New Publications,
New Music Book Publications - 29th June 2020
Welcome to our latest selection of new music books. Our picks this time round include a companion to Beethoven's Eroica symphony; a look at the making of the film version of Leonard Bernstein's West Side Story; biographies of composer Florence Price and violinist Isaac Stern; a collection of conversations with composer Julian Anderson; a new paperback edition of Stephen Hough's reflections on music; everything you ever wanted to know and more about tuba technique; the history of the symphonic poem in Britain from 1850-1950; and a handbook on teaching singing.
The Cambridge Companion to the Eroica Symphony
Nancy November (editor); Cambridge University Press; Paperback
This companion provides orientation for those embarking on the study of Beethoven's Eroica Symphony, as well as offering fresh insights for scholars and listeners already familiar with the work. The book addresses the symphony in three thematic sections (genesis, analysis, and reception history), and covers key topics including political context, dedication, sources of inspiration, 'heroism' and the idea of a 'watershed' work.
Available Format: Book
West Side Story: The Jets, the Sharks, and the Making of a Classic
Richard Barrios; Running Press; Hardback
West Side Story was a movie different from anything that had come before, but this cinematic victory came at a price. The enormous budget and complicated logistics made it a difficult production, and massive overruns in both cost and schedule led to tension between co-directors Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins. This book offers a captivating account of a crucial and exciting cultural moment.
Available Format: Book
The Heart of a Woman: The Life and Music of Florence B. Price
Rae Linda Brown; University of Illinois Press; Paperback
This is the first-ever biography of Florence B. Price, a composer whose career spanned both the Harlem and Chicago Renaissances, and the first African American woman to gain national recognition for her works. Through interviews and a wealth of material from public and private archives, Rae Linda Brown illuminates Price's major works while exploring the depth of her achievement, and also traces her life, teaching, and her struggles with racism, poverty, and professional jealousies.
Available Format: Book
Despite modest origins as the child of Jewish immigrants in San Francisco, by the early 1940s talent and practice had brought Isaac Stern a Carnegie Hall debut alongside critical acclaim. Wide-ranging yet intimate, this book offers a portrait of an artist and musical statesman who left a profound musical and cultural legacy.
Available Format: Book
Julian Anderson - Dialogues on Listening, Composing and Culture
Christopher Dingle; Boydell & Brewer; Hardback
This book of conversations captures Anderson's thoughts and memories in-depth for the first time, capturing the workings of a remarkable mind. These extraordinarily diverse discussions range far beyond his own compositions and even beyond the sphere of music, exploring issues of broad cultural interest. They will be essential reading not only for composers and composition students, but for those interested in culture more generally.
Available Format: Book
In this new paperback edition, one of the world's leading pianists writes about life as a musician, from exploring what it is like to walk out on stage or to make a recording, to tips from inside the practice room. He also writes about people he's known, places he's travelled to, books he's read, paintings he's seen, and touches on more controversial subjects, including the challenges involved in being a gay Catholic.
Available Format: Book
The Rival Sirens: Performance and Identity on Handel's Operatic Stage
Suzanne Aspden; Cambridge University Press; Paperback
The tale of the onstage fight between prima donnas Francesca Cuzzoni and Faustina Bordoni is notorious, but it is a fiction. Starting from this misunderstanding, this book suggests that their rivalry was in large part a social construction, conditioned by audience expectations. It offers readings of operas by Handel and Bononcini as performance events inflected by the audience's perceptions of singers' personas.
Available Format: Book
This book is a companion for composers and players alike, deepening their understanding of this somewhat neglected family of instruments. It gives tuba players an opportunity to master and employ new performance techniques on their instrument, particularly in contemporary music, and offers instruction in various tuning mechanisms, resonance properties, new forms of notation and contemporary practices. The text is illustrated with numerous music examples and diagrams.
Available Format: Book
The Symphonic Poem in Britain, 1850-1950
Michael Allis & Paul Watt (editors); Boydell & Brewer; Hardback
This book highlights some of the continental models that influenced British composers, identifying a range of issues related to the genre of the symphonic poem. Richard Strauss became an important figure during this time, not only in terms of the impact of his tone poems, but the debates over their value and even ethics. The historical development of the genre, the impact of compositional models, issues of critical reception, as well as programming strategies all contribute to a richer understanding of the symphonic poem in Britain.
Available Format: Book
With the relationship between singer and instructor in mind, this book presents a detailed guide to singing and teaching singing. It systematically explores all aspects of the vocal technique - respiration, phonation, resonance, and articulation - with each chapter containing exercises aimed at applying and teaching these principles. Beyond basic vocal anatomy and singing fundamentals, the handbook also covers such understudied topics as the young voice, the changing voice, and the aging voice, along with helpful chapters for teachers about how to organise lessons.
Available Format: Book
German Song Onstage: Lieder Performance in the Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries
Natasha Loges & Laura Tunbridge (editors); Indiana University Press; Paperback
For much of the nineteenth century, the songs of Beethoven, Schubert, Schumann, and Brahms were heard in the home and salon as well as on the concert platform. The historical case studies presented in this new paperback edition are set alongside reflections from a selection of today's leading musicians, offering insights on current Lied practices.
Available Format: Book
Cultivated by Hand: Amateur Musicians in the Early American Republic
Glenda Goodman; Oxford University Press; Hardback
Amateur music-making played a key role in the post-revolution years of the United States. These early Americans, seeking ways to present themselves as erudite, saw copying music by hand and performing it in intimate groups as a way to make themselves appear culturally sophisticated. This study explores the social and material practices of amateur music-making, analysing the materiality of manuscripts, tracing the lives of individual musicians, and uncovering their musical tastes and sensibilities.
Available Format: Book
A seminal work in music theory for over two decades, Christopher Hasty's tome is foundational to new subfields in ethnomusicology and music cognition, and its ideas have recently been used and explored in relation to non-musical fields from literary studies and poetics to physics and biology.
Available Format: Book
Broadway in the Box: Television's Lasting Love Affair with the Musical
Kelly Kessler; Oxford University Press; Paperback
From Rodgers and Hammerstein's appearance on the first Toast of the Town telecast in 1948 to a string of one-off musical episodes of sitcoms, soaps, and fantasy shows, television has always embraced the musical. This book shows how the form is written across the history of American television and how its various incarnations tell the stories of shifting cultural landscapes.
Available Format: Book
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