Chris Walton

Lies and Epiphanies (eBook, ePUB)

Composers and Their Inspiration from Wagner to Berg

• Format: ePub

Produktbeschreibung

Presents case studies of "inspiration" in five composers -- Wagner, Mahler, Furtwängler, R. Strauss, and Berg -- examining how the supposedly extrarational world of creative inspiration intersects with the highly rational world ofmoney and politics.

Lies and Epiphanies offers case studies of "inspiration" in five composers -- Richard Wagner, Gustav Mahler, Wilhelm Furtwängler, Richard Strauss, and Alban Berg. Their own tales of their epiphanies played a determining role in the reception history of their works: the finale of Mahler's Second Symphony was supposedly born of a "lightning bolt" of inspiration at the funeral of Hans von Bülow, while Alban Berg's Violin Concerto was purportedly his direct response to the tragic early death of Alma Mahler's daughter.
Chris Walton looks behind these tales to explore instead the composer's dual role as author and self-commentator, laying bare the fissures and inconsistencieswithin these artists' testimonies and revealing how the putatively extrarational world of creative inspiration intersects with the highly rational world of money and politics. As Walton points out, the composer often imposes on the audience an interpretation of a work and its genesis that is as superficial as the score itself is not. This study seeks to show why.

Chris Walton teaches music history at the Basel University of Music in Switzerland.He is the author of Othmar Schoeck: Life and Works (University of Rochester Press, 2009) and Richard Wagner's Zurich: The Muse of Place (Camden House, 2007).

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Produktdetails

• Verlag: Wits University Press
• Seitenzahl: 180
• Erscheinungstermin: 30. Juni 2014
• Englisch
• ISBN-13: 9781580468442
• Artikelnr.: 56407549

Autorenporträt

Chris Walton is an Honorary Professor at Stellenbosch University. He has written and translated several books on Austro-German and Swiss music.

Inhaltsangabe

Introduction Richard Wagner's Dynastic Dreams Gustav Mahler's Resurrection
and the Apostolic Succession Of Forked Tongues and Angels: Alban Berg's
Violin Concerto Wilhelm Fürtwangler and the Return of the Muse Here Comes
the Sunset: The Late and the Last Works of Richard Strauss Postlude: The
Telephone Call Notes Bibliography Index