Silvio Scionti: Remembering a Master Pianist and Teacher - J.Guerry - 1991

"Scionti’s arrival at the School of Music, University of North Texas in the early ’40s . . . ushered in . . . a golden age . . . in the musical life in the area . . . By the late ’40s his students were beginning to rival those of the Juillard School’s Rosina Lhevinne in the number of prizes taken on a national level, and by the early 1950s they were competing successfully in the international arena . . . A handsomely produced biography covering the life and career of the teacher."—Dallas Morning News
         Silvio Scionti was a zestful, colorful figure, as well as a master pianist and teacher. Stories about him, particularly about his more than ten-year career at the University of NorthTexas, are legion, and author Jack Guerry—a former Scionti student—has collected many of them in this remembrance and biography.
Scionti firmly established his reputation as a compelling pianist, whose playing has been described as powerful, vital, and full of eloquence, during his twenty-six years at the American Conservatory in Chicago. Known especially throughout the United States and Europe for his duo-piano playing, Scionti’s career flourished when he married Texan Isabel Laughlin, and the ‘irreproachable and irrepressible Sciontis' impressed critics wherever they played.
         Lured to North Texas in 1942, the Sciontis were instrumental in the growth of the School of Music to the stature it still claims today. Scionti’s "buoyant spirit," enthusiasm, talent, and reputation brought students to Denton from around the country. Many members of Scionti’s "student family"—themselves now professionals and teachers—have contributed their recollections to this volume including tales of Scionti’s proverbial Italian spaghetti dinners, exhausting hikes up Mount Etna, and high-speed sight-seeing along Italian mountain lanes with Scionti at the wheel of his "magnificent red Buick."
          The "indefatigable" Scionti never stopped: When he was seventy and near the end of his North Texas career, he organized a ten-day tour of five states for his eight-piano emsemble—taking the eight pianos along and assembling them at each of the thirteen cities visited. Even through his "retirement" years, Scionti still was busy teaching and opening professional doors for students who continued to seek him out.

French pianism. A historical perspective - C.Timbrell - 1999

The undisputed preeminence of Paris as a center of the piano world dates from the early 19th century, and the rigorous professors of the Paris Conservatoire transmitted the characteristic French piano style faithfully to each new generation for some 150 years. First published to critical acclaim in 1992, this landmark study, now considerably expanded and revised, surveys the historical development, performance practices and pedagogical philosophies of this vital school.

Oxford History of Western Music (Five-Volumes Set) - R.Taruskin - 2009

The universally acclaimed and award-winning Oxford History of Western Music by one of the most prominent and provocative musicologists of our time, Richard Taruskin. Now in paperback, the set has been reconstructed to be available for the first time as individual books, each one taking on a critical time period in the history of western music. All five books are also being offered in a shrink wrapped set for a discounted price. Each book in this magnificent set illuminates - through a representative sampling of masterworks - those themes, styles, and currents that give shape and direction to each musical age. The five titles cover Western music from its earliest days to the sixteenth century, the seventeenth and eighteenth century, the nineteenth century, the early twentieth century, and the late twentieth century. Taking a critical perspective, Taruskin sets the details of music, the chronological sweep of figures, works, and musical ideas, within the larger context of world affairs and cultural history. He combines an emphasis on structure and form with a discussion of relevant theoretical concepts in each age, to illustrate how the music itself works, and how contemporaries heard and understood it. He also describes how the context of each stylistic period - key cultural, historical, social, economic, and scientific events - influenced and directed compositional choices. Moreover, the five books are filled with helpful illustrations that enhance the historical context of musical composition, as well as musical examples, black-and-white pictures throughout, suggestions for further reading, and indexes. Laced with brilliant observations, memorable musical analysis, and a panoramic sense of the interactions between history, culture, politics, art, literature, religion, and music, these books will be essential reading for anyone who wishes to understand this rich and diverse tradition.

Correspondence of Wagner and Liszt, Volume 1 & 2 - 2009

The German musical genius Richard Wagner (1811 1883) could be considered to be one of the ideological fathers of early 20th century German nationalism. He was well suited for this role. Highly intelligent, sophisticated, complex, capable of imagining whole systems of humanistic philosophy, and with an intense need to communicate his ideas, he created great operas which, in addition to their artistic merits, served the peculiar role of promoting a jingoistic, chauvenistic kind of Germanism. There are things in his operas that only a German can fully understand, especially if he would like to see his country closed off to outsiders. It is unlikely, however, that Wagner expected these ideas to achieve any popularity. Time and again he rails against philistines, irrational people and politicians in his letters. With great exasperation and often depression he expressed little hope that his country would ever emerge out of its "philistinism" and embrace "rational" ideas such as he propagated. Add to this the great difficulties he had in getting his works performed, and one might assume that he felt himself to be composing, most of the time, to audiences of bricks. Yes, his great, intensely beloved friend Liszt believed in, fully understood, and greatly appreciated Wagner's works, but Liszt was just one in a million, and even he, as Wagner suggested, associated with a base coterie incapable of assimilating Wagnerian messages. Considering the sorry state of music and intellectualism in Wagner's time and setting, he surely would have been surprised if his operas and his ideas achieved any wide currency. That he continued to work with intense energy to develop his ideas, to fix them into musical form and to propagate them, while knowing that probably no sizeable population would ever likely take note of them, and while believing that his existence as an underappreciated, rational individual in an irrational world was absurd and futile, is a testimony to the enormous will power of this "ubermensch."

Franz Liszt: A Guide to Research - M.Saffle - 1998

Franz Liszt has become for music historians the archetypical genius--able to upstage such titans as Chopin and Thalberg on the piano, then moving with ease into composition and effortlessly traveling outside the boundaries of his age with wildly original music. Such a figure will always be difficult to evaluate and thus this comprehensive bibliography and guide will be all the more valuable for student and scholar.

The Quotable Musician: From Bach to Tupac - S.E Anderson - 2003

In The Quotable Musician: From Bach to Tupac, music artists through the ages speak out in this illuminating collection of quotations. Both the famous and the obscure from every genre of music--including classical, rock, Latin, country, blues, and hip-hop–are celebrated in more than one thousand quotations sure to intrigue and delight. Quotes offer individual takes on the music world, other musicians, singing and “the song,” performing and rehearsing, success, fame, fortune, failure, and rejection. Readers will also see both the playful and serious sides of the music masters in sections on love, passion, relationships, and sex; aging and death; nature and healing; humor and witticisms; religion and spirituality; and much more. Special sections pay particular attention to the words of Ron Carter, T.S. Monk, the Beatles, and Benny Golson. Any musician or music lover will savor this collection of provocative, mischievous, and profound words from music personalities of the past and present.

Beethoven and the Construction of Genius: Musical Politics in Vienna, 1792-1803 - T.DeNora - 1997

In this provocative analysis of Beethoven's late style, Stephen Rumph demonstrates how deeply political events shaped the composer's music, from his early enthusiasm for the French Revolution to his later entrenchment during the Napoleonic era. Impressive in its breadth of research as well as for its devotion to interdisciplinary work in music history, Beethoven after Napoleon challenges accepted views by illustrating the influence of German Romantic political thought in the formation of the artist's mature style. Beethoven's political views, Rumph argues, were not quite as liberal as many have assumed. While scholars agree that the works of the Napoleonic era such as the Eroica Symphony or Fidelio embody enlightened, revolutionary ideals of progress, freedom, and humanism, Beethoven's later works have attracted less political commentary. Rumph contends that the later works show clear affinities with a native German ideology that exalted history, religion, and the organic totality of state and society. He claims that as the Napoleonic Wars plunged Europe into political and economic turmoil, Beethoven's growing antipathy to the French mirrored the experience of his Romantic contemporaries. Rumph maintains that Beethoven's turn inward is no pessimistic retreat but a positive affirmation of new conservative ideals.

The Age of Mozart and Beethoven - G.Pestelli - 1984

Giorgio Pestelli examines one of the crucial periods of musical history, from the middle of the eighteenth century to the era of Beethoven. This was a time of great cultural, technical and social changes. The free professional composer, in direct contact with the wide musical public, replaced the dependent court musician. Instrumental music became the centre of new developments, and sonata form, the cornerstone of nineteenth-century musical architecture, dominated its language. With the decrease in private patronage came the birth of the public concert; there was a vast increase in music publishing, and important developments were made in instrumental techniques, the dominant feature being the rise of the piano. Standing out from this common background are three major figures; Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven, whose specific characteristics are discussed in detail, along with their links with many other musicians. Dr Pestelli also emphasizes general lines of development: the galant style, the passion for antiquity and curiosity for the exotic, the debate over 'literary' opera, the Sturm und Drang movement, the influence of the French Revolution and the Restoration, and the origins of romanticism. The originality of the book arises from the fact that it views the music against the background of social, political, philosophical and cultural trends of the time, rather than relying on detailed analyses of specific works.

Mozart and Masonry - P.Nettl - 1976

This book gave the history of music within the masonic ritual, music supplied by Mozart, and told of how Mozart was received among other masons. Great information on the Magic Flute and attempted sequels thereafter. Great book if you want to know Mozart from another side. As it is only about 130 pages, you will get a lot of information in a short span.

Constanze Mozart: After the Requiem - H.Gärtner - 1991

Analyzing Schubert - S.Clark - 2011

When Schubert's contemporary reviewers first heard his modulations, they famously claimed that they were excessive, odd and unplanned. This book argues that these claims have haunted the analysis of Schubert's harmony ever since, outlining why Schubert's music occupies a curiously marginal position in the history of music theory. Analyzing Schubert traces how critics, analysts and historians from the early nineteenth century to the present day have preserved cherished narratives of wandering, alienation, memory and trance by emphasizing the mystical rather than the logical quality of the composer's harmony. This study proposes a new method for analyzing the harmony of Schubert's works. Rather than pursuing an approach that casts Schubert's famous harmonic moves as digressions from the norms of canonical theoretical paradigms, Suzannah Clark explores how the harmonic fingerprints in Schubert's songs and instrumental sonata forms challenge pedigreed habits of thought about what constitutes a theory of tonal and formal order.

Goethe and Schubert: the unseen bond - K.S.Whitton - 1999

Franz Schubert set 80 of Goethe's poems to music; the resulting lieder are masterpieces of the song literature. Whitton discusses the cultural background of the era, describing Goethe's interest in music and musicians, and Schubert's surprisingly wide knowledge of contemporary literature. Each of the songs is treated, with translation and discussion of the background of both text and music.

Franz Schubert: A Biography - E.Norman - 1999

In his short, tumultuous life, Franz Schubert (1797-1828) produced an astonishing amount of music. Symphonies, chamber music, opera, church music, and songs (more than 600 of them) poured forth in profusion. His "Trout" Quintet, his "Unfinished" Symphony, the last three piano sonatas, and above all his song cycles Die Schone Mullerin and Winterreise have come to be universally regarded as belonging to the very greatest works of music? Who was the man who composed this amazing succession of masterpieces, so many of which were either entirely ignored or regarded as failures during his lifetime? In this new biography, Elizabeth McKay paints a vivid portrait of Schubert and his world. She explores his family background, his education and musical upbringing, his friendships, and his brushes and flirtations with the repressive authorities of Church and State. She discusses his experience of the arts, literature, and theater, and his relations with the professional and amateur musical world of his day. She traces the way Schubert's manic-depression became an increasingly significant influence in his life, responsible at least in part for social inadequacies, professional ineptitude, and idiosyncrasies in his music. And she examines Schubert's decline after he contracted syphilis, looking at its effect on his music and emotional life.