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Contemporary Composers On Contemporary Music

Contemporary Composers On Contemporary Music
By Elliott Schwartz, Barney Childs, Jim Fox

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Product Description

This anthology of essays, interviews, and autobiographical pieces provides an invaluable overview of the evolution of contemporary music—from chromaticism, serialism, and indeterminacy to jazz, vernacular, electronic, and non-Western influences. Featuring classic essays by Stravinsky, Stockhausen, and Reich, as well as writings by lesser-known but equally innovative composers such as Jack Beeson, Richard Maxfield, and T. J. Anderson, this collection covers a broad range of styles and approaches. Here you will find Busoni's influential "Sketch of a New Esthetic of Music"; Partch's exploration of a new notation system; Babbitt's defense of advanced composition in his controversial "Who Cares If You Listen?"; and Pauline Oliveros's meditations on sound. Now updated with fifteen new composers including Michael Tippet, György Ligeti, Gunther Schuller, Ben Johnston, Sofia Gubaidulina, and William Bolcom, this important book gathers together forty-nine pieces—many out of print and some newly written for this volume—which serve as a documentary history of twentieth-century music, in theory and practice. Impassioned, provocative, and eloquent, these writings are as exciting and diverse as the music they discuss.

Product Details

  • Amazon Sales Rank: #786707 in Books
  • Published on: 1998-03-21
  • Original language: English
  • Number of items: 1
  • Binding: Paperback
  • 510 pages

Features

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review
Contemporary Composers on Contemporary Music first appeared in 1967 and immediately became a standard for those with an interest in what--in our time--has come to be known as "music of our time." Even three decades ago it was a bit disingenuous to call some of these interviews and essays "contemporary"; it's been a while since Ferruccio Busoni (1866-1924), Claude Debussy (1862-1918), or Erik Satie (1866-1925) could properly be thought of as contemporary or even recent. A better title back then and certainly now might have been 20th-Century Composers on 20th-Century Music. Still, Debussy's section is invaluable, not least for its humor, and if there are a few musical frauds represented in these pages, there is also plenty of useful information and insight into the thought processes of significant composers of the last few decades. But a number of important composers, including Philip Glass, are noticeably absent while far more obscure musicians get the full treatment. The editors' tastes run to serialism, electronic music, and other more dissonant, less traditionalist, and less tonal trends. And since the range of contributors is broad, the quality of the essays and interviews is at times inconsistent. Still, particularly with this expanded edition, Contemporary Composers on Contemporary Music remains an important work for those concerned with what the editors call "new attitudes" in serious music. --Sarah Bryan Miller

About the Author

Elliott Schwartz has been a featured guest composer throughout the U.S. and Europe, and has held extended residencies at the University of California, Ohio State University, and Cambridge University. He is the author of Music Since 1945: Issues, Materials, and Literature (with Daniel Godfrey) and is the Robert K. Beckwith Professor of Music at Bowdoin College. Barney Childs is the cofounder of Advance Recordings, former poetry editor of Genesis West, and a contributor to Perspectives of New Music and other journals. His music has been performed at the ONCE Festival and Tanglewood. He is Professor Emeritus at Johnston College, University of Redlands. Jim Fox is a Los Angeles-based composer and co-publisher of Silman-James Press.

Customer Reviews

Comprehensive but not enough; non-selective3
This ambitious work attempts a comprehensive view of XX Century music as expressed by the composers. Some chapters are esthetically nauseating (e.g. the chapters concerning a couple of straight-line Soviet composers, and some Western charlatans as well), but the historical value of these texts is undeniable. At last could I read the "scandalous" text by Babbit "Who cares if you listen?" However, it seems that in many cases the Editors just put together what was readily available instead of trying further to obtain what would be desirable to publish. Considering that this reviewed edition was published in 1998 maybe some younger composers with appreciable international projection could have been included (e.g. Rihm, Essl). Some very important composers are missing (Berio, Messiaen, Boulez).

Contemporary Composers on Contemporary Music5
A very nice compilation of essays, speeches, and excerpts. Definitely worth a read if you're interested in composition, later 20th century music, or just music in general. Some essays are insightful, and some are... not, but that's to be expected when you get artists together into one "place."