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It is well known that Richard Wagner, the renowned and controversial 19th century composer, exhibited intense anti-Semitism. The evidence is everywhere in his writings as well as in conversations his second wife recorded in her diaries. In his infamous essay "Judaism in Music," Wagner forever cemented his unpleasant reputation with his assertion that Jews were incapable of either creating or appreciating great art. Wagner's close ties with many talented Jews, then, are surprising. Most writers have dismissed these connections as cynical manipulations and rank hypocrisy. Examination of the original sources, however, reveals something different: unmistakeable, undeniable empathy and friendship...
Though his image is tarnished today by unrepentant anti-Semitism, Richard Wagner (1813Ð1883) was better known in the nineteenth century for his provocative musical eroticism. In this illuminating study of the composer and his works, Laurence Dreyfus shows how WagnerÕs obsession with sexuality prefigured the composition of operas such as Tannhuser, Die Walkre, Tristan und Isolde, and Parsifal. Daring to represent erotic stimulation, passionate ecstasy, and the torment of sexual desire, Wagner sparked intense reactions from figures like Baudelaire, Clara Schumann, Nietzsche, and Nordau, whose verbal tributes and censures disclose what was transmitted when music represented sex. Wagner hi...
A major study sure to fascinate musicians, Brahms enthusiasts and those interested in the history of recorded music. How did Brahms conduct his four symphonies? What did he want from other conductors when they performed these works, and to which among them did he give his approval? And crucially, are there any stylistic pointers to these performances in early recordings of the symphonies made in the first half of the twentieth century? For the first time, Christopher Dyment provides a comprehensive and in-depth answer to these important issues. Drawing together thestrands of existing research with extensive new material from a wide range of sources - the views of musicians, contemporary jour...
A rich and fascinating account of one of music history’s most ancient, varied, and distinctive instruments From its origins in animal horn instruments in classical antiquity to the emergence of the modern horn in the seventeenth century, the horn appears wherever and whenever humans have made music. Its haunting, timeless presence endures in jazz and film music, as well as orchestral settings, to this day. In this welcome addition to the Yale Musical Instrument Series, Renato Meucci and Gabriele Rocchetti trace the origins of the modern horn in all its variety. From its emergence in Turin and its development of political and diplomatic functions across European courts, to the revolutionary invention of valves, the horn has presented in innumerable guises and forms. Aided by musical examples and newly discovered sources, Meucci and Rocchetti’s book offers a comprehensive account of an instrument whose history is as complex and fascinating as its music.
Drawing on the expertise of a wide range of musicologists, performer-scholars, and music theorists, Rethinking Brahms provides new perspectives on Brahms's music, the contexts of his creativity, and the reception of his works.
This lively chronicle of the years 1847–1947—the century when the Jewish people changed how we see the world—is “[a] thrilling and tragic history…especially good on the ironies and chain-reaction intimacies that make a people and a past” (The Wall Street Journal). In a hundred-year period, a handful of men and women changed the world. Many of them are well known—Marx, Freud, Proust, Einstein, Kafka. Others have vanished from collective memory despite their enduring importance in our daily lives. Without Karl Landsteiner, for instance, there would be no blood transfusions or major surgery. Without Paul Ehrlich, no chemotherapy. Without Siegfried Marcus, no motor car. Without R...
First published in 2011. Johannes Brahms: A Research and Information Guide is an annotated bibliography concerning both the nature of primary sources related to the composer and the scope and significance of the secondary sources which deal with him, his compositions, and his influence as a composer and performer. The second edition will include research published since the publication of the first edition and provide electronic resources.
Hans von Bulow's career unfolded in at least six directions simultaneously. He was a renowned concert pianist; the first virtuoso orchestral conductor; a respected (and sometimes feared) teacher; an influential editor of works by Bach, Mendelssohn, Chopin, and above all of Beethoven, in the performance of whose music he had no rival; a scourge as a music critic; and lastly, he was himself also a composer of music. In Hans von Bulow: A Life and Times, Alan Walker, the acclaimed author of numerous award-winning books on the era's iconic composers, provides the first full-length English biography of this remarkable musical figure.
Richard Strauss is a composer much loved among audiences throughout the world, both in the opera house and the concert hall. Despite this popularity, Strauss was for many years ignored by scholars, who considered his commercial success and his continued reliance on the tonal system to be liabilities. However, the past two decades have seen a resurgence of scholarly interest in the composer. This Companion surveys the results, focusing on the principal genres, the social and historical context, and topics perennially controversial over the last century. Chapters cover Strauss's immense operatic output, the electrifying modernism of his tone poems, and his ever-popular Lieder. Controversial topics are explored, including Strauss's relationship to the Third Reich and the sexual dimension of his works. Reintroducing the composer and his music in light of recent research, the volume shows Strauss's artistic personality to be richer and much more complicated than has been previously acknowledged.