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Books > Music > Musical instruments & instrumental ensembles
In this book, Julian Hellaby presents a detailed study of English
piano playing and career management as it was in the middle years
of the twentieth century. Making regular comparisons with early
twenty-first-century practice, the author examines career-launching
mechanisms, such as auditions and competitions, and investigates
available means of career sustenance, including artist management,
publicity outlets, recital and concerto work, broadcasts,
recordings and media reviews. Additionally, Hellaby considers
whether a mid-twentieth-century school of English piano playing may
be identified and, if so, whether it has lasted into the early
decades of the twenty-first century. The author concludes with an
appraisal of the state of English pianism in recent years and
raises questions about its future. Drawing on extensive research
from a wide variety of primary and secondary sources, this book is
structured around case-studies of six pianists who were commencing
and then developing their careers between approximately 1935 and
1970. The professional lives and playing styles of Malcolm Binns,
Peter Katin, Moura Lympany, Denis Matthews, Valerie Tryon and David
Wilde are examined, and telling comparisons are made between the
state of affairs then and that of more recent times. Engagingly
written, the book is likely to appeal to professional and amateur
pianists, piano teachers, undergraduate and postgraduate music
students, academics and anyone with an interest in the history of
pianists, piano performance and music performance history in
general.
Recent scholarship has vanquished the traditional perception of
nineteenth-century Britain as a musical wasteland. In addition to
attempting more balanced assessments of the achievements of British
composers of this period, scholars have begun to explore the web of
reciprocal relationships between the societal, economic and
cultural dynamics arising from the industrial revolution, the
Napoleonic wars, and the ever-changing contours of British music
publishing, music consumption, concert life, instrument design,
performance practice, pedagogy and composition. Muzio Clementi
(1752-1832) provides an ideal case-study for continued exploration
of this web of relationships. Based in London for much of his life,
whilst still maintaining contact with continental developments,
Clementi achieved notable success in a diversity of activities that
centred mainly on the piano. The present book explores Clementi's
multivalent contribution to piano performance, pedagogy,
composition and manufacture in relation to British musical life and
its international dimensions. An overriding purpose is to
interrogate when, how and to what extent a distinctive British
musical culture emerged in the early nineteenth century. Much
recent work on Clementi has centred on the Italian National Edition
of his complete works (MiBACT); several chapters report on this
project, whilst continuing to pursue the book's broader themes.
The revised edition for Suzuki Violin School, Volume 6 is now
available. Like the other revised violin books, the music has been
edited by the International Violin Committee. Titles: La Folia (A.
Corelli/S. Suzuki), Sonata No. 3 in F Major, HWV 370 (G. F.
Handel), Allegro (J.-H. Fiocco), Gavotte (J. Ph. Rameau), Sonata
No. 4 in D Major, HWV 371 (G. F. Handel) Other features include: *
New engravings in a more easily readable 9 x 12 format * New
editing of pieces, including bowings and fingerings * Available
together with the newly recorded CD for $19.99 * CD by William
Preucil, Concertmaster of the Cleveland Orchestra * Piano
accompaniments recorded by Linda Perry.
This companion volume to The Courtly Consort Suite in
German-Speaking Europe surveys an area of music neglected by modern
scholars: the consort suites and dance music by musicians working
in the seventeenth-century German towns. Conditions of work in the
German towns are examined in detail, as are the problems posed by
the many untrained travelling players who were often little more
than beggars. The central part of the book explores the
organisation, content and assembly of town suites into carefully
ordered printed collections, which refutes the concept of the
so-called 'classical' suite. The differences between court and town
suites are dealt with alongside the often-ignored variation suite
from the later decades of the seventeenth century and the separate
suite-writing traditions of Leipzig and Hamburg. While the
seventeenth-century keyboard suite has received a good deal of
attention from modern scholars, its often symbiotic relationship
with the consort suite has been ignored. This book aims to redress
the balance and to deal with one very important but often ignored
aspect of seventeenth-century notation: the use of blackened notes,
which are rarely notated in a meaningful way in modern editions,
with important implications for performance.
The viola da gamba was a central instrument in European music from
the late 15th century well into the late 18th. In this
comprehensive study, Bettina Hoffmann offers both an introduction
to the instrument -- its construction, technique and history -- for
the non-specialist, interweaving this information with a wealth of
original archival scholarship that experts will relish. The book
begins with a description of the instrument, and here Hoffmann
grapples with the complexity of various names applied to this and
related instruments. Following two chapters on the instrument's
construction and ancestry, the core of the book is given to a
historical and geographical survey of the instrument from its
origins into the classical period. The book closes with a look at
the revival of interest in the 19th and 20th centuries.
This book takes as its historical point of departure the radical
appearance in 1779 of technically difficult keyboard music in a set
of six sonatas (Op. 2) by Muzio Clementi. The difficult passages
contained in this opus are unique amongst keyboard music published
for a market that was understood at the time to consist almost
entirely of female amateur keyboardists. Previously actively
discouraged from practicing or improving their skills due to the
restrictive ideologies in place, Clementi's music increasingly
affords female pianists a new kind of musical expression. Clementi
and the woman at the piano: Virtuosity and the market for music in
eighteenth-century London maps the social, musical, and gendered
implications of technically difficult music and helps to underline
important changes in Enlightenment culture and keyboard practice.
Clementi's activities initiated the now familiar and modern
concepts of repetitive musical practice, the work-concept,
virtuosity itself, and the division between amateur and
professional. Additionally, Clementi promotes a radical new mode of
expression for female pianists that is at first highly
controversial but slowly gains acceptance due to a widespread
promotion of his music, instruments, and methods. Clementi's career
is in many respects a perfect case study for the tensions between
Enlightenment thinking and new Romantic ideologies.
A fascinating history of the piano explored through 100 pieces
chosen by one of the UK's most renowned concert pianists "Tomes . .
. casts her net widely, taking in chamber music and concertos,
knotty avant-garde masterworks and (most welcome) jazz."-Richard
Fairman, Financial Times, "Best Books of 2021: Classical Music"
"[One of] the most beautiful books I got my hands on this year. . .
. About the shaping of this maddening, glorious, unconquerable
instrument."-Jenny Colgan, Spectator, "Books of the Year" An
astonishingly versatile instrument, the piano allows just two hands
to play music of great complexity and subtlety. For more than two
hundred years, it has brought solo and collaborative music into
homes and concert halls and has inspired composers in every musical
genre-from classical to jazz and light music. Charting the
development of the piano from the late eighteenth century to the
present day, pianist and writer Susan Tomes takes the reader with
her on a personal journey through 100 pieces including solo works,
chamber music, concertos, and jazz. Her choices include composers
such as Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Robert Schumann, Tchaikovsky,
Debussy, Gershwin, and Philip Glass. Looking at this history from a
modern performer's perspective, she acknowledges neglected women
composers and players including Fanny Mendelssohn, Maria
Szymanowska, Clara Schumann, and Amy Beach.
for solo violin and orchestra or piano This serene romance is one
of Vaughan Williams's most enduring popular works. Taking its title
from a poem by George Meredith, the music perfectly evokes the
lark's 'chirrup, whistle, slur, and shake'. This beautifully
presented new edition of the violin and piano score includes a
preface by Michael Kennedy.
(Faber Piano Adventures ). Writing Book C (the companion book for
Lesson Book C) provides 64 colorful, fun-filled pages of writing,
ear-training, and "CLAP for Sightreading" activities. A focus on
reading skips leads students to cross bridges, connect flags, meet
a mouse, and skip to deep-sea treasures, to name just a few Writing
Book C engages children in the lives and melodies of classical
composers introduced in the Lesson Book C. Take part in Haydn's Fun
Facts and Game, make after-dinner music with Mozart, tap
Beethoven's rhythms, and help Tchaikovsky tell the story of a doll
with a broken arm. The valuable educational activities and vibrant
illustrations of My First Piano Adventure are sure to delight the
young beginner and teacher.
This is the first history of the harp in Scotland to be published.
It sets out to trace the development of the instrument from its
earliest appearance on the Pictish stones of the 8th century, to
the present day. Describing the different harps played in the
Highlands and the Lowlands of Scotland, the authors examine the
literary and physical evidence for their use within the Royal
Courts and "big houses" by professional harpers and aristocratic
amateurs. They vividly follow the decline of the wire-strung
clarsach from its links with the hereditary bards of the Highland
chieftains to its disappearance in the 18th century, and the
subsequent attempts at the revival of the small harp during the
19th and 20th centuries. The music played on the harp, and its
links with the great families of Scotland are described. The
authors present, in this book, material which has never before been
brought to light, from unpublished documents, family papers and
original manuscripts. They also make suggestions, based on their
research, about the development and dissemination of the early
Celtic harps and their music. This book, therefore, should be of
great interest, not only to harp players but to historians, to all
musicians in the fields of traditional and early music, and to any
reader who recognises the importance of these beautiful
instruments, and their music, throughout a thousand years of
Scottish culture.
No band would be complete without some kick-ass electric guitar.
"How to Play Electric Guitar" contains everything the new or
intermediate electric player needs to perfect their playing of this
vital instrument. More than a simple how-to-play guitar book, this
great new addition to a best-selling series also shows you how to
use effects, how to adapt to stage and rehearsal amps, how to
record the electric guitar at home on your computer and how to cope
with cables, feedback and dodgy microphones while playing live on
stage. The clear text is accompanied by illustrative photos and
diagrams, and is complemented by some how-to-play basics, selected
scales and modes and useful barre and power chords.
* For undergraduate music majors at colleges, universities, and
conservatories who take the Class Piano course. * The pedagogical
text is on separate pages from the musical content/notation,
creating fewer distractions in the narrative, while helping
students to focus on the music more readily * Includes music by
women, persons of color, and from outside the United States have a
prominent place throughout the textbook. * contains sections on
fundamentals such as scales and arpeggios, as well as sightreading,
keyboard theory, harmonizing melodies, improvising in both
classical and blues styles, score reading, accompanying, and solo,
duet, and ensemble repertoire
In the age of digital music it seems striking that so many of us
still want to produce music concretely with our bodies, through the
movement of our limbs, lungs and fingers, in contact with those
materials and objects which are capable of producing sounds. The
huge sales figures of musical instruments in the global market, and
the amount of time and effort people of all ages invest in
mastering the tools of music, make it clear that playing musical
instruments is an important phenomenon in human life. By combining
the findings made in music psychology and performative
ethnomusicology, Marko Aho shows how playing a musical instrument,
and the pleasure musicians get from it, emerges from an intimate
dialogue between the personally felt body and the sounding
instrument. An introduction to the general aspects of the tactile
resources of musical instruments, musical style and the musician is
followed by an analysis of the learning process of the regional
kantele style of the Perho river valley in Finnish Central
Ostrobothnia.
This book contains valuable material to help players strengthen
their sight-reading skills in preparation for the ABRSM Grade 5
exam. Featuring preparatory exercises that gradually introduce key
new elements encountered at Grade 5, along with a comprehensive
selection of sample sight-reading pieces, More Piano Sight-Reading
supports students with the transition between grades, and
encourages them to integrate sight-reading into their daily
practice. More Piano Sight-Reading is available for ABRSM Grades 1
to 8, offering additional support for the sight-reading
requirements of the current syllabus.
Technology and the Stylistic Evolution of the Jazz Bass traces the
stylistic evolution of jazz from the bass player's perspective.
Historical works to date have tended to pursue a 'top down'
reading, one that emphasizes the influence of the treble
instruments on the melodic and harmonic trajectory of jazz. This
book augments that reading by examining the music's development
from the bottom up. It re-contextualizes the bass and its role in
the evolution of jazz (and by extension popular music in general)
by situating it alongside emerging music technologies. The bass and
its technological mediation are shown to have driven changes in
jazz language and musical style, and even transformed creative
hierarchies in ways that have been largely overlooked. The book's
narrative is also informed by investigations into more commercial
musical styles such as blues and rock, in order to assess how, and
the degree to which, technological advances first deployed in these
areas gradually became incorporated into general jazz praxis.
Technology and the Jazz Bass reconciles technology more thoroughly
into jazz historiography by detailing and evaluating those that are
intrinsic to the instrument (including its eventual
electrification) and those extrinsic to it (most notably evolving
recording and digital technologies). The author illustrates how the
implementation of these technologies has transformed the role of
the bass in jazz, and with that, jazz music as an art form.
Thomas Schuttenhelm provides a detailed account of the events
leading up to and throughout the compositional process associated
with Michael Tippett's Fifth String Quartet and a comprehensive
analysis of the entire quartet. The commentary discusses this work
in the context of Tippett's creative development and places it
within the historical context of the genre of the string quartet.
The commentary includes interviews with the members of the Lindsay
String Quartet, who premiered the work, as well as previously
unpublished letters from the composer and interviews with Tippett
in which he discusses the quartet in detail. Special attention is
given to Tippett's preliminary attempts, which were only recently
discovered (2011) and to the evidence that suggests he altered the
original ending. Included are images from the composer's
sketchbooks and manuscripts, as well as the original beginning and
the altered ending.
Dynamic Group-Piano Teaching provides future teachers of group
piano with an extensive framework of concepts upon which effective
and dynamic teaching strategies can be explored and developed.
Within fifteen chapters, it encompasses learning theory, group
process, and group dynamics within the context of group-piano
instruction. This book encourages teachers to transfer learning and
group dynamics theory into classroom practice. As a piano pedagogy
textbook, supplement for pedagogy classes, or resource for graduate
teaching assistants and professional piano teachers, the book
examines learning theory, student needs, assessment, and specific
issues for the group-piano instructor.
Every day people come together to make music. Whether amateur or
professional, young or old, jazz enthusiasts or rock stars, what is
common to all of these musical groups is the potential to create
communities of musical practice (CoMP). Such communities are
created through practices: ways of engaging, rules, membership,
roles, identities and learning that is both shared through
collective musical endeavour and situated within certain
sociocultural contexts. Ailbhe Kenny investigates CoMP as a rich
model for community engagement, musical participation and
transformation in music education. This book is the first to
produce a valid and reliable in-depth study of music communities
using a community of practice (CoP) framework - in this case
focusing on the social process of musical learning. Employing case
study research within Ireland, three illustrations from particular
sociocultural, genre-specific, economic and geographical contexts
are examined: an adult amateur jazz ensemble, a youth choir, and an
online Irish traditional music web platform. Each case is analysed
as a distinct community and phenomenon offering sharpened
understandings of each sub-culture with specific findings presented
for each community.
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