis': Tallis's music `Such a man as Tallis': Tallis the man `This Mistake of a Barbarous Age': Spem in alium `A Solid Rock of Harmony': The Preces and Responses `The Englishman's Harmony': Tallis and national identity Conclusion Bibliography
£71.25
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Ivor Gurney and Marion Scott: Song of Pain and
Book SynopsisInsightful account of the life and works of two of the most important figures in twentieth-century British cultural life. This dual biography of Ivor Gurney and Marion Scott tells the dramatic story of two geniuses who met at the Royal College of Music in 1911 and formed an unlikely partnership that illuminated and enriched the musical and literary worlds in which they moved. Gurney's poetry and songs have taken their place as part of the inheritance of England. Scott, Gurney's strongest advocate, emerges from his shadow for the first time. Her own remarkable achievements as a pioneering music critic, musicologist, advocate of contemporary music and women musicians place her among the most influential and respected women of her generation. Based on original research, this is thefirst biography of Gurney since 1978 and the only biography of Scott. It offers new, in-depth perspectives on Gurney's attempts to create music and poetry while struggling to overcome the bipolar illness that eventually derailed his genius, and restores Marion Scott's rightful place in music history. Pamela Blevins is a former journalist and managing editor of Signature, a magazine about women in classical music. She has publishedwidely on British composers and poets.Trade ReviewIn the cruelly brief space allotted to him, Gurney achieved something lapidary and touching: he reigns as the supreme miniaturist of twentieth century British music. * MUSIC & LETTERS *[A] fine biography. [...] This biography should go some way toward bringing Ivor Gurney back into our ken. That it suggest we ought to know more about Marion Scott is also useful. * FANFARE MAGAZINE *A remarkable new biography [...] that fans of Ivor Gurney will certainly appreciate. Blevins has spared no detailed, which makes the book riveting from cover to cover. * SUITE101 *This new biography...comes as near as we're likely to get to the whole story. For Pamela Blevins has not only researched, sifted and assessed every available source with enormous diligence, but she has brought to the foreground the hitherto under-exposed figure of writer and musicologist Marion Scott, and has thus both widened the lens and concentrated the focus of Gurney studies...both Gurney and Scott [are restored] to their rightful place in musical history. * BBC MUSIC MAGAZINE *The material about Scott is...invaluable...and the book as a whole, with its superb photographs, will prove a vital source for future researchers. * TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT *Draw[s] extensively on the published letters as well as on a good deal of fresh research including an informative investigation of Gurney's bipolar condition...Blevins brings a journalistic zeal to the interaction of these two lives. * GRAMOPHONE *A striking account of two lives bound inextricably together...beautifully produced and lavishly illustrated. * FRIENDS OF THE DYMOCK POETS NEWSLETTER *This remarkable volume is a penetrating reassessment of Ivor Gurney...but more than that, a searching consideration of the life and achievements of Marion Scott. * CHORAL JOURNAL *Table of ContentsPreface Prologue London, 1911 A Clash of Wills An Island of Serenity Friendship and Poetry The Gurney Family Golden Days A Lad's Love The First Breakdown The Lost Year The Experiment A Partnership The Dirty Business of War Blighty 'Love has come to bind me fast' 'You would rather know me dead...' An Uncertain Course A New Mastery The Tide of Darkness 'There is dreadful hell within me...' Asylum -- 'the soul halts here' The Last Chance 'A fantastic mix-up' Bitter Troubles and Suffering 'In time to come' Epilogue Appendices Bibliography Index
£31.50
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Erik Chisholm, Scottish Modernist (1904-1965):
Book SynopsisA study of the life and works of Erik Chisholm, one of the most influential figures in twentieth-century Scottish music. Erik Chisholm was the pre-eminent composer and musician in Scottish classical music in the first half of the twentieth century. As Sir Charles Mackerras put it, 'Chisholm was a musician of rare capabilities. He was a pianist and organist, a conductor, a composer, a lecturer on music, an entrepreneur and administrator, and to all these he brought a unique blend of originality, flair and energy.' As well as his life in Glasgow, Chisholm travelled to the Far East, notably Singapore, for the Entertainments and National Service Association during the Second World War, and subsequently became Professor of Music at the University of Cape Town, where he greatly developed the study and performance of music. He conducted numerous first British performances, including Berlioz's The Trojans in 1935 and Bartok's Bluebeard's Castle in 1957. Accounts of the visits to Glasgow by such composers as Bartók,Casella, Hindemith et al are being presented here. Erik Chisholm. Scottish Modernist will be of general interest to scholars and students of twentieth-century music. In particular, those interested in the development of music, opera and ballet in Scotland, Scottish literature and cultural history will find this book of much value. It will also be of interest to those studying the music of Bartók, Sorabji, Hindemith, Walton, Bax, Casella, and Shostakovich whom Chisholm knew personally and brought to Scotland.Trade ReviewPursers ausgezeichnet geschriebene Arbeit, die die Musikgeschichte um einen weiteren wichtigen Mosaikstein bereichert, legt den Grund für weiterführende Untersuchungen. * DIE MUSIKFORSCHUNG *The book is one of the most readable of its type I've come across in some time. * THE DELIAN *Chisholm's contribution has been crying out for this reassessment - that it's as readable as this is a real bonus. * SCOTSMAN *Purser's welcome book will help to acquaint contemporary readers with the significant and fascinating musician who was Erik Chisholm. * CLASSICAL MUSIC *[A] superb publication. It is a massive investigation into the life and music of one of Scotland's great, but massively underrated composers. It will provide the biographical and musical reference material for all interested parties for years to come. * BRITISH MUSIC SOCIETY NEWSLETTER *Table of ContentsForeword by Sir Charles Mackerras Glasgow, Kailyard or Coal Yard? The Active Society - Bringing the Heroes of Modernism to Glasgow Chisholm's Scottish Inheritance Interlude: The Love of Sorabji A Trojan Horse in Glasgow - Berlioz, Mozart and Gluck The Ballet and the Baton as Weapons of War Centrepiece: Pictures from Dante and Night Song of the Bards - A Journey fr om West to East From Italy to India and Singapore Under Table Mountain On Tour in the USA and Europe Soviet Ambassador - Chisholm Behind the Iron Curtain Interlude: The Love of Janacek Chasing a Restless Muse - The Heart's Betrayal Envoi Appendix I: The Active Society for the Propagation of Contemporary Music Appendix II: Patrick Macdonald Sources for Chisholm's Piano Works Select Bibliography Discography Selected Compositions
£36.00
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Hermann Pötzlinger's Music Book: The St Emmeram
Book SynopsisA study of one of the most significant medieval manuscripts containing music, and its owner, sheds light on many aspects of contemporary culture. Hermann Pötzlinger (+ 1469), the university-educated schoolmaster of the monastery of St Emmeram, Regensburg, was the creator of one of the largest and most intriguing collections of late-medieval polyphonic music to have survivedfrom Central Europe. His music book, the so-called 'St Emmeram Codex' (Munich, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Clm 14274), was compiled in the years immediately following his graduation from Vienna University in 1439. It contains aunique cross-section of polyphonic vocal music not only from the West but also from Central and Eastern Europe; moreover, it is only one among more than a hundred scholarly manuscripts that he copied or acquired during his career. This volume presents an in-depth study of the manuscript and of the professional networks and academic culture within which it was compiled; its context as part of one of the largest surviving personal libraries of its time is also explored. It will appeal to all those interested in early music and other aspects of late-medieval life and culture. Dr IAN RUMBOLD is an independent scholar; PETER WRIGHT is Professor of Music at the University of Nottingham.Trade ReviewThis is a wholly admirable piece of work, a delight to read [...] and also a very finely produced book. In fact, admiration mingles with astonishment as one reads it. The handling of the primary documents and the construction of a narrative from them is first-rate. * MUSIC & LETTERS *[T]his study represents the first comprehensive examination of the manuscript and its context. Meticulously researched, this book is highly specialised. * THE CONSORT *A dazzling documentary study that explores the relationships between the source and the life of its scribe, owner and compiler [...] It is difficult to imagine a more thorough, balanced and rigorous treatment of the topic than Rumbold and Wright's. * EARLY MUSIC *This is an excellent book. * EARLY MUSIC REVIEW *Table of ContentsIntroduction Pötzlinger's Family Background Vienna and Auerbach Pötzlinger's Music Book: Clm 14274 Pötzlinger in Regensburg, I: Monastery Politics Pötzlinger in Regensburg, II: Schooling, Liturgy and Music Pötzlinger in Leipzig Pötzlinger in Regensburg, III: Retirement and Legacy Appendices Bibliography
£75.00
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Benjamin Britten: New Perspectives on His Life
Book SynopsisAn essay collection which examines Britten's juvenilia, influences such as Shostakovich and Verdi, his opera Owen Wingrave and a libretto written by Australian novelist Patrick White with the hope of a future collaboration. Benjamin Britten: New Perspectives on his Life and Work reveals the extent to which Britten scholarship is reaching outside the confines of Anglo-American criticism. The volume engages with juvenilia and other orchestral works from the 1920s and examines a broad range of influences on Britten, including the works of Shostakovich and Verdi, the poetry of Ovid, and the cinema. Among his operatic works the dramatic qualities of Owen Wingrave arediscussed through a close study of Piper's libretto and we witness the genesis of a libretto written by Australian novelist Patrick White and submitted to Britten with the hope of a future collaboration. The volume uncovers the generally hostile reception Britten's operas received in Paris until around the 1990s. Britten's status as 'outsider' in both the USA and in his own country when he returned in 1942 is discussed: the possibility is that Britten wasbecoming nervous of the gathering US involvement in the war and the real chance he may be called up to serve in the US forces is also discussed here.Trade ReviewThis book contains substantive discussion of one of the greatest composers of the twentieth century. It is a solid contribution to the libraries of those who admire the composer and his work. * ANGELICAN AND EPISCOPAL HISTORY *These essays should spark discussion among scholars and fans of Britten. * BOOK NEWS *Walker's book... paves the way to a freer, more balanced view of the man and musician. * CLASSICAL MUSIC *Read and reflect, discuss and argue: [the contributors] are mostly new to Britten studies... and it must be a healthy sign if they are generating controversial ideas. It is also good to see two writers from continental Europe... Britten was an internationalist and it is surely right that Britten studies should be too. * GRAMOPHONE *It is [the] critrical distance, and the absence of for-or-against defensiveness which has often scarred Britten scholarship, that distinguishes Walker's volume. * TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT *Table of ContentsIntroduction - Lucy Walker Going Behind Britten's Back - Colin Matthews Performing Early Britten: Signs of Promise and Achievement in Poemes Nos 4 and 5 (1927) - Sharon Choa Shostakovich's Fourteenth Symphony: A Response to War Requiem? - Six Metamorphoses After Ovid and the Influence of Classical Mythology on Benjamin Britten - George Caird Britten and the Cinematic Frame - David Crilly Storms, Laughter and Madness: Verdian 'Numbers' and Generic Allusions in Benjamin Britten's Peter Grimes - Jane Brandon Dramatic Invention in Myfanwy Piper's Libretto for Owen Wingrave - Frances Spalding 'The Minstrel Boy to the War is Gone': Father Figures and Fighting Sons in Britten's Owen Wingrave - Arne Muus Made You Look! Children in Salome and Death in Venice - From the Borough to Fraser Island - Claire Seymour Britten and France; or the Late Emergence of a Remarkable Lyric Universe - Maena Py Why did Britten Return to Wartime England? - Brian McMahon
£66.50
Boydell & Brewer Ltd The Genius of Valhalla: The Life of Reginald
Book SynopsisThe life of enigmatic Wagner conductor, Reginald Goodall, by the author of the acclaimed Thomas Beecham: An Obsession with Music, newly available in paperback. When Sir Reginald Goodall died in 1990, at the age of 88, he had already acquired cult status and was considered one of the greatest Wagner conductors of our times. Although he had conducted the première of Benjamin Britten's Peter Grimes in 1945 and was admired by Erich Kleiber and Otto Klemperer, he suffered years of neglect until his triumphant return to conduct Die Meistersinger at Sadler's Wells in 1968. John Lucas, author of theacclaimed Thomas Beecham: An Obsession with Music, examines the mysteries of Goodall's early career, his Mosleyite sympathies, his remarkable late flowering and the fame of his last 20 years. Drawing upon letters and diaries as well as extensive interviews with friends and colleagues, Lucas pieces together the life of this enigmatic, self-effacing figure - a great Wagner conductor in a tradition stretching back through Knappertsbusch and Karl Muckto Hans Richter. Previously available as Reggie: The Life of Reginald Goodall - now available for the first time in paperback with a new Preface and Introduction. Published in association with the Peter Moores Foundation.Trade ReviewLucas's fine biography (which carries the benefit of access to plenty of personal Goodall material) will continue to stir curiosity far into the future. * CLASSICAL MUSIC [Editor's Choice] *Lucas gives a sympathetic yet judicious account of [Goodall]...The quality of research is high...and although the author clearly has a high personal regard for his subject there is no sense whatever of uncritical adulation. * WAGNER JOURNAL *This is an inspiring story. * OPERA NEWS *Superbly researched and sympathetic. * DAILY TELEGRAPH *Engrossing and deeply affectionate. * THE SPECTATOR *Marvellously informative. * OBSERVER *An engrossing and informative read...I recommend this book with enthusiasm. * FANFARE *
£23.74
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Essays on the History of English Music in Honour
Book SynopsisArticles on English music, from the medieval period to the present day, centred on four of the major areas of scholarly enquiry. The major themes of the essays in this collection reflect the work of the distinguished scholar John Caldwell, professor of music at Oxford University and a composer in his own right. There is a strong focus on early music, with contributions considering the medieval carol, sources for seventeenth- and eighteenth-century harpsichord music, and the transmission of fifteenth-century English music to the Continent; but they range right up to the twentieth century, with an examination of music in Oxford. All are concerned in one way or another with themes which recur in Professor Caldwell's scholarship: sources; style; performance; and historiography. Contributors: SALLY HARPER, DAVID HILEY, EMMA HORNBY, HARRY JOHNSTONE, MARGARET BENT, DAVID MAW, MATTHIAS RANGE, REINHARD STROHM, PETER WRIGHT, MAGNUS WILLIAMSON, JOHN HARPER, SIMON MCVEIGH, CHRISTOPHER PAGE, OWEN REES, SUSAN WOLLENBERG, JOHN ARTHUR SMITH, BENNETT ZON, DAVID MAW. To subscribe to the Tabula Gratulatoria for this volume, CLICK HERETrade ReviewThe affection as well as the respect in which John Caldwell is held by other scholars exudes unmistakably from the pages of this volume in his honour. [...] This brilliantly researched, engagingly written, and elegantly produced volume [...] its enduring significance will surely lie in its explorations of new historical material, its suggestive reconsiderations of the well known, and it's opening up of new areas of research. * MUSIC & LETTERS *The seventeen essays have much that is of interest to the thoughtful reader with an interest in the organ and its music, most particularly in relation to its presence - and absence - in liturgical settings. * JOURNAL OF THE BRITISH INSTITUTE OF ORGAN STUDIES *Table of ContentsIntroduction - Emma Hornby Traces of Lost Late Medieval Offices? The Sanctilogium Angliae, Walliae, Scotiae, et Hiberniae of John of Tynemouth [fl.1350] - Sally Harper The saints venerated in medieval Peterborough as reflected in the antiphoner Cambridge, Magdalene College, F.4.10 - David Hiley Interactions between Brittany and Christ Church, Canterbury in the tenth century: the Linenthal leaf - Emma Hornby A new source of late seventeenth- and early eighteenth-century English harpsichord music by Barrett, Blow, Clarke, Croft, Purcell and others - H. Diack Johnstone The earliest fifteenth-century transmission of English music to the continent - Margaret Bent 'Phantasy mania': Quest for a National Style - Purcell's 1694 Te Deum and Jubilate: its Successors, and its Performance History - Imitative counterpoint in mid-fifteenth-century English Mass settings - Reinhard Strohm Double cantus firmus compositions in the Eton Choirbook - Magnus Williamson Englishness in a Kyrie [Mis]attributed to Du Fay - Peter Wright Continuity, discontinuity, fragments and connections: the organ in church c.1500-1640 - John Harper 'As the Sand on the Sea Shore': Women Violinists in London's Concert Life around 1900 - Simon McVeigh The carol in Anglo-Saxon Canterbury - Luisa de Carvajal y Mendoza and music in an English Catholic house in 1605 - Owen Rees Music in Oxford, 1945-1960: The years of change - Susan Wollenberg Three Anglican Church Historians on Liturgy and Psalmody in the Ancient Synagogue and the Early Church - John Arthur Smith Histories of British Music and the Land Without Music: National Identity and the Idea of the Hero - Epilogue: John Caldwell [1938- ]: Scholar, Composer, Teacher, Musician -
£85.50
Boydell & Brewer Ltd György Ligeti: Of Foreign Lands and Strange
Book SynopsisThe combination of new insights into Ligeti by people who knew him with new analytical approaches will make this a core publication not only for Ligeti scholars, but also for readers interested in post-war music history and in Hungarian culture. Shortlisted for the RPS Music Award 2012 for Creative Communication. György Ligeti: Of Foreign Lands and Strange Sounds offers a new assessment of a composer whose constant exploration of new sound worlds- based on the musics of different cultures and ages - contributed in crucial ways to making him one of the most important musical voices of the last 50 years. The book combines texts by former students, colleagues and friends, who reflect on different and so far unknown aspects of Ligeti's persona, with new musicological interpretations of his style and several of his main works. Among the contributors are some of the most eminent Ligeti scholars, including Richard Steinitz and Paul Griffiths. Louise Duchesneau, Ligeti's assistant of over 20 years, acts not only as contributor but also as co-editor of the volume. Many of the musicological chapters are based on studies of Ligeti's sketches, which are now housed by the Paul Sacher Foundation in Basle and were made available for research only recently. Two close collaborators representing disciplines which deeply interested Ligeti - Heinz-Otto Peitgen (a mathematician who introduced Ligeti to fractal geometry, which influenced many if his works since 1985) and Simha Arom (an ethnomusicologist who acquainted Ligeti with the complex rhythmic patters of the music of Sub-saharan Africa) - also reflect on the composer for the very first time in writing. The combination of new insights into Ligeti by people who knew him with new analytical approaches will make this a core publication not only for Ligeti scholars, but also for readers interested in music of the second half of the twentieth century and in Hungarian culture. WOLFGANG MARX is Lecturer in Music, University College Dublin. LOUISE DUCHESNEAU was Ligeti's assistant for 20 years Contributors: SIMHA AROM, JONATHAN W. BERNARD, CIARÁN CRILLY, LOUISE DUCHESNEAU, BENJAMIN DWYER, TIBORC FAZEKAS, PAUL GRIFFITHS, ILDIKÓ MÁNDI-FAZEKAS, WOLFGANG MARX, HEINZ-OTTO PEITGEN, FRIEDEMANN SALLIS, WOLFGANG-ANDREAS SCHULTZ, MANFRED STAHNKE, RICHARD STEINITZTrade ReviewSpiced with thoughtful, at times even poetic, observations ... An important bonus of the book is the numerous photographs by Ines Gellrich, some of which capture Ligeti's face in his most private moments. One must also praise the care of the editors, since the orthography of the numerous Hungarian terms is as good as flawless. * FONTES ARTIS MUSICAE, December 2013 *A fine-grained, nuanced portrait of Ligeti and his music that will continue to enrich scholarly and popular interest. * JOURNAL OF MUSICOLOGICAL RESEARCH *[U]nverzichtbar[e] Lektüre für denjenigen, der sich intensiver mit György Ligeti und seiner Musik befassen möchte. * DIE TONKUNST *[W]ill surely set a new standard for scholarly work on Ligeti for years to come. The wealth of information and the breadth of historical and theoretical approaches makes this an indispensable volume for anyone interested in this great composer and his music. * MLA NOTES *Given the closeness between the authors and Ligeti, reading the musical descriptions gives much knowledge about Ligeti the human, and about how he was as a teacher, student, or friend. [...] This book is a must to those who want to get to know more closely one of the most important composers of our time more closely. * KLASSISK MUSIKKMAGASIN *This book piles up its contrasting and multi-toned commentaries, with continuity and connectedness at a premium. [...] a handsomely produced volume. * MUSICAL TIMES *[E]ditorial standards are of the highest [...] the present book can be cordially recommended, fulfilling as it does the remit of a broad-based symposium while making for an absorbing read [...] what emerges from these pages is the extent to which Ligeti has remained on the forefront of European musical thinking. * GRAMOPHONE *György Ligeti is already seen as one of the major post-war composers. Of Foreign Lands and Strange Sounds is [...] lavishly produced and illustrated [...] will appeal to the general reader. * INTERNATIONAL PIANO *Of Foreign Lands and Strange Sounds is fantastically wide-ranging and yet relevant for even the lay reader. The essays in this collection - and the rich accompanying photographs, illustrations, sketches and scores - provide an excellent introduction to a formidable [...] composer. * THE PRAGUE POST *Table of ContentsIntroduction "We play with the music and the music plays with us." Sándor Veress and his student György Ligeti - Friedemann Sallis Transformational Ostinati in György Ligeti's Sonatas for Solo Cello and Solo Viola - Benjamin Dwyer Magicians of Sound - Seeking Ligeti's Inspiration in the Poetry of Sándor Weöres - Ildikó Mándi-Fazekas and Tiborc Fazekas "Make Room for the Grand Macabre!" The Concept of Death in György Ligeti's Oeuvre - Continuum, Chaos and Metronomes - A Fractal Friendship - Heinz-Otto Peitgen A Kinship Foreseen: Ligeti and African Music. Simha Arom in Conversation - Simha Arom "Play it like Bill Evans": György Ligeti and Recorded Music - Louise Duchesneau Rules and Regulation: Lessons from Ligeti's Compositional Sketches - Jonathan W. Bernard À qui un hommage? The Genesis of the Piano Concerto and Horn Trio - Richard Steinitz Craft and Aesthetics - The Teacher György Ligeti - Wolfgang-Andreas Schultz The Hamburg Composition Class - Manfred Stahnke The Bigger Picture: Ligeti's Music and the Films of Stanley Kubrick - Ciarán Crilly Invented Homelands: Ligeti's Orchestras - Paul Griffiths
£44.99
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Out of Silence: A Pianist's Yearbook
Book SynopsisThe author of Beyond the Notes demonstrates how a working musician draws energy from the events of daily life, and sometimes seeks a refuge from them in music. Out of Silence is a diary of a year in Susan Tomes's life as a performer. Taking as its inspiration Schumann's remark that 'I am affected by everything that goes on in the world, and I think it all over in my own way', it aims to show how a working musician mulls over and draws energy from the events of everyday life. We follow this internationally renowned pianist as she prepares for concerts and performs, both as a soloist and as part of a chamber ensemble; we experience the highs and lows of practising and the challenges of live performance, we see her planning masterclasses and interacting with both musicians and audiences. She casts her mind back to her childhood - practicing before school on cold Edinburgh mornings, playing 'Danny Boy' for a relative - and reflects on paintings, dance, books, sport and gardening. 'A delight and a revelation...She writes with Schubertian intimacy, modesty and grace,' said the Independent of her first book, Beyond the Notes. Here Susan Tomes strives to unlock the secrets of great music and to understand its place in the wider world. SUSAN TOMES has won a number of awards for her recordings of chamber music. For fifteen years she was the pianist of Domus, and for another fifteen she has been the pianist of the Florestan Trio, one of the world's leading piano trios. She is the author of Beyond the Notes and A Musician's Alphabet. She writes occasionally for the Guardian and on a blog on her own website, www.susantomes.com.Trade ReviewThe Japanese translation of Out of Silence has been chosen as one of the best books of 2012 by Chopin magazine, Japan. * . *With a sure literary touch, that outstanding pianist and educator Susan Tomes [takes] us inside the world of the over-worked, under-valued classical player in 'Out of Silence'. I wish idiots who bleat about the 'elitism' of the classical tradition could at least pick up this generous, friendly, revealing diary of a year's hard slog. THE INDEPENDENT, Best Books for Christmas 2010 feature * THE INDEPENDENT, Best Books for Christmas 2010 feature *A distinguished performer who writes with penetration, fluency and charm...Tomes has the unique gift of answering questions about the musical life that every other literary register seems to overlook. A supreme chamber performer, she writes with all the qualities of her chosen field: intimate, exact, conversational; a style of mutual respect...Open this insightful and delightful book on any page, and learn with pleasure. * INDEPENDENT *Susan Tomes has contributed two remarkably probing books, Beyond the Notes and Out of Silence, to the literature [of performers writing about their craft]. -- Simon Callow * GUARDIAN *There have been books about the experience of playing...but none by so naturally gifted a writer as Tomes...[who] has a particular understanding of humanity rare in writing about music. * TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT *Packed full of fascinating material reflecting upon the difficult and sometimes intangible issues that face a busy professional pianist...what emerges from these pages is Tomes's strong sense of humility, her quirky humour, and above all her tremendous love and driving enthusiasm for her work...a compelling read. * BBC MUSIC *Tomes joins that small band of musicians whose literary skill runs parallel to their musical talent...[she] extracts on almost every page a life lesson for the rest of us, whether or not we are musicians. * CLASSIC FM MAGAZINE *This is an essentially practical volume that encapsulates what it is to be a jobbing professional who is sensitive to the interconnectivity of the world at large...by the end, I felt I not only knew more about the author, but also about myself. Highly recommended. * INTERNATIONAL PIANO *For a parent with a musically gifted child the collection is essential reading. * OLDIE *
£27.00
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Life After Death: The Viola da Gamba in Britain
Book SynopsisNew research throws light on the history of the viol after Purcell, including its revival in the late eighteenth century through Charles Frederick Abel. It is normally thought that the bass viol or viola da gamba dropped out of British musical life in the 1690s, and that Henry Purcell was the last composer to write for it. Peter Holman shows how the gamba changed its role and function in the Restoration period under the influence of foreign music and musicians; how it was played and composed for by the circle of immigrant musicians around Handel; how it was part of the fashion for exotic instruments in themiddle of the century; and how the presence in London of its greatest eighteenth-century exponent, Charles Frederick Abel, sparked off a revival in the 1760s and 70s. Later chapters investigate the gamba's role as an emblem of sensibility among aristocrats, artists, and intellectuals, including the Countess of Pembroke, Sir Edward Walpole, Ann Ford, Laurence Sterne, Thomas Gainsborough and Benjamin Franklin, and trace Abel's influence and legacy far into the nineteenth century. A concluding chapter is concerned with its role in the developing early music movement, culminating with Arnold Dolmetsch's first London concerts with old instruments in 1890. PETER HOLMAN is Professor of Historical Musicology at Leeds University, and director of The Parley of Instruments, the choir Psalmody, and the Suffolk Villages Festival.Trade Review[O]utstanding research [...] a valuable reference book that I will no doubt consult again and again. * EIGHTEENTH CENTURY MUSIC *[A] fascinating study that has significantly enlightened the dark ages of a much loved instrument. * MUSIC & LETTERS *[Eine] spannenede und extreme informative Abhandlung. * VIOLA DA GAMBA *This is a book not only for those interested in the viola da gamba but also in musical social history in Britain from the 17th to the end of the 19th century. It is rich in scholarly detail and is entertaining to read. * STRINGENDO *[B]eautifully presented and Holman's lucid and elegant prose is a joy to read. [...] This is a book suitable for players and scholars alike, which makes a valuable contribution to our understanding of the viol; I recommend it wholeheartedly. * EARLY MUSIC *[This] volume draws on a truly vast range of documentation [...] and is written in an unpretentious, descriptive prose [...] the coverage is impressive and its result will be of use in many connections: indeed a reference work. * MUSICAL TIMES *There are so many new insights into the life of the viol in this book [...] that the reader is put on a steep learning curve and sent on a truly fascinating journey through the centuries. [...] it can easily be used as a reference book by delving into the sub-chapters or consulting the very comprehensive index, or be read like an exciting novel. * THE CONSORT *No one better could have written this book, which is superb. [...] Applying to the task his extensive research, close acquaintance with the instruments and their music, stellar command of the literature, and lively narrative, Holman demonstrates the extent to which viol playing in Britain survived. * CHOICE *Holman has the knack of finding interesting information and writing interestingly about it. [...] It is a book to dip into. * EARLY MUSIC REVIEW *Table of ContentsIntroduction 'Musitians on the Viol de Gamba': Professional Players in Restoration England 'The Noble Bass Viol': Amateur Players around 1700 'Per la Viola da Gamba': Immigrants in Early Eighteenth-Century London 'Awake my Cetra, Harp and Lute': John Frederick Hintz and the Cult of Exotic Instruments 'A Solo on the Viola da Gamba': Charles Frederick Abel as a Performer 'Composed to the Soul': Abel's Viola da Gamba Music 'The Heart of Sensibility': Writers, Artists and Aristocrats 'The Art of Playing it has never Died Out in this Country': Abel's Competitors, Followers and Successors 'Performed upon the Original Instruments for which it was Written': the Viola da Gamba and the Early Music Revival
£105.31
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Carl Nielsen and the Idea of Modernism
Book SynopsisA critical re-evaluation of the music of Carl Nielsen which examines its context and relationship to musical modernism. Carl Nielsen (1865-1931) is one of the most playful, life-affirming and awkward voices in twentieth-century music. His work resists easy stylistic categorisation or containment, yet its melodic richness and harmonic vitality are immediately appealing and engaging. Nielsen's symphonies, concertos and operas are an increasingly prominent feature of the international repertoire, and his songs remain perennially popular at home in Denmark. But his work has only rarely attracted sustained critical attention within the scholarly community; he remains arguably the most underrated composer of his international generation. This book offers a critical re-evaluation of Carl Nielsen's music and his rich literary and artistic contexts. Drawing extensively on contemporary writing and criticism, as well as the research of the newly completed Carl Nielsen Edition, the book presents a series of case studies centred on key works in Carl Nielsen's output, particularly his comic opera Maskarade, the Third Symphony (Sinfonia Espansiva), and his final symphony, the Sinfonia Semplice. Topics covered include his relationship with symbolism and fin-de-siècle decadence, vitalism, counterpoint, and the Danish landscape. Running throughout the book is a critical engagement with the idea of musical modernism - a term which, for Nielsen, was fraught withanxiety and yet provided a constant creative stimulus. DANIEL M. GRIMLEY holds a University Lectureship in Music at Oxford, and is the Tutorial Fellow in Music at Merton College and Lecturer in Music, Landscape at University College. His previous books include Grieg: Music, Landscape and Norwegian Identity (Boydell, 2006) and the Cambridge Companion to Sibelius (Cambridge University Press, 2004).Trade ReviewOne closes Carl Nielsen and the Idea of Modernism grateful for what one has learned [...] and resonating with a striking impression that will not go away. That impression is, to put it in Grimley's terms, simply one of breakthrough. [...] opens the door into understanding, at least in part, how the Danish Nielsen is different in kind from his kindred 'senior' modernists, in Finland, Norway, and England. * TWENTIETH CENTURY MUSIC *This well written book offers a broad critical summary of his work through detailed analysis of his musical language. * STRINGENDO *[T]he act of airbrushing Nielsen out of musical history has been reversed in uplifting detail: [the] new study from Nordic music scholar Daniel Grimley recasts Nielsen as a visionary - a vital precursor to modernism and a central protagonist in the playground scrap that was 20th-century music. -- Andrew Mellor * GROMOPHONE *Nielsen fans will find plenty to feast on. -- Philip Clark * GRAMOPHONE *In brief, the result is highly recommendable. Grimley is extremely well read in cultural, literary, and art history, in music theory and music aesthetics of Nielsen's and later times as well as in music history, be it of Scandinavia, United Kingdom, Germany, or France. Thus his readings are very convincing, in analytical detail as well as in the contexts of Danish and European cultural life. A Danish translation should be mandatory. * DANISH YEARBOOK OF MUSICOLOGY *Grimley has given us provocative and stimulating new guidelines for understanding Nielsen, not as a marginal figure, but as one very much a part of a cultural generation deeply involved in aesthetic change and renewal. * AMERICAN RECORD GUIDE *The book presents some fascinating source material that will interest anyone [...] who believes Nielsen to be one of the truly distinctive geniuses of latter-day symphonic writing. * CLASSICAL MUSIC *Table of ContentsPreface Introduction. Carl Nielsen at the Edge Thresholds Hellenics Energetics Funen Dreams Counterpoints Cosmic Variations Conclusion
£71.25
Boydell & Brewer Ltd The Vienna Don Giovanni
Book SynopsisAspects of Don Giovanni's compositional history are uncovered and the study provides for detailed evidence with which to evaluate Da Ponte's recollections. The essential truth of his account - that the revision of the operain Vienna was an interactive process - seems to be fully borne out. A general theory of transmission is proposed, which clarifies the relationship between the fluid text produced by re-creation and the static text generated by replication.Trade Review[A] serious, thoughtful, and thought-provoking study. * NOTES *Woodfields Buch ist eine akribische, fundierte philologische Studie, die jüngste Erkenntnisse der Opernforschung in ihre Betrachtungen einbezieht [...] Eine überaus anregende Lektüre für jeden, der sich mit der Opernpraxis des 18. Jahrhunderts beschäftigt. * DIE MUSIKFORSCHUNG *Following up his fascinating study of the compositional history of Così Fan Tutte, musicologist Ian Woodfield turns his meticulous investigation skills to Don Giovanni in an effort to unravel the process of revision between the opera's 1787 Prague premiere and performances in Vienna in 1788. * OPERA NEWS *Woodsfield's admirable analysis equips the musical director to make [a choice of versions] in full possession of such facts as are currently known. * MUSICAL TIMES *Professor Woodfield's scholarship is immaculate, his conclusions are well supported, and his theories about one of the most famously debated of Mozart's operas make exciting musical reading. * MIDWEST BOOK REVIEW *Ian Woodfield has carefully examined a variety of manuscripts of Mozart's 'Don Giovanni' opera, and, on a technical level - as a detective that knows how to sort out fingerprints - makes intelligent, reasoned choices as to the probable sequence of events in Mozart's composition of some parts of the opera. And there are delightful details that are strewn throughout such an investigation. * THE SCHILLER INSTITUTE *Table of ContentsCasts of the First Performances and Introduction The Prague Don Giovanni A possible cut Prague musical fingerprints Errors The Vienna Don Giovanni The Graz score The Court Theatre score (OA361/1) The Court Theatre parts (OA361/Stimmen) Later copies deriving from the Court Theatre score The Lausch and Julliard scores The casting of the Vienna Don Giovanni The full version (Vienna 1) An intermediate version? The final versions Vienna 2a and Vienna 2b Da Ponte's story The late eighteenth-century dissemination of Don Giovanni Guardasoni's performances of Don Giovanni in 1788 and 1789 The reception of the Vienna Music in 1790s Prague The 1798 Vienna revival The autograph of Don Giovanni after Mozart's death The Breitkopf & Härtel full score Later manuscripts based on the published score Conclusion
£71.25
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Juan Esquivel: A Master of Sacred Music during
Book SynopsisFirst study of Juan Esquivel, a highly significant figure in Spanish musical life in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. Juan Esquivel was a cathedral choirmaster and composer, active in Spain during the period c.1580-c .1623 in which all aspects of the arts flourished, and one of the few peninsular composers of his generation to see his works published. He is known to have produced three large volumes of sacred polyphony - masses, motets, hymns, psalms, magnificats, and Marian antiphons - under the titles Liber primus missarum, Motecta festorum([both published 1608)and Tomus secondus, psalmorum, hymnorum... et missarum (published 1613); they reveal him to be a highly skilled craftsman. This first full-length study of his life and works presents a critical assessment of the man and his music, setting him within the social and religious context of the so-called Counter-Reformation. Beginning by outlining the facts of his life, the book goes on to offer an analysis and assessment of his output. Clive Walkley was until his retirement a lecturer in music and music education at Lancaster University.Trade ReviewWalkley's book is a valuable amplification of the meagre biographical scholarship available [...], and is well documented and engagingly written. * EARLY MUSIC *[T]his is a book designed to promote interest in and widen knowledge of Spanish renaissance music in general and Juan Esquivel Barahona in particular. [...] a useful addition to the reference shelves. * THE CONSORT *[Der Autor hat] einer der wichtigsten Mittlerfiguren der spanischen, traditionsschweren Spätrenaissance endlich den gebührenden Platz im Kreise seiner Kollegen eingeräumt [...]. * DIE TONKUNST *Table of ContentsPreface Cathedral Music in Spain in the time of the Counter-Reformation Biographical details Source materials The masses of 1608 The motets of 1608 The Tomus secundus of 1613 Conclusions Appendix: Modern editions of music by Esquivel Bibliography
£76.00
Boydell & Brewer Ltd New Aldeburgh Anthology
Book SynopsisA book for those drawn back to Aldeburgh year after year for the music, writing and arts - and to all who care for the landscape, the sea and the ongoing life of the Suffolk Coast. The New Aldeburgh Anthology takes its inspiration from Ronald Blythe's classic Aldeburgh Anthology of 1972, which summoned the spirit of Aldeburgh and the Suffolk coast in words and images that resonate still, and has proved enduringly popular. This new volume brings the story up to date and distils the very essence of the place just at the point when its identity might seem diluted by the accelerating pace of change. It speaks for and to thepresent generation, combining young voices with old, those of writers and musicians with poets and artists, of historians with naturalists, architects and ecologists, and local people. Britten and Pears' Aldeburgh Festivallies at the heart of the enterprise. Much has changed, but the Festival still owes its unique appeal and character to the remarkable history and the inspiration of its founders, as well as their strong sense of place. Their legacy is re-examined by musicians such as Ian Bostridge, Steven Isserlis and Roger Vignoles, and music writers James Fenton, Paul Kildea, Peter Dickinson and Rupert Christiansen. Aldeburgh and the east coast of Suffolk is about so much more than music, however: the poets Andrew Motion, Blake Morrison, Kevin Crossley-Holland and Lavinia Greenlaw and other writers as diverse as Craig Brown and Wilkie Collins have all been inspired by its bright yet haunting atmosphere, Maggi Hambling and Alison Wilding are sculptors who have left their mark on the landscape, while artists as varied as Sidney Nolan and John Piper, Arthur Boyd and Louise Wilson have all derived rich inspiration from it. The very landscape and ecology of east Suffolk is on the move, too, the coastline responding to the vagaries of climate change, the traditional ways of life, of farming and of fishing giving way to new. George Ewart Evans, W.G. Sebald and Richard Mabey are among those who respond to the power of the landscape, others to the spell of the sea, and the life that has evolved around both is evoked in words and images, some of them startling in their intensity. Amongst the many contributions, the new Anthology contains some of the classic articles from the original, including writings by WH Auden, George Crabbe, Eric Crozier, Imogen Holst, Norman Scarfe and of courseRonald Blythe himself. Published in association with Aldeburgh Music.Trade ReviewThe felicities of this anthology are many, with many a precious insight into their subjects. There is charm, wit, melancholy scientific inquiry, musical and psychological interpretation. [...] Even its presentation - the look and feel of the book - is impressive. I cannot praise it enough. * AMERICAN RECORD GUIDE *A magisterial companion to the festival and its setting. [...] More than 375 splendid pages confirm how much the annual festival of arts and music owes to the landscape and the sea and to the history of local creativity. * EASTERN DAILY PRESS *A fascinating dip-in read and a source book for those wishing to trace the cultural history of the festival. * RA (Royal Academy of Arts Magazine) *[A] handsome and valuable volume...The long-term survival and eventual rejuvenation of Aldeburgh as a musical nerve centre post-Britten has...been a triumph of creativity over adversity and this anthology gradually and magically tells exactly how and why. * GRAMOPHONE *Highly enjoyable reading... * EASTERN DAILY PRESS *Table of ContentsForeword Introduction Glitter of Waves The Borough Aldeburgh Rooted Here Brief Lives He Who Loves Beauty Britten and Pears Golly! What a Party! The Aldeburgh Festival and its Legacy Where Have You Come From? Visitors Water Married to Stone Human Landscape Beneath the Dazzling Sky Land, Marsh & Water Appendices Notes on Contributors
£24.99
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Music at German Courts, 1715-1760: Changing
Book SynopsisMusic at German Courts serves to illustrate the extraordinary diversity of eighteenth-century German court music establishments without losing sight of what these Kapellen had in common. What was musical life at German courts really like during the eighteenth century? Were musical ensembles as diverse as the Holy Roman Empire's kaleidoscopic political landscape? Through a series of individual case studies contributed by leading scholars from Germany, Poland, the United States, Canada, and Australia, this book investigates the realities of musical life at fifteen German courts of varied size (ranging from kingdoms to principalities), religious denomination, and geographical location. Significant shifts that occurred in the artistic priorities of each court are presented through a series of "snapshots"- in effect "core sample" years - which highlight both individualand shared patterns of development and decline. What emerges from the wealth of primary source material examined in this volume is an in-depth picture of music-making within the daily life of individual courts, featuring acast of music directors, instrumentalists, and vocalists, together with numerous support staff drawn from across Europe. Music at German Courts serves to illustrate the extraordinary diversity of eighteenth-century German court music establishments without losing sight of what these Kapellen had in common. SAMANTHA OWENS is Senior Lecturer in Musicology at the University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia. BARBARA M. REUL is Associate Professor of Musicology at Luther College, University of Regina, Canada. JANICE B. STOCKIGT is a Principal Fellow of the University of Melbourne, Australia. Contributors: DIETER KIRSCH, URSULA KRAMER, MICHAEL MAUL, MARY OLESKIEWICZ, SAMANTHA OWENS, RASHID-S. PEGAH, BÄRBEL PELKER, BARBARA M. REUL, WOLFGANG RUF, BERT SIEGMUND, JANICE B. STOCKIGT, MICHAEL TALBOT, RÜDIGER THOMSEN-FÜRST, ALINA ZORAWSKA-WITKOWSKA, STEVEN ZOHNTrade ReviewUltimately, this book is to be highly recommended: it will make a valuable and indispensable addition to the libraries of both scholars of eighteenth-century music and those from other disciplines who want to expand their knowledge of the role of music [...] in the self-fashioning and sustenance of European monarchic structures. * NOTES *This book is one of the most important contributions to our understanding of the context of the music most familiar to musicians and concert-goers today. [...] The editors have gathered an expert team; their own contributions are paradigms of accessibility. I commend this important book to every serious musician's book shelf. * STRINGENDO *The editors of this volume are [...] to be congratulated on assembling a systematically organized collection of essays by an impressive international panel of scholars, each of whom is an expert on a particular court and its archival sources. [...] It includes much new and occasionally surprising information, and a substantial amount of material made available in English for the first time. * MUSICOLOGY AUSTRALIA *The detail presented in this book is remarkable [...] a useful book which extends our knowledge of courtly music-making in Germany during this time, and it will undoubtedly be of value to scholars of the period. * THE CONSORT *[A] valuable resource for any historical musicologist investigating this extraordinarily productive and fascinating period of German music history, and I hope it encourages and enables more research in this area, and ultimately more performances of its many forgotten treasures. * CONTEXT *[T]he treasures in [the book's] 500 pages will satisfy a whole range of other music historical interests for years to come. The personnel lists, mini biographies and sheer number of name references to rulers and the musicians in their employ are invaluable. * MUSICAL TIMES *[A] fascinating picture emerges of the birth and nurture of a rich musical tradition which continues today in democratic form with the unequalled wealth of German musical performance in virtually every German town. * CLASSICAL MUSIC *[T]his valuable book provides a reliable source of information for anyone interested in 18th-century music in Germany. [...] there is an abundance of knowledge here from which everyone can draw. * EARLY MUSIC REVIEW *Table of ContentsForeword by Michael Talbot 'Das gantze Corpus derer...musicirenden Personen': An Introduction to German Hofkapellen - 'Das gantze Corpus derer...musicirenden Personen': An Introduction to German Hofkapellen - Barbara Reul The Court of Saxony-Dresden - Janice Stockigt The Saxon Court of the Kingdom of Poland - Alina Zorawska-Witkowska The Court of Brandenburg-Prussia - Mary Oleskiewicz The Palatine Court in Mannheim - Bärbel Pelker The Court of Württemberg-Stuttgart - The Court of Saxony-Gotha-Altenburg - Bert Siegmund The Courts of Saxony-Weissenfels, Saxony-Merseburg and Saxony-Zeitz - Wolfgang Ruf The Court of Anhalt-Zerbst - Barbara Reul The Court of Sondershausen - Michael Maul The Court of Würzburg - Dieter Kirsch The Court of Hesse-Darmstadt - Ursula Kramer The Court of Baden-Durlach in Karlsruhe - Rüdiger Thomsen-Fürst The Court of Brandenburg-Culmbach-Bayreuth - Rashid-S Pegah 'Die vornehmste Hof-Tugend': German Musicians' Reflections on Eighteenth-Century Court Life -
£105.31
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Imogen Holst: A Life in Music: Revised Edition
Book SynopsisThis paperback edition is updated to include new insights into Holst's life and work resulting from the discovery of important unseen archival materials. Imogen Holst was one of the most wide-ranging and highly regarded of musicians. Popular with all who knew her, she was intensively protective of her inner life, reminding one friend of a 'locked door of which she had thrown away the key'. Imogen Holst: A Life in Music uses a wealth of newly discovered material to explore the complexities and contradictions of her life and career, drawing on her own writings - ranging from heartfelt early poetry, through correspondence, to a series of journals that maintain a colourful record of her travels and achievements. Most revealing of these is the daily journal that she kept at the start of her working association with Britten, adocument that provides a unique insight both into her own thoughts, and into the professional and domestic life of a major composer. Extensively revised with new material, the book also includes a study of Imogen Holst's music and a chronological list of her works, revealing her as a composer of tremendous talent, whose music deserves to be much more familiar. CHRISTOPHER GROGAN is Director of Collections and Heritage at the Britten-Pears Foundation.Trade ReviewThis magnificent centenary volume...(miraculously edited to her own high standards)...documents a lifetime's pioneering achievement...A compelling portrait emerges of a single minded and uniquely talented woman. -- Geraint Lewis * GRAMOPHONE *An encounter with a true original...Grogan has put together an excellent critical biography. * TLS *This book - available at a remarkably reasonable price given the quality of its production...is a wonderful centenary tribute to a fascinating and often underappreciated figure. * BRITISH MUSIC SOCIETY NEWS *Excellently written...a successful, lively portrait of an important personality in C20th British musical life. * DIE MUSIKFORSCHUNG *Table of ContentsForeword 'She do favour 'er Pa': Infancy and early schooldays, 1907-20 'Corn-coloured pigtails and very blue eyes': St Paul's Girls' School, 1921-6 'To be best when all are good': The Royal College of Music, 1926-30 'Wandering about Europe', 1930-31 'Life is not going to be too easy for you': London and elsewhere, 1931-8 'A present from the Government': Travelling with CEMA, 1939-42 'A wonderful opportunity': Dartington, 1942-50 'She is quite brilliant': India to Aldeburgh, 1950-52 'The excitement of working with Ben': an introduction to the Aldeburgh Diary Aldeburgh Diary, September 1952-March 1954 'The thing that one wants to do most in the whole world', 1955-64 'The joy of learning about Holst via Britten', 1964-76 'Old age - Protest against disintegration - Gradual calming down - Acceptance', 1977-84 'A real composer': an introduction to Imogen Holst's musical style Chronological list of works
£26.99
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Gerald Finzi: His Life and Music
Book SynopsisCritically acclaimed biography of one of England's best loved composers, with a full discussion and evaluation of his works. Gerald Finzi is one of the best-known modern English composers. While he is especially famous as a song-writer, for his sensitive settings of poets such as Hardy and Wordsworth, he also wrote in other genres; notable works includethe exquisite cantata Dies Natalis, and his cello concerto. He also exerted a major influence in the musical world as a whole, championing the neglected Ivor Gurney and reviving eighteenth-century composers with the amateur orchestra he founded. In this lively and sensitive study of his life and works, Diana McVeagh, the renowned Elgar and Finzi scholar, has made use of interviews with the main figures in his life, correspondence with contemporaries such as Vaughan Williams, Edmund Blunden, Arthur Bliss, Edmund Rubbra, Howard Ferguson and Herbert Howells, and her access to previously unpublished material in the form of his widow, Joy's, unpublished journal. The Finzithat emerges is a multi-faceted and complex character. The author shows how he developed from a solitary, introverted youth into a man with strong views and a myriad of interests: everything from education, pacifism, vegetarianism, to the Arts and Crafts movement, the English pastoral tradition, English apple varieties, and the significance of ancestry, friendship and marriage in an artist's life. She also discusses every work within the narrative of Finzi's life, and shows what makes his output so outstanding. Diana McVeagh is the author of the highly acclaimed Elgar the Music Maker [2007]; of the entries on Elgar and Finzi for The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians [1980, 2001]; and of the Finzi entry in The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography [2004].Trade Review[T]he author's style is very easy indeed, informal and communicative. * RALPH VAUGHAN WILLIAMS SOCIETY JOURNAL *The book is very well researched and immensely informative. [...] From reading this particular biography, there is also the wish to read more by Diana McVeagh. * THE ELGAR SOCIETY JOURNAL *McVeagh's analyses unfailingly draw the reader's attention to the melodic and harmonic subtleties of Finzi's writing. At her best, as in a beautiful passage on Finzi and Hardy, she sings with a lyricism that matches Finzi's own. This book comes as a timely reminder that there should be a place for the finely wrought music of a minor master. -- Richard Lawrence * TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT *This has been long in preparation, but the wait has been worthwhile. Lucky the composer who finds so fair-minded, candid and scrupulous a biographer and one who writes so well...[McVeagh's] analyses achieve the rare distinction of being both illuminating and readable. This is one of the best-written books about a musician to appear for many years. -- Michael Kennedy * BBC MUSIC MAGAZINE *McVeagh surely loves Finzi's music and it shows. However her devotion is clear-eyed and her writing completely avoids the sort of pastoral hagiography that Finzi scholarship can easily collapse into. The book is self-recommending but that does not stop me recommending it. - * CLASSICAL MUSIC ON THE WEB *[This] is unquestionably destined to be the standard biography of Gerald Finzi. - -- Rolf Jordan * RALPH VAUGHAN WILLIAMS SOCIETY JOURNAL *[Now] we have McVeagh at last, so good and so well written that those who already possess...other books must have it, not only to complement them but for the sheer pleasure afforded by such a winning combination of scholarship, insight and clear-eyed humanity.. their belief will be reinforced and intensified by Miss McVeagh's candour and her remarkable achievement in writing not only a good biography but in re-creating the atmosphere of English musical life in the half-century of Finzi's life. * FINZI NEWSLETTER *With clear-eyed affection for her subject, McVeagh relates Finzi's poignant history with clarity of design that does not preclude empathy, and never allows herself the luxury of letting him off lightly over either musical or personal foibles...[a] lovely, warm and elegiac book. -- Byron Adams * MUSIC & LETTERS *
£17.99
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Essays on Renaissance Music in Honour of David
Book SynopsisNew articles on du Fay and Desprez, on sacred and secular music, and reception history, form a fitting tribute to one of the field's foremost scholars. This volume celebrates the work of David Fallows, one of the most influential scholars in the field of medieval and Renaissance music. It draws together articles by scholars from around the world, focusing on key topics to which Fallows has contributed significantly: the life and works of Guillaume Du Fay and of Josquin Desprez, archival studies and biography, sacred and secular music of the late mediaeval and Renaissance period, and reception history. Studies include major archival discoveries concerning the identity of the composer Fremin Caron; a reconsideration of the authorship of works within the Josquin canon, notably Mille regretz and Absalon fili mi; a freshlook at key works from Du Fay's youth and early maturity; accounts of newly discovered sources and works; and an appraisal of David Fallows' contribution to the early music performance movement by Christopher Page, former directorof Gothic Voices. The collection also includes two newly published compositions dedicated to the honorand. Fabrice Fitch teaches at the Royal Northern College of Music; Jacobijn Kiel is an independent scholar. Contributors: Rob C. Wegman, Jane Alden, Bonnie J. Blackburn, Honey Meconi, Gianluca D'Agostino, Andrew Kirkman, Jaap van Benthem, Margaret Bent, James Haar, Alenjandro Enrique Planchart, Jesse Rodin, Lorenz Welker, Kinuho Endo, Joshua Rifkin, Thomas Schmidt-Beste, Richard Sherr, Peter Wright, Fabrice Fitch, Tess Knighton, Warwick Edwards, Adam Knight Gilbert, Markus Jans, Oliver Neighbour, Anthony Rooley, Keith Polk, John Milsom, Jeffrey J. Dean, EricJas, Peter Gülke, Iain Fenlon, Barbara Haggh, Dagmar Hoffmann-Axthelm, Leofranc Holford-Strevens, Andrea Lindmayr-Brandl, Esperanza Rodríguez-García, Eugeen Schreurs, Reinhard StrohmTrade ReviewThe book is beautifully produced, with lots of good illustrations and musical examples [...] In a sense it is a monument, not just to one scholar, but to a whole generation in which some of the finest minds dedicated themselves to the music of the fifteenth century. * MUSIC & LETTERS *[T]he volume is serious in style and content but has moments of lightness and humour [...] the articles provide new, original material and ideas on a large number of topics. [...] a labour of love. * THE CONSORT *Table of ContentsManuscript Sigla Preface - Fabrice Fitch and Jacobijn Kiel Foreword: David Fallows and the Performance of Medieval Music - Fremin le Caron at Amiens: New Documents - Rob C. Wegman Ung Petit cadet: Verbal and Visual Play in the Wolfenbüttel Chansonnier - Jane Alden A New Tenor on So ys emprentid - Bonnie Blackburn Shedding New Light [Literally] on the Rochester Fascicle: A Preliminary Report - Honey Meconi Two musical letters from Aragonese Naples - Gianluca D'Agostino Johannes Sohier dit Fede and St. Omer: a Story of Pragmatic Sanctions - Andrew Kirkman Intermedio I: Yes, We Were Young... - Jaap van Benthem Petrarch, Padua, the Malatestas, Du Fay and Vergene bella - Margaret Bent A Suggestion about Fauxbourdon - James Haar Du Fay's Plainsong Paraphrase Settings - Alejandro Planchart With a Flourish: Melismatic Writing in Du Fay's Early Songs - Jesse Rodin Portugaler: Guillaume Du Fay's contribution to instrumental music? - Lorenz Welker A Reconsideration of the Mass Cycle by Arnold de Lantins and Ciconia in Bologna Q15 - Kinuho Endo Martini and Obrecht: Some Speculations - Joshua Rifkin The Art of Cellular Counterpoint: The Motets of Petrus Wilhelmi - Thomas Schmidt-Beste What Were They Thinking? Sola caret monstris at the Papal Court - Richard Sherr A Gloria Newly Attributed to Byttering - Peter Wright Intermedio II: Agricola VIII - Fabrice Fitch A new song in a strange land? Garcimuños's Una montaña pasando - Tess Knighton Isaac's pre-Italian songs: An over-optimistic hand-list - Warwick Edwards Words and Music in the Sea of Long Waiting - Adam Knight Gilbert 'Dieu vous doinst hui en bonne estraine tout le desir de vostre coeur': Observations on Binchois' Margarite, fleur de valeur - Markus Jans Three times seven Songs by Byrd - Oliver Neighbour 'I must complain': A Comparative Study in Variant Settings - Anthony Rooley Heinrich Isaac and shifting musical perspectives, c.1485-1490 - Keith Polk 'Plaine de dueil et de melancolie': Tracing a Negative of Josquin des Prez - Jaap van Benthem Surface, Structure and 'Style' in Absalon fili mi - John Milsom Who Really Knows Who Composed Mille regretz? - Fabrice Fitch Josquin, Two Contrafacta, and the Lost Stanzas of 'Comment peult avoir joye' - Jeffrey Dean In pace in idipsum: a little-known motet attributed to Josquin - Eric Jas Intermedio III: Verspätete Monologe - Brahms' Klavierstücke op. 116, 117, 118 und 119 - Peter Gülke Confessional Companions: Herpol, Glareanus, and Friends - Matthew Laube, Reviews Editor Credit for Music in Court and City in the Low Countries, 1467-1500 - Barbara Haggh David musicus, or: On the consoling power of string music - Dagmar Hoffmann-Axthelm The Laudes Musicae in Renaissance Music Treatises - Leofranc Holford-Strevens The Role of Music in 16th Century German City Life: A close look at the iconography of Hans Sachs' and Jost Amman's Ständebuch - Andrea Lindmayr-Brandl The Perfect Spanish Chapelmaster: the Depiction of the Composer Ginés Pérez [d. 1600] in Felipe Pedrell's Hispaniae Schola Musica Sacra - Esperanza Rodríguez-Garcia The 'topstukkendecreet' in Flanders and its musical context: the case of Glareanus' Dodekachordon - Eugeen Schreurs The difference of early European music - Reinhard Strohm List of Contributors Principal publications of David Fallows
£105.31
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Thomas Beecham: An Obsession with Music
Book SynopsisNow available in paperback to coincide with the 50th anniversary of his death, this biography corrects many of the myths surrounding the often controversial Thomas Beecham. Thomas Beecham was one of Britain's greatest conductors of orchestral music and opera as well as an entrepreneur and impresario of exceptional energy and brilliant wit. This acclaimed biography places him - musically, politicallyand socially - in the troubled times in which he lived and corrects the stories and myths, many of them Beecham's own making, that have grown up around this uniquely gifted and controversial figure. Drawing upon extensive research, Lucas presents new material on his early years, his complicated private life, his father's catastrophic attempt to buy a large part of Covent Garden - which brought the family to its knees financially - and the orchestras andopera companies that Beecham founded. New light is shed on his visits to Nazi Germany and his view of its leaders, as well as the much misunderstood and previously unchronicled years of the Second World War, which he spent in Australia and America. Thomas Beecham: An Obsession with Music will remain the standard biography for years to come. JOHN LUCAS was on the staff of the Observer for 25 years, completed Peter Heyworth's monumentalbiography of Otto Klemperer, wrote Genius of Valhalla, the biography of Reginald Goodall, and is responsible for the current entries on Beecham and Klemperer in the New Grove .Trade ReviewThis book [...] is a must. * THE DELIAN *This marvellous book is very readable with many anecdotes and witty asides, much like Beecham himself. [...] Lucas's formidable amount of research is impressive [...] Reprinted in paperback for the 50th anniversary of Beecham's death, this book is excellent value for money. * STRINGENDO *This is the best biography of a musician I have read for a very long time...one which all genuine music lovers should possess. International Record Review * . *Beecham's insensitivities...have to be seen in the context of his kindnesses, which were numerous and generous. Lucas holds the two in balance, which is an asset of his enthralling book. -- Glasgow] Herald, Conrad WilsonJohn Lucas's brimming biography...reminds us just how much...we owe him. -- Sunday Times, David CairnsLucas has excelled himself: this is in every way a magnificent achievement...the wit, exuberance and professionalism of his subject come across wonderfully well. Classic FM Magazine [Book of the Month, 5 Stars] * . *Impeccably researched...Lucas is excellent on the visits to Australia and America. Spectator * . *[Beecham's] rackety private life makes for many an entertaining page in... [this] thorough study of a man who changed the face of British music for ever. -- David Mellor, Mail on SundayNot only a very good biography, it is, in the circumstances, an extraordinarily concise one. -- Richard Osborne * The Oldie *[Beecham] meets his match in his engaging and erudite biographer. Opera * . *Lucas' thorough, exhaustive and often highly amusing biography will...re-establish Beecham as one of the foremost musical personalities of the last hundred years. Classical Music * . *Remarkably thorough...A good read...and a solidly informative biography. BBC Music Magazine * . *Lucas [expands upon Beecham's international reputation] with the sort of balanced judgments and care for detail that bring fresh perspective. Financial Times * . *A quite spectacular biography. This England * . *A fully comprehensive chronicle of...an extraordinary life...in a wealth of mesmerising detail, whole swathes of which have previously been completely unknown. Classic Record Collector * . *
£22.49
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Music and Ceremony at the Court of Charles V: The
Book SynopsisShows how Charles V used music and ritual to reinforce his image and status as the most important and powerful sovereign in Europe. The presentation of Charles V as universal monarch, defender of the faith, magnanimous peacemaker, and reborn Roman Emperor became the mission of artists, poets, and chroniclers, who shaped contemporary perceptions of him and engaged in his political promotion. Music was equally essential to the making of his image, as this book shows. It reconstructs musical life at his court, by examining the compositions which emanated from it, the ordinances prescribing its rituals and ceremonies, and his prestigious chapel, which reflected his power and influence. A major contribution, offering new documentary material and bringing together the widely dispersed information on the music composed to mark the major events of Charles's life. It offers.a very useful insight into music as one of many elements that served to convey the notion of the emperor-monarch in the Renaissance. TESS KNIGHTON Mary Ferer is Associate Professor at the College of Creative Arts, West Virginia University.Trade ReviewThe strongest commendation should be given to the painstaking and thorough research that is collated and presented in this book. This results in a handy volume that is virtually exhaustive in content ... Without a doubt, this book should be in the music libraries of universities, conservatories, and specialists interested in the Renaissance. * NOTES, December 2013 *[A] valuable [...] addition to any music library. * The CONSORT *Ferer has provided a comprehensive, critical overview that collects, evaluates, and summarizes much of the secondary literature and the disparate registers, paylists, and other primary sources. She offers a clear, readable narrative that makes sense out of a wide array of data. * FONTES ARTIS MUSICAE *Table of ContentsCharles V [1500-1558]: Defender of the Faith and Universal Monarch The Genesis of the Chapel The Reconstruction of the Capilla Flamenca The Chapel Ordinances: Ritual and Repertory at the Court Music and Ceremony at the Court of Charles V Charles V as Crusader and Christian Knight The Presentation of the Emperor Appendix A: Chapel Rosters Appendix B: Chapel Statutes and Ordinances Appendix C: Selected Chapel Personnel Bibliography
£80.75
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Music and Soviet Power, 1917-1932
Book SynopsisThe book offers unprecedented access to primary sources that have been unavailable in English, or which lay unknown on archival shelves. Music and Soviet Power offers cultural history told through documents - both colourfuland representative - with an extensive commentary and annotation throughout. The October Revolution of 1917 tore the fabric of Russian musical life: institutions collapsed, and leading composers emigrated or fell into silence. But in 1932, at the outset of the "socialist realist" period, a new Stalinist music culture was emerging. Between these two dates lies a turbulent period of change which this book charts year by year. It sheds light on the vicious power struggles and ideological wars, the birth of new aesthetic credos, and the gradual increase of Party and state control over music, in the opera houses, the concert halls, the workers' clubs, and on the streets. The book not only provides a detailed and nuanced depiction of the early Soviet musical landscape, but brings it to life by giving voice to the leading actors and commentators of the day. The vibrant public discourse on music is presented through a selection of press articles, reviews and manifestos, all suppliedwith ample commentary. These myriad sources offer a new context for our understanding of Shostakovich, Prokofiev and Myaskovsky, while also showing how Western music was received in the USSR. This, however, is only half the story.The other half emerges from the private dimension of this cultural upheaval, traced through the letters, diaries and memoirs left by composers and other major players in the music world. These materials address the beliefs, motivations and actions of the Russian musical intelligentsia during the painful period of their adjustment to the changing demands of the new state. While following the twists and turns of official policies on music, the authors also offer their own explanations for the outcomes. The book offers unprecedented access to primary sources that have been unavailable in English, or which lay unknown on archival shelves. Music and Soviet Power offers cultural history told through documents - both colourful and representative - with an extensive commentary and annotation throughout. MARINA FROLOVA-WALKER is Reader in Music History at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of Clare College, Cambridge; JONATHAN WALKER, who has a PhD in Musicology, is a freelance writer, teacher and pianist.Trade Review[A] valuable source for both students and specialists of Soviet history and music. * INT'L JOURNAL OF RUSSIAN STUDIES *Frolova-Walker and Walker have done an admirable job of selecting documents that shed new light on the time period. This is an invaluable source for students of Soviet history and music, and even specialists will find much new material in the range of articles presented here. * REVOLUTIONARY RUSSIA *Highly recommended to those with a specialist or general interest in music [...] or, more broadly, in cultural politics or just politics. * JCES *[A] fascinating and invaluable book [...] It navigates an absorbing way through this difficult and complex period, and presents fresh material that should be made available beyond the confines of academic libraries and their scholars. * MUSICAL TIMES *Few will penetrate the archives as comprehensively as the authors, and the riches they have brought back will help to change and deepen our understanding of early Soviet music. * SCRSS NEWSLETTER *Frolova [sic] and Walker describe these years of relative but tightly circumscribed freedom through the great number of documents they have translated, with excellent introductions and annotations. Some of the authors of these texts are already known, but their work appears here for the first time in a Western language and shows how fiercely the battle was waged on both sides * NRC HANDELSBLAD *[T]o immerse oneself in this collection of manifestos and other cultural polemics is revealing. [...] The apparatus [...] supplies invaluable guideposts. [...] Highly recommended. * CHOICE *Enrich[es] the developing sense of how Soviet artists worked with and against the official dictates of their time, and how they responded to the incidental squabbles and long-term preoccupations with which they had to contend. * TLS *[A] subtly nuanced and painstakingly annotated account of this period unearthing a wealth of documentary information [...] The resulting narrative is extraordinarily vivid, bringing to light much significant material that alters long-established historical preconceptions. * BBC MUSIC MAGAZINE *This is an important book and one that makes compelling reading. With their careful selection and commentary, the authors have brought a level gaze to bear upon dark and difficult times in which optimism and torment seemed to alternate unpredictably. * GRAMOPHONE *Table of ContentsOctober 1917-18 Out of Chaos 1919 Depression and Fever 1920 Bureaucracy on the Rise 1921 Should I stay or should I go? 1922 Just Like the Old Days? 1923 The Birth of ASM and RAPM 1924 ASM in the Ascendant 1925 Equilibrium 1926 Guests from the West 1927 Celebrations 1928 At the Crossroads 1929 "Velikiy perelom" - "The Great Turning Point" 1930 RAPM's Glorious Year? 1931 RAPM's Fortunes Turning 1932 The Rules Change
£31.50
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Lionel Tertis: The First Great Virtuoso of the
Book SynopsisThis new biography examines the life and work of Lionel Tertis, almost solely responsible for the rise of the viola in the twentieth century. Lionel Tertis [1876-1975] stands in the company of Ysaÿe, Kreisler, Casals, Thibaud and Rubinstein as one of the greatest instrumentalists - and arguably the greatest viola player - of all time. Such composers as Arnold Bax, Holst, and Vaughan Williams all wrote significant works for him; he was a member of a number of prominent string quartets; and he was later to design and promote his own 'Tertis model' viola. He is virtually synonymous with the increasing importance of the viola as a solo and recital instrument alongside the violin and the cello. This biography, the first full-length survey of his life, tells how he rose from humble beginnings to become 'the father of themodern viola'. It explores in detail his long and distinguished career, persuading composers to write works for the viola, arranging existing works for the instrument, editing and performing the music, teaching and coaching in Great Britain, and his performances in the United States. JOHN WHITE is a prominent viola teacher and performer; in 2000 he was awarded the International Viola Society's highest award for distinguished scholarship and contributions to the viola.Trade ReviewIn this exhaustively researched and compellingly written biography John White encapsulates this noble man and artist as never before...White's achievement is to bring not only his subject fully to life but also the times in which he lived via an impressive range of articles, recollections, reviews and letters...magnificent. * BBC MUSIC MAGAZINE [Julian Haylock] *A finely woven narrative drawn from a rich array of primary sources. -- Richard Osborne * THE OLDIE *White, himself a distinguished violist, has written a highly informed and engaging biography...He offers an abundance of correspondence, articles, personal recollections and tributes; these, complemented by touching photographs, vividly bring to life Tertis's indomitable, sometimes fearsome, yet lovable character and even physical presence...This book is a must for violists and lovers of the instrument, and will interest many beyond this sphere. -- Nathaniel Vallois * THE STRAD *With a variety of endearing photographs and a useful discography...the book contains a wealth of characterful detail...many things to be grateful for. -- Benjamin Ivry * CLASSIC RECORD COLLECTOR *John White's superb full length biography...all of us with an interest in the heartland of the British musical renaissance should lose no time in getting this book. * BRITISH MUSIC SOCIETY NEWSLETTER *The detailing and readability of this magnificent book from John White, the doyen of the viola and viola literature, is remarkable...anyone with an interest in the English musical renaissance will find the pages thronged with composers from that era. A well structured, sturdy and fascinating account of a life - a crusade for the viola and its repertoire. * MUSIC WEB INTERNATIONAL *This book belongs in the library of every school of music and in the personal library of every serious violist. NEWSLETTER of the * CANADIAN VIOLA SOCIETY *Hopefully this book, easily one of the greatest ever written about a violist, will find its way into hundreds of studios and libraries...and put Lionel Tertis' fascinating life and achievements into proper perspective. * JOURNAL OF THE AMERICAN VIOLA SOCIETY *Table of ContentsThe Tertis Family Early Career The First World War Chamber Music Players American Tours Return to the Royal Academy of Music The Elgar and Walton Concertos The BBC Orchestra, Delius, Bax and Vaughan Williams A Shock Retirement The Richardson-Tertis Viola The Second World War Promoting the Tertis Model Viola Return to America and Eightieth Birthday Celebrations Second Marriage and Last Appearance TV Profile and Ninetieth Birhtday Final Years
£28.49
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Bohemian Baroque: Czech Musical Culture and
Book SynopsisExamines Czech musical culture c. 1600-1750 and the society that created and shaped it Traditional polemical histories of Bohemia and Moravia identify the period from the early seventeenth to the mid-eighteenth century as a "period of darkness" - particularly in terms of Czech-language culture. This book challengesthat interpretation from the perspective of musical culture and demonstrates that this was actually a vibrant, productive and innovative period, both for music in the Czech language and instrumental music. By focussing on the distinctive nature of Czech-language education and devotional traditions (rehabilitated along Catholic lines after the Thirty Years War), the book reveals a new understanding of Czech musical practices and repertoires as a beguiling blend of the older, non-conformist, vernacular traditions with the new, theatrical, Italian styles and genres. Drawing on a broad range of genres including sonatas, concertos, oratorios, Passion music, masses, motets, litanies andoperas, Bohemian Baroque reveals a fascinating culture and repertoire that have long been overlooked. In the Czech lands, seventeenth-century courtly life emerged in a much different way from many other European countries. Bohemian Baroque underscores the prominent role of rural life in shaping musical culture more broadly in Bohemia and Moravia and consequently draws attention to the works and environments of composers whose careers were primarily in the Czech lands (in contrast to the traditional focus on more famous émigré composers). The book also considers the influence of Germanic traditions on Czech musical culture; several areas of overlap reveal newly identified examples of shared repertoires-in some cases, German and Czech even appear within a single work. Taken as a whole, Bohemian Baroque posits a new paradigm in which received notions of "Czechness" in the musical culture of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries might be reconsidered. Bohemian Baroque will be required reading for anyone interested in the music of the Habsburg Empire and Central Europe, cultural history, or baroque music more generally. Students and scholars of musical style and music and identity will equally find much of interest here. Robert G. Rawson is Reader in Musicology and Performance at Canterbury Christ Church University.Trade Review[P]rovides a detailed and thorough study of music of the Bohemian Baroque. Rawson's understanding of the complex, blended culture of the time and place is noteworthy and provides an ideal backdrop for the discussion of the musical practices and repertoire. * SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY MUSIC *Unique and engaging. * SLAVIC AND EAST EUROPEAN JOURNAL *Bohemian Baroque emphasizes the vibrant networks of Baroque music-making, uncovers long-forgotten connections, and forges scholarly dialogue in twenty-first-century Europe. * MUSIC & LETTERS *Rawson's book is an extremely valuable and timely reassessment of a musical (and literary) culture that has languished in obscurity ... The musical culture of the Bohemian baroque has finally received the scholarly attention it deserves. * SLAVIC REVIEW *An admirably sensitive appraisal of a musical culture that has for too long remained in the dark while opening up numerous avenues for further research. * EARLY MUSIC *Rawson has mastered the Czech language ... Fascinating ... Rawson is a skilful guide. * MUSICAL TIMES *It fills a unique niche that has to date been unoccupied on the shelves of our music libraries, and paves the way for the search for Czech music at a more fundamental level. * THE CONSORT *Table of ContentsIntroduction National Narratives and Identities Cultural and Musical Idioms of Town and Country Devotional Practices and the Culture of Conversion 'Thither From the Country'-Village Life and Education Christmas Pastorellas 'Melancholy Ditties about Dirt and Disorder' Musical Devotions and the (re)Engineering of Patron Saints Between Venice and Prague-the Vivaldi Connection Identity on the Stage
£80.75
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Edmund Rubbra: Symphonist
Book SynopsisLeo Black, a pupil of Rubbra in the 1950s, presents a full-scale study of his symphonies (the first for twenty years). A biographical sketch throws light on legends about the BBC and Rubbra; there are full programme notes on eachsymphony, with accounts of important non-symphonic works. The music of Edmund Rubbra (1901-1986) has been unjustly neglected - arguably because its wide-ranging nature makes it difficult to categorise. He is perhaps best known as a symphonist; his eleven symphonies covered a period of musical and political upheaval [1934 - 1980], the first four reflecting the uneasy later 1930s, with a second global conflict no longer avoidable. The immediately-post-war ones document new emotional depths and his conversion, whilethe final symphonies show a man still in search of peace and reconciliation, overlooked by the world but certain he was on the right path. Leo Black, a pupil of Rubbra at Oxford in the 1950s, here presents a sympatheticfull-scale study of these works (the first for some twenty years). A succinct biographical sketch throws light on legends about the BBC and Rubbra; there are full programme notes on each symphony, with shorter accounts of important non-symphonic works, in particular a 'triptych' of concertos from the 1950s and major liturgical pieces composed around the time of the Second Vatican Council, after Rubbra's conversion to Catholicism. He also deals with the vexed question of Rubbra's mysticism. LEO BLACK is a former BBC chief producer for music and author of the highly-acclaimed Franz Schubert: Music and Belief [2003].Trade ReviewThis handsomely produced volume can be read with profit by amateurs, connoisseurs, and scholars alike ...Thoughtful, erudite and compelling. A labor of love, it is also the brief of a skilled advocate; Rubbra's music, now lost in the twilight of musical limbo, fully merits such a committed redeemer. * NOTES *The reader is treated to a wide-ranging discussion that is stylishly written and invitingly presented. * MUSICAL TIMES *[An] excellent new biography. * TLS *Such are [Black's] skill and insights that there are few works about which he does not have something penetrating to say. His discussion of individual works engages the interest of the lay reader in a way that eludes...most other writers on matters musical. He brings the music and the issues it raises alive...This is an important book that should be in the library of every self-respecting music lover. -- Robert Layton * INTERNATIONAL RECORD REVIEW *
£23.75
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Music in Elizabethan Court Politics
Book SynopsisMusic and musical entertainments are here shown to be used for different ends, by both monarch and courtiers. Queen Elizabeth I (1558-1603) had a strong reputation for musicality; her court musicians, Thomas Tallis and William Byrd, even suggested that music was indispensable to the state. But what roles did music play in Elizabethan court politics? How did a musical image assist the Queen in projecting her royal authority? What influence did her private performances have on her courtships, diplomatic affairs, and relationships with courtiers? To what extent did Elizabeth control court music, or could others appropriate performances to enhance their own status and achieve their ambitions? Could noblemen, civic leaders, or even musicians take advantage of Elizabeth's love of music to present their complaints and petitions in song? This book unravels the connotations surrounding Elizabeth's musical image and traces the political roles of music at the Elizabethan court. It scrutinizes the most intimate performances within the Privy Chamber, analyses the masques and plays performed in the palaces, and explores the grandest musical pageantry of tournaments, civic entries, and royal progresses. This reveals how music served as a valuable means for both the tactful influencing of policies and patronage, and the construction of political identities and relationships. In the late Tudor period music was simultaneously a tool of authority for the monarch and an instrumentof persuasion for the nobility. KATHERINE BUTLER is a Senior Lecturer at Northumbria University, Newcastle.Trade ReviewA fascinating book. * THE CONSORT *No one who reads this fine study will again treat music as a background to the Elizabethan court. * AMERICAN HISTORICAL REVIEW *[A] major undertaking of importance, a careful and thorough study of numerous examples of secular music that is undergirded by a keen understanding of music's role in the political life of a fascinating era. * EARLY MUSIC *Tightly organized and impeccably researched, this engaging study triangulates the disciplines of musicology, literary history, and iconography to present the political roles music could play within Elizabeth's court, and adds welcome nuance to the preexisting scholarly narratives of monarchial control over the arts. * RENAISSANCE QUARTERLY *[O]ffers a ... detailed and focused look at the application of music to the specific context of the world of the Elizabethan court. * NORTHERN RENAISSANCE *Table of ContentsIntroduction Music, Authority, and the Royal Image The Politics of Intimacy The Royal Household and its Revels Noble Masculinity at the Tournaments Politics, Petition, and Complaint on the Royal Progresses Conclusion Appendices Bibliography
£71.25
Boydell & Brewer Ltd Performance and the Middle English Romance
Book SynopsisAn examination of if and how medieval romance was performed, uniquely uniting the perspective of a scholar and practitioner. Although English medieval minstrels performed gestes, a genre closely related to romance, often playing the harp or the fiddle, the question of if, and how, Middle English romance was performed has been hotly debated. Here,the performance tradition is explored by combining textual, historical and musicological scholarship with practical experience from a noted musician. Using previously unrecognised evidence, the author reconstructs a realistic model of minstrel performance, showing how a simple melody can interact with the text, and vice versa. She argues that elements in Middle English romance which may seem simplistic or repetitive may in fact be incomplete, as missing an integral musical dimension; metrical irregularities, for example, may be relics of sophisticated rhythmic variation that make sense only with music. Overall, the study offers both a more accurate comprehension of minstrel performance, and a deeper appreciation of the romances themselves. Linda Marie Zaerr is Professor of Medieval Studies at Boise State University.Trade Review[O]ffers the first comprehensive list of references to minstrel performances in the Middle English romances. . . . Zaerr's vivid account . . . provides a strong sense of how much we have lost now that we can only read the romances on the page. * EARLY MUSIC *Offer[s] a fresh perspective on Middle English romances not just as texts but also as performance acts. * COMITATUS 44 *[T]his is a splendid book, presenting a fine collection of textual evidence and commentary, which is a most valuable contribution to the field of medieval musicology. * THE CONSORT *This is a fascinating book, a sort of dialogue between scholar and performer, both being the same person [. . .] stimulating. * EARLY MUSIC REVIEW *With huge experience in performing Middle English romances, Professor Zaerr brings her valuable perspective as a performer to current textual, historical and musicological scholarship, in order to understand better how medieval minstrels performed romances with music. She shows how a broader, more fluid concept of romance can lead us to more profound understanding, and exciting revelations. -- Professor Marilyn Lawrence, New York University.Table of ContentsIntroduction Continental Traditions of Narrative Performance The English Minstrel in History and Romance Musical Instruments and Narrative Meter, Accent, and Rhythm Music and the Middle English Romance Conclusions Appendix A: Minstrel References in the Middle English Verse Romances Appendix B: Medieval Fiddle Tuning and Implications for Narrative Performance Glossary of Terms Bibliography
£76.00
The History Press Ltd Masters of Irish Music
Book SynopsisPresents a collection of some thirty profiles which have appeared periodically in "Ireland's Own". This book aims to give readers an overview of some of the most interesting and important figures in Irish music. It can be used as a work of reference, for writing or preparing programme notes for a concert, or, simply to be read from cover to cover.
£16.19
Zone Books Jacques Offenbach and the Paris of His Time
Book Synopsis
£19.80
York Medieval Press The Songs and Travels of a Tudor Minstrel:
Book SynopsisA reconstruction of the life and works of a sixteenth-century minstrel, showing the tradition to be flourishing well into the Tudor period. Richard Sheale, a harper and balladeer from Tamworth, is virtually the only English minstrel whose life story is known to us in any detail. It had been thought that by the sixteenth century minstrels had generally been downgradedto the role of mere jesters. However, through a careful examination of the manuscript which Sheale almost certainly "wrote" (Bodleian Ashmole 48) and other records, the author argues that the oral tradition remained vibrant at this period, contrary to the common idea that print had by this stage destroyed traditional minstrelsy. The author shows that under the patronage of Edward Stanley, earl of Derby, and his son, from one of the most important aristocratic families in England, Sheale recited and collected ballads and travelled to and from London to market them. Amongst his repertoire was the famous Chevy Chase, which Sir Philip Sidney said moved his heart "more than witha trumpet". Sheale also composed his own verse, including a lament on being robbed of 60 on his way to London; the poem is reproduced in this volume. ANDREW TAYLOR lectures in the Department of English, University of Ottawa.Trade Review[A] carefully researched study of one minstrel, one manuscript, and a social world in which they were both living and already taking on an antiqued patina. * JOURNAL OF FOLKLORE RESEARCH *Impressive, productive and insightful. * ENGLISH HISTORICAL REVIEW *Contains a wealth of information useful to any student of early modern musical traditions. * HISTORY, December 2013 *Provides a fascinating insight into a transitional moment in the history of English balladry. . This is an intriguing book, highly recommended. * FOLK MUSIC JOURNAL *Offers important revisions to our understanding of the sixteenth century musician and his relationship to the various communities he served. * THE MEDIEVAL REVIEW *[A] stimulating and well written study. [...] Historians, literary scholars, folklorists, anthropologists, and singers will all find [...] material to set them thinking. * RENAISSANCE QUARTERLY *[A] valuable study. * REVIEW OF ENGLISH STUDIES *Taylor's piecing together of Sheale's life and work adds greatly to our understanding of late minstrelsy and the social and political world that formed its background. * EARLY MUSIC *Table of ContentsPreface Introduction: The Minstrel Rides Out The Minstrel of Tamworth and His Audiences The Stanleys, The Stanley Poem, and the Campaign of 1558 Ashmole 48 and Its History The Hunting of the Cheviot and the Battle of Otterburn 'More than with a Trumpet': Tudor Responses to the Cheviot Ballads The Lay of the Last Minstrel Appendix: Five Poems Bearing the Name of Richard Sheale Bibliography
£63.00
Henry Bradshaw Society The Rosslyn Missal: An Irish manuscript in the
Book SynopsisA manuscript rather obliquely named from its once having been at Rosslyn Castle, but that at the time of this edition had come to the Advocates' Library at Edinburgh, which since 1925 is part of the National Library of Scotland (MS Advocates 18.5.19). Lawlor dated it to the late 13th or early 14th century, and saw it as an English copy of an Irish exemplar in turn descended from a book belonging to the Benedictine nuns of St Werbugh, Chester, in the 12thcentury.
£49.50
Henry Bradshaw Society The Processional of the Nuns of Chester, Edited
Book SynopsisThis manuscript, now now Huntington Library, MS EL 34 B 7, contains a fifteenth- century Latin text interesting for its admixture of English rubrics, as well as prayers and hymns. Chester was in the Lichfield diocese, and thus inthe Province of Canterbury, so it is no surprise that the text is closer to Sarum than York usage.
£40.50
Henry Bradshaw Society Three Coronation Orders
Book SynopsisThe order for the coronation of William III and Mary at Westminster on 11 April 1689 (from London, College of Arms, MS L.19; Lambeth Palace, Misc.MS 1077) with a fourteenth century Anglo-French text (Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 20) and an eleventh century rite for the coronation of an Anglo-Saxon kingfrom an English pontifical (Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS 44). With apparatus and considerable notes.
£45.00
Henry Bradshaw Society Ordinale Sarum, sive Directorium Sacerdotum:
Book SynopsisThe Directorium Sacerdotum is a sort of ordinal or directory for the Sarum Use, which though a private compilation by the Brigittine Clement Maydeston, acquired a de facto official status. The text here is taken from the quarto edition published by Wynkyn de Worde in 1495 (Duff, n. 294; GW 8460; STC 17724), and is furnished with indices. Vol. 20 in the present series is the first part, this volume is the second part.
£49.50
Henry Bradshaw Society The Hereford Breviary, Edited from the Rouen
Book SynopsisThe Rouen edition of 1505 published by Inghelbert Haghe (BB 2275; STC 15793; copies in Worcester, Cathedral Library, I.k.14; Oxford, Bodleian Library, Gough Missals, 69, pars aestivalis only) with use of MSS London, British Library, Harley MS 2983; Hereford, Cathedral Chapter Library, P.9.VII; Oxford, Balliol College, MS 321; Oxford, University College, MS 7; Worcester, Cathedral Chapter Library, MS Q.86. See also volumes 40 and 46 in the present series.
£49.50
Henry Bradshaw Society Ordinale Exoniense III: Appendix: Exeter Chapter
Book SynopsisThe Exeter Ordinale is a huge ordinal issued by John de Grandisson, bishop of Exeter [1327-69], in 1337; it is edited on the basis of manuscripts that belonged to, and were annotated by, the bishop himself. The compilationmarked an important point in medieval study of the liturgy, and the Legenda [liturgical readings for saints' days] which it contains are regarded as one of the most important sources for the study of English medieval hagiography, particularly for saints of English origin.
£45.00
Henry Bradshaw Society Chant, Liturgy, and the Inheritance of Rome:
Book SynopsisThe influence of Rome on medieval plainsong and liturgy explored in depth. Containing substantial new studies in music, liturgy, history, art history, and palaeography from established and emerging scholars, this volume takes a cross-disciplinary approach to one of the most celebrated and vexing questions about plainsong and liturgy in the Middle Ages: how to understand the influence of Rome? Some essays address this question directly, examining Roman sources, Roman liturgy, or Roman practice, whilst others consider the sway ofRome more indirectly, by looking later sources, received practices, or emerging traditions that owe a foundational debt to Rome. Daniel J. DiCenso is Assistant Professor of Music at the College of the Holy Cross; Rebecca Maloy is Professor of Musicology at the University of Colorado Boulder. Contributors: Charles M. Atkinson, Rebecca A. Baltzer, James Borders, Susan Boynton, Catherine Carver, Daniel J. DiCenso, David Ganz, Barbara Haggh-Huglo, David Hiley, Emma Hornby, Thomas Forrest Kelly, William Mahrt, Charles B. McClendon, Luisa Nardini, Edward Nowacki , Christopher Page, Susan Rankin, John F. Romano, Mary E. WolinskiTrade ReviewOverall this book is a fitting tribute to Joseph Dyer and will be of interest to a wide variety of medieval scholars. * SPECULUM *Impressive.. For students of medieval liturgy, especially relating to the continent, this is an important volume. * PARERGON *Table of ContentsDoxa en ipsistis Theo: Its Textual and Melodic Tradition in the 'Missa graeca' - Charles M Atkinson The Changing Roles of Old Saint Peter's in Late Antique and Early Medieval Rome - Charles McClendon The Archdeacon, Power, and Liturgy before 1000 - John Romano The Earliest Antiphons of the Roman Office - Edward Nowacki The Paschal Vigil in Medieval Rome - Thomas Kelly As the Bells Toll: Parish Proximity in Medieval Rome - Catherine Carver McCurrach The Moment of Scrutiny in the Missale Gallicanum Vetus and the Instruction of Catechumens in Merovingian and Carolingian Francia - David Ganz Melodic Style and the Transmission History of the Beneventan Easter Vigil Canticles - Emma Hornby Fitting New Texts into Old Melodies: The Diffusion and Technique of Prosulas for Tracts and Graduals - Luisa Nardini Singing the Psalter in the Early Middle Ages - Susan K Rankin The Tonality of the Numerical Offices in Cambrai, Médiathèque municipale, MS 38 - Barbara Haggh-Huglo Revisiting the Admonitio generalis - Daniel J. DiCenso An Overlooked Source of the Pontifical romain du XIIe siècle and its Chants: Lyon, Bibliothèque des Facultés catholiques, MS Réserve 1/0011 [olim MS 2] - James Borders Music and the Cluniac Vision of History in Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, lat. 17716 - Susan Boynton To Chant in a Vale of Tears - Melodic Trope as Modal Rhetoric - William Mahrt Proper Office Chants for St George in South German Manuscripts - David Hiley Notre-Dame and the Challenge of the Sainte-Chapelle in Thirteenth-Century Paris - Rebecca Baltzer Music for the Confraternity of St James in Paris - Mary Wolinski Publications by Joseph Dyer
£60.00
Jacaranda Books Art Music Ltd Once Upon a Time in Shaolin: The Untold Story of
Book SynopsisThe untold story behind one of the most controversial album releases in modern music history, for fans of the Wu-Tang Clan, hip-hop music, and all those interested in the music industry. Take a kid with a dream. A legendary hip hop group. 6 years of secret recordings. A casing worthy of a king. A single artifact. Hallowed establishment institutions. An iconoclastic auction house. The world's foremost museum of modern art. A bidding war. Endless crises of conscience. An angry mob. A furious beef. A sale. A villain of Lex Luthor-like proportions. Bill Murray. The FBI. The internet gone wild. In 2007, the innovative Wu-Tang producer, Cilvaringz, feeling that digitisation increasingly supported the perception of music as disposable, took an incendiary idea to his mentor, hip hop legend, RZA: create a unique physical copy of a secret Wu-Tang album, to be encased in silver and sold through auction as a work of contemporary art. The plan raised a number of complex questions: Would selling one album for millions be the ultimate betrayal of music? How would fans react to an album that's sold on condition it could not be commercialised? And could anyone justify the ultimate sale of the album to the infamous pharmaceutical mogul Martin Shkreli? "An epic battle between colorful, creative maniacal heroes and one of the blandest beta-villains of our time. Couldn't put it down."Patton Oswalt, comedian and bestselling author of Silver Screen FiendTrade Review“An epic battle between colorful, creative maniacal heroes and one of the blandest beta-villains of our time. Couldn’t put it down.”Patton Oswalt, comedian and bestselling author of Silver Screen Fiend"[An] utterly candid work...Bozorgmehr's stirring account gives readers the insider's view of musical outlaws who possessed the best intentions of elevating hip-hop from its street moorings to more stylish, chic surroundings, and whose efforts exploded in a crisis of bad media coverage and soulless pharmaceutical drug merchants."Publishers Weekly
£11.69
