Abstract How did Renaissance composers write their music? In this revolutionary look at a subject that has fascinated scholars for years, musicologist Jessie Ann Owens offers new and striking evidence that contrary to accepted theory, sixteenth-century composers did not use scores to compose--even to write complex vocal polyphony.L L Drawing on sources that include contemporary theoretical treatises, documents and letters, iconographical evidence, actual fragments of composing slates, and numerous sketches, drafts, and corrected autograph manuscripts, Owens carefully reconstructs the step-by-step process by which composers between 1450 and 1600 composed their music. The manuscript evidence--autographs of more than thirty composers--shows the stages of work on a wide variety of music--instrumental and vocal, sacred and secular--from across most of Renaissance Europe. Her research demonstrates that instead of working in full score, Renaissance composers fashioned the music in parts, often working with brief segments, according to a linear conception. The importance of this discovery on editorial interpretation and on performance cannot be overstated.L Lhe book opens with a broad picture of what has been known about Renaissance composition. From there, Owens examines the teaching of composition and the ways in which musicians and composers both read and wrote music. She also considers evidence for composition that occurred independent of writing, such as composing “in the mind “ or composing with instruments. In chapters on the manuscript evidence, she establishes a typology both of the sources themselves and of their contents (sketches, drafts, fair copies). She concludes with case studies detailing the working methods of Francesco Corteccia, Henricus Isaac, Cipriano de Rore, and Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina.L L This book will change the way we analyze and understand early music. Clear, provocative, and painstakingly researched, Composers at Work: The Craft of Musical Composition 1450-1600 makes essential reading for scholars of Renaissance music as well as those working in related fields such as sketch studies and music theory.
Abstract In The Composer as Intellectual, musicologist Jane Fulcher reveals the extent to which leading French composers between the world wars were not only aware of, but engaged intellectually and creatively with the central political and ideological issues of the period. Employing recent sociological and historical insights, she demonstrates the extent to which composers, particularly those in Paris since the Dreyfus Affair, considered themselves and were considered to be intellectuals, and interacted closely with intellectuals in other fields. Their consciousness raised by the First World War and the xenophobic nationalism of official culture, some joined parties or movements, allying themselves with and propagating different sets of cultural and political-social goals. Fulcher shows how these composers furthered their ideals through the specific language and means of their art, rejecting the dominant cultural exclusions or constraints of conservative postwar institutions and creatively translating their cultural values into terms of form and style. This was not only the case with Debussy in wartime, but with Ravel in the twenties, when he became a socialist and unequivocally refused to espouse a narrow, exclusionary nationalism. It was also the case with the group called “Les Six,” who responded culturally in the twenties and then politically in the thirties, when most of them supported the programs of the Popular Front. Others could not be enthusiastic about the latter and, largely excluded from official culture, sought out more compatible movements or returned to the Catholic Church. Like many French Catholics, they faced the crisis of Catholicism in the thirties when the church not only supported Franco, but Mussolin’s imperialistic aggression in Ethiopia. While Poulenc embraced traditional Catholicism, Messiaen turned to more progressive Catholic movements that embraced modern art and insisted that religion must cross national and racial boundaries. Fulcher demonstrates how closely music had become a field of clashing ideologies in this period. She shows also how certain French composers responded, and how their responses influenced specific aspects of their professional and stylistic development. She thus argues that, from this perspective, we can not only better understand specific aspects of the stylistic evolution of these composers, but also perceive the role that their art played in the ideological battles and in heightening cultural-political awareness of their time.
Modernism often appears as a movement of individual iconoclasts: the visionary Pablo Picasso, the aloof Gertrude Stein, the isolated Charles Ives, among others. Often overlooked are the various groups that supported modernist styles during the early decades of the century. Collective organization especially shaped the production of new music, as many composers realized the necessity of solidarity in confronting the increased marginalization of their works. This awareness led to the formation of such composers' groups as the Verein ffir musikalische Privatauffiihrungen and Les Six. Although the two differ in many respects, they, along with most other groups, shared a commitment to providing members with much needed creative support and performances.' Responding to the same needs, several modern music societies arose in the United States, notably the International Composers' Guild (1921-27), Pro-Musica (1920-44), Henry Cowell's New Music Society (1925-36), the Pan American Association of Composers (1928-34), and the League of Composers (1923-54).2 This article discusses the formation of the League and traces its activities in New York City through the 1920s. During that decade modernist styles, which had previously made only sporadic appearances in the New York concert scene, bounded into the city's music world. The League was a major force in the promotion of modern music. The organization's role in that effort can be best appreciated by describing its ventures inside and outside of the concert hall and by comparing it to its chief rival, the In-
In this remarkable study, Robert R. Faulkner shows that the Hollywood film industry, like most work communities, is dominated by a highly productive and visible elite who exercise major influence on the control of available resources, career chances, and access to opportunity. Faulkner traces a network of connections that bind together filmmakers (employers) and composers (employees) and reveals how work is allocated among composers and the division of labor within the Hollywood film community, using statistical analysis and highly revealing personal interviews. One of the very first empirical studies in the new economic sociology, Music on Demand shows the dynamics of markets constituted by the interaction between buyers and artistic talent (the producers and directors of feature films) and the sellers of artistic talent (the composers of film scores). Faulkner's interviews with those composers considered to be elite and those on the industry's periphery reveal how they perceive their careers, how they define commercial artistic success, and how they establish, or try to establish, those vital connections with filmmakers. Now available in paperback, this pioneering study will be of compelling interest to researchers in culture studies as well as readers interested in learning more about this little-known world.
European Music Before 1945 * From Sketch of a New Esthetic of Music Ferruccio Busoni [18661924] * From Monsieur Croche the Dilettante Hater Claude Debussy [18621918] * Three Brief Epigrams Erik Satie [18661925] * From Notes Without Music Darius Milhaud [18921974] * Man and Music Ernest Bloch [18801959] * From Dialogues and a Diary Igor Stravinsky [18821971] * Why is Schoenbergs Music so Hard to Understand? Alban Berg [18851935] * The Influence of Peasant Music on Modern Music Bla Bartk [18811945] * From A Composers World Paul Hindemith [18951963] * From Autobiography, Articles, Reminiscences Serge Prokofiev [18921953] * Music and the Times Dmitri Shostakovitch [19061975] * From The Making of Music Ralph Vaughan Williams [18721958] * On Winning the First Aspen Award Benjamin Britten [19131976] Experimental Music and American Developments * Preface to 114 Songs Charles Ives [18741954] * From New Musical Resources Henry Cowell [18971965] * The Creative Mind and the Interpretive Mind Aaron Copland [19001990) * FolksongAmerican Big Business Roy Harris [18981979] * On Waiting for a Libretto Samuel Barber [19101981] * From The State of Music Virgil Thomson [18961989] * The Musical Impulse Roger Sessions [18961985] * The Liberation of Sound Edgard Varse [18851964] * Experiments in Notation Harry Partch [19011974] * Space as an Essential Aspect of Musical Composition Harry Brant [1913 ] * Who Cares if You Listen? Milton Babbit [1916 ] * Some Random Remarks about Electronic Music Otto Luening [19001996] * Shop Talk by an American Composer Elliot Carter [1908 ] * Thinking Twice Stefan Wolpe [19021972] * Towards a Re-merger in Music Chou Wen-Chung [1923 ] * Grand and Not So Grand Jack Beeson [1921 ] * The Changing ComposerPerformer Relationship: A Monologue and a Dialogue Lukas Foss [1922 ] * John CageInterview with Roger Reynolds John Cage [19121992] * Composers, Performance and Publications Music, Electronic and Performed Richard Maxfield [19241969] * Morton FeldmanAn Interview with Robert Ashley, August, 1964 Morton Feldman [19261987] * Charles WuorinenAn Interview with Barney Childs Charles Wuorinen [1938 ] Postmodernism and Recent Concerns * Five Revolutions Since 1950 Karlheinz Stockhausen [1928 ] * Dreaming of Things to Come... Michael Tippet [1905 ] * Gyrgy LigetiAn interview with Joseph Husler, 1968/69 Gyrgy Ligeti [1923 ] * On the Third String Quartet George Rochberg [1918 ] * Third Stream Third Stream Revisited Gunther Shuller [1925 ] * Some sound Observations Pauline Oliveros [1932 ] * Music as a Gradual Process Steve Reich [1936 ] * T. J. AndersonAn Interview with Elliot Schwartz T. J. Anderson [1928 ] * Maximum Clarity Ben Johnston [1926 ] * On Criticism Cornelius Cardew [19361981] * Sofia GubaidulinaAn Interview with Dorothea Redepenning, 1992 SOfia Gubaidulina [1931 ] * I am Sitting in a Room (1969) Alvin Lucier [1931 ] * Anthony BraxtonAn Interview with Graham Lock, 1988 Anthony Braxton [1945 ] * Composing a Viable (if transitory Self): Brian Ferneyhough in Conversation with James Boros Brian Fenneyhough [1943 ] * From Something About Music William Bolcom [1938 ]
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