This is the first individual study of Beethoven's Violin Concerto. It explores the work's background and the influences that combined in its creation, and describes its indifferent initial reception. It considers the numerous textual problems that confront the performer, including discussion of Beethoven's adaptation for piano and orchestra. Following a detailed synopsis of the work itself, a final section reviews the wide variety of cadenzas that have been written to complement the concerto throughout its performance history.

Bartók's Concerto for Orchestra has proven to be one of the most popularly successful concert works of the twentieth century. It is seen by its champions as an example of Bartók's seamless blend of Eastern European folk music and Western art music, and by its detractors as indicative of the composer's artistic compromise. This book contains a discussion of the historical and musical contexts of the piece, its early performance history and critical reception. It also includes the first complete movement-by-movement synopsis of the Concerto, as well as detailed technical information about the work.

This edition of Walton's celebrated Viola Concerto (1962 version) has been off-printed from the William Walton Edition full score, and combines the scholarship of the Edition with the practical benefits of the smaller format. An introduction is provided by the volume editor, Christopher Wellington. Orchestral material is available on hire/rental.

This new investigation of the Brandenburg Concertos explores musical, social, and religious implications of Bach's treatment of eighteenth-century musical hierarchies. By reference to contemporary music theory, to alternate notions of the meaning of "concerto," and to various eighteenth-century conventions of form and instrumentation, the book argues that the Brandenburg Concertos are better understood not as an arbitrary collection of unrelated examples of "pure" instrumental music, but rather as a carefully compiled and meaningfully organized set. It shows how Bach's concertos challenge (as opposed to reflect) existing musical and social hierarchies.

Careful consideration of Lutheran theology and Bach's documented understanding of it reveals, however, that his music should not be understood to call for progressive political action. One important message of Lutheranism, and, in this interpretation, of Bach's concertos, is that in the next world, the heavenly one, the hierarchies of the present world will no longer be necessary. Bach's music more likely instructs its listeners how to think about and spiritually cope with contemporary hierarchies than how to act upon them. In this sense, contrary to currently accepted views, Bach's concertos share with his extensive output of vocal music for the Lutheran liturgy an essentially religious character.

The story of the National Youth Orchestra of Iraq is here told by its musical director from its inception to its eventual end. The NYOI came through the most difficult and dangerous of times to produce fine music not only in Iraq but also in Britain, Germany, France and the United States. A beacon of hope and achievement the young musicians and their tutors made bridges across their own ethnic divisions, made great music in the most trying and tragic of circumstances, and became their country's best ambassadors in 5000 years.

Described by Walton as the 'greatest symphony since Beethoven', Vaughan Williams's fourth symphony was composed in 1935 and is noted for its abrasively dissonant harmonic language, unlike much of the composer's other work. This new, scholarly edition, edited by David Matthews, will replace the existing OUP edition from 1935 and the Eulenburg edition from 1983. The preliminary text will include a preface, sources and editorial method, and detailed textual notes.

Choral Monuments provides extensive material about eleven epoch-making choral masterworks that span the history of Western culture. Included are: Missa Pange lingua (Josquin Desprez); Missa Papae Marcelli (G. P. da Palestrina); B Minor Mass (J. S. Bach); Messiah (G. F. Handel); The Creation (Joseph Haydn); Symphony #9 (Ludwig van Beethoven); St. Paul (Felix Mendelssohn); Ein deutsches Requiem (Johannes Brahms); Messa da Requiem (Giuseppe Verdi); Mass (Igor Stravinsky); and War Requiem (Benjamin Britten). The works are presented in separate chapters, with each chapter divided into three basic sections-history, analysis, and performance practice. Discussions of history are focused on relevancies-the genesis of the designated work in reference to the composer's total choral output, the work's place within the musical environment and social climate of its time, and essential features of the work that make it noteworthy. In addition, the compositional history addresses three other factors: the work's public reception and critical response, both at the time of its composition and in ensuing years; the history of score publications, detailing the various differences between editions; and the texts of the composition. The material regarding textual treatment, which often includes the complete texts of the works being discussed, concentrates on primary concerns of the text's usage; also included in the discussion are noteworthy aspects of texts separate from the music as well as biographical details of librettists and poets, if appropriate. The analysis section of each chapter outlines and describes musical forms and other types of compositional organization, including parody technique, mirror structures, and motto repetitions, as well as salient compositional characteristics that directly relate and contribute to the work's artistic stature. Numerous charts and musical examples illustrate the discussions. The discussion of performance practices includes primary source quotations about a wide range of topics, from performing forces, tempo, and phrasing of each work to specific issues such as tactus, text underlay, musica ficta, metric accentuation, and ornamentation.

Widely considered a classic, Beyond Talent is the "go to" guide for musicians. This newly revised and updated 3rd edition cracks the code of how to build a creatively fulfilling career in music. With key insights into the mindset issues that often plague musicians, veteran career coach Angela Myles Beeching provides a wealth of strategies, examples, and real-world solutions. Step-by-step instructions detail how to design promotional materials, book performances, fund your projects, and cultivate a community of support so you can manage your career like a pro-without losing your soul. And this edition goes further: it unpacks how to deal head on with the typical "inner" challenges musicians face. From getting past perfectionism and fear, to sustaining motivation, finding your artistic voice, managing projects, time, and money, and setting achievable goals. With her straight-shooting, energizing approach, Beeching presents a wealth of practical solutions to help musicians take charge of their careers and get past the obstacles that have held them back. Whether you're an emerging artist or a mid-career professional, this edition offers the inspiration to transform your music career journey so you can get more of your best work out into the world and finally become the artist you are meant to be. Includes a free downloadable companion workbook.

Conducting is not simply the act of marking beats; it is the much more rich art of communicating emotion, character, and mood through movement to a large group of performers in order to inspire them to create music together. Baton Basics is based on the premise that the most effective and musical forms of conducting are about conveying energy, and that doing so is a fundamentally physical activity. In Baton Basics, conductor Diane Wittry offers a unique approach to teaching conducting through familiar gestures: weight, resistance, and energy, combined with size, beat placement. The end goal is the ability to communicate a better concept of musical sound to the musicians. Wittry demonstrates how conductors can communicate through gestures, by training the muscles of their fingers, hands, wrists, forearms, and full arms. She also provides techniques for releasing body tension, improving posture, and developing a deeper sense of calm on the podium through overall body and breathing exercises. Additionally, she guides the reader on an exploration of the concepts and diagrams of the Musin and Saito conducting methods, and providing innovative suggestions on how to best incorporate these other styles into his or her own technique.
Featuring many detailed drawings and access to over 60 video examples on the companion website, Baton Basics guides conductors away from simply marking beat patterns, and towards a nuanced and phrased musicality that can be communicated to a group of musicians. Baton Basics is a key foundational text for the student and experienced conductor alike, and is must for anyone interested in improving and expanding their vocabulary of conducting gestures.

This book aids the listener in getting beneath the surface of Beethoven's two beloved symphonies.Composers often write pieces in highly contrasting moods in very close proximity. But no composer took this process further than Beethoven. His famous "Fifth Symphony", with an opening familiar to anyone, became the standard for the Romantic, tragedy to triumph, 'victory symphony'. The sunny Sixth however represents a high-water mark of relaxed lyricism. On a superficial listening, they couldn't sound more different from one another. Yet by examining them more closely it is revealed that they have more in common than their emotional trajectories might suggest.This book aids the listener in getting beneath the surface of these two beloved symphonies, revealing that however disparate the expressive message, the language and style remain Beethoven's - a symphonic voice as powerful in struggle and victory as in relaxation and meditation."Magnum Opus" is a series for anyone seeking a greater familiarity with the cornerstones of Western Classical Music - operatic, choral and symphonic. Always passionate, down-to-earth, and authoritative on the works and their creators, "Magnum Opus" is an indispensable resource for anyone's musical library and the perfect gift for the music-lover in your life.

In The Score, The Orchestra, and the Conductor, internationally-renowned conducting instructor Gustav Meier presents his practical approach to preparing an orchestral score for rehearsal and performance. Well-illustrated with numerous music examples, charts, figures, and tables, Meier's methods, grounded in the rich body of his collected experience as a music director and teacher of conducting students, are explained in great detail. Meier covers all aspects of conducting from experimenting without the orchestra to creating signals that produce the desired sound. The methods he describes offer specific and readily applicable advice for virtually every musical and technical decision that occurs in the important phase between when a conductor first decides upon a specific score and the first rehearsal with an orchestra. And from ear training to working with musicians to programming, he also offers his expertise on the day-to-day aspects of conducting and musical performance. The Score, The Orchestra, and the Conductor will be an indispensable and often-read contribution to the library of every music director and conducting student.

The years of the Great Depression, World War II, and their aftermath brought a sea change in American music. This period of economic, social, and political adversity can truly be considered a musical golden age. In the realm of classical music, Aaron Copland, Samuel Barber, Howard Hanson, Virgil Thompson, and Leonard Bernstein among others produced symphonic works of great power and lasting beauty during these troubled years. It was during this critical decade and a half that contemporary writers on American culture began to speculate about "the Great American Symphony" and looked to these composers for music that would embody the spirit of the nation.

In this volume, Nicholas Tawa concludes that they succeeded, at the very least, in producing music that belongs in the cultural memory of every American. Tawa introduces the symphonists and their major works from the romanticism of Barber and the "all-American" Roy Harris through the theatrics of Bernstein and Marc Blitzstein to the broad-shouldered appeal of Thompson and Copland. Tawa's musical descriptions are vivid and personal, and invite music lovers and trained musicians alike to turn again to the marvelous and lasting music of this time."

*Chosen as an Observer Book of the Year 2012!* War is always with us, and so is peace. This is about the peace that comes after a war. It is one woman's account of her experiences in the new country of Bosnia as guest conductor of a remarkable little orchestra, the Mostar Sinfonietta. International violinist Ruth Waterman first met the musicians of the multi-ethnic ensemble in 2002, and since then has returned regularly to the region, teaching, conducting and performing, and listening to their stories. Here she describes the nuts and bolts of daily life - in turn frustrating, hilarious and touching: the putting together of concerts despite the odds; the rebuilding of bridges, towns, communities, lives; and how making music can connect us to our essential humanity and to each other. Ruth Waterman's writing is humane and down-to-earth, perceptive and inspiring. Interspersed with her diaries and observations are the stories of war and peace by the Bosnians themselves, in their own voices, acts of witness that reveal their courage, despair, resilience and humour. This intermingling of narrative, first-hand accounts and photographs builds a mosaic that provides a visceral introduction to an unfamiliar world where people simply want to 'live a normal life'.

From Yakima, Washington, to the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Donald Peck's journey as a flutist has been extraordinary. Here, Peck offers an insider's view of the inner workings of one of the most prestigious orchestras in the country. Peck, like many artists, did not select his path voluntarily, but rather let fate lead him to a career in music. In 1957, he secured a seat with the orchestra as a flutist. Beginning in 1958, Peck garnered the title of principal which he kept until his retirement in 1999.

A memoir filled with stories about life on the road, making recordings, and working with the best musicians and singers in the business, The Right Place, The Right Time is a joy for anyone interested in the life of a dedicated, devoted, and talented artist.

The symphonic orchestra is intriguingly considered in essays by 23 leading music authors and thinkers. The topics include historical beginnings, the role of the conductor, the orchestral audience, the nature of the repertoire, and how recordings have affected the modern orchestra. It comes with a new editor's introduction for this 2006 edition and a glossary of terms.

Sachsische Staatskapelle Dresden is the world's known second oldest orchestra. John Hunt was able to draw on the knowledge of orchestra members in the the creation of this discography. John Hunt was born in Windsor and Graduated from University College London, in German language and literature. He has worked in personnel administration, record retailing and bibliographic research for a government agency and is on the lecture panel of the National Federation of Music Societies. In his capacity as Chairman of the Furtwangler Society UK, John Hunt has attended conventions in Rome, Paris and Zurich and has contributed to important reference works about Furtwangler by John Ardoin and Joachim Matzner. He has also translated from the German Jurgen Kesting's important monograph on Maria Callas. John Hunt has published discographies of over 80 performing artists, several of which have run into two or more editions.

Central to the repertoire of Western art music since the 18th century, the symphony has come to be regarded as one of the ultimate compositional challenges. Surprisingly, heretofore there has been no truly extensive, broad-based treatment of the genre, and the best of the existing studies are now several decades old. In this five-volume series, A. Peter Brown explores the symphony from its 18th-century beginnings to the end of the 20th century. Synthesizing the enormous scholarly literature, Brown presents up-to-date overviews of the status of research, discusses any important former or remaining problems of attribution, illuminates the style of specific works and their contexts, and samples early writings on their reception. The Symphonic Repertoire provides an unmatched compendium of knowledge for the student, teacher, performer, and sophisticated amateur. The series is being launched with two volumes on the Viennese symphony.

Volume IV
The Second Golden Age of the Viennese Symphony
Brahms, Bruckner, Dvorak, Mahler,
and Selected Contemporaries

Although during the mid-19th century the geographic center of the symphony in the Germanic territories moved west and north from Vienna to Leipzig, during the last third of the century it returned to the old Austrian lands with the works of Brahms, Bruckner, Dvorak, and Mahler. After nearly a half century in hibernation, the sleeping Viennese giant awoke to what some viewed as a reincarnation of Beethoven with the first hearing of Brahms s Symphony No. 1, which was premiered at Vienna in December 1876. Even though Bruckner had composed some gigantic symphonies prior to Brahms s first contribution, their full impact was not felt until the composer s complete texts became available after World War II. Although Dvorak was often viewed as a nationalist composer, in his symphonic writing his primary influences were Beethoven, Schubert, and Brahms. For both Bruckner and Mahler, the symphony constituted the heart of their output; for Brahms and Dvorak, it occupied a less central place. Yet for all of them, the key figure of the past remained Beethoven. The symphonies of these four composers, together with the works of Goldmark, Zemlinsky, Schoenberg, Berg, Smetana, Fibich, Janacek, and others are treated in Volume IV, The Second Golden Age of the Viennese Symphony, covering the period from roughly 1860 to 1930."

Central to the repertoire of Western art music since the 18th century, the symphony has come to be regarded as one of the ultimate compositional challenges. Surprisingly, heretofore there has been no truly extensive, broad-based treatment of the genre, and the best of the existing studies are now several decades old. In this five-volume series, A. Peter Brown explores the symphony from its 18th-century beginnings to the end of the 20th century. Synthesizing the enormous scholarly literature, Brown presents up-to-date overviews of the status of research, discusses any important former or remaining problems of attribution, illuminates the style of specific works and their contexts, and samples early writings on their reception. The Symphonic Repertoire provides an unmatched compendium of knowledge for the student, teacher, performer, and sophisticated amateur. The series is being launched with two volumes on the Viennese symphony.

Volume II
The First Golden Age of the Viennese Symphony
Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, and Schubert

Volume II considers some of the best-known and most universally admired symphonies by Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, and Schubert, who created what A. Peter Brown designates as the first golden age of the Viennese symphony during the late 18th and first three decades of the 19th century. The last two dozen symphonies by Haydn, half dozen by Mozart, and three by Schubert, together with Beethoven s nine symphonies became established in the repertoire and provided a standard against which every other symphony would be measured. Most significantly, they imparted a prestige to the genre that was only occasionally rivaled by other cyclic compositions. More than 170 symphonies from this repertoire are described and analyzed in The First Golden Age of the Viennese Symphony, the first volume of the series to appear."

John Hunt was born in Windsor and Graduated from University College London, in German language and literature. He has worked in personnel administration, record retailing and bibliographic research for a government agency and is on the lecture panel of the National Federation of Music Societies. In his capacity as Chairman of the Furtwangler Society UK, John Hunt has attended conventions in Rome, Paris and Zurich and has contributed to important reference works about Furtwangler by John Ardoin and Joachim Matzner. He has also translated from the German Jurgen Kesting's important monograph on Maria Callas. John Hunt has published discographies of over 80 performing artists, several of which have run into two or more editions.

John Hunt was born in Windsor and Graduated from University College London, in German language and literature. He has worked in personnel administration, record retailing and bibliographic research for a government agency and is on the lecture panel of the National Federation of Music Societies. In his capacity as Chairman of the Furtwangler Society UK, John Hunt has attended conventions in Rome, Paris and Zurich and has contributed to important reference works about Furtwangler by John Ardoin and Joachim Matzner. He has also translated from the German Jurgen Kesting's important monograph on Maria Callas. John Hunt has published discographies of over 80 performing artists, several of which have run into two or more editions.

This edition includes the Concert Register. About the compiler: John Hunt was born in Windsor and Graduated from University College London, in German language and literature. He has worked in personnel administration, record retailing and bibliographic research for a government agency and is on the lecture panel of the National Federation of Music Societies. In his capacity as Chairman of the Furtwangler Society UK, John Hunt has attended conventions in Rome, Paris and Zurich and has contributed to important reference works about Furtwangler by John Ardoin and Joachim Matzner. He has also translated from the German Jurgen Kesting's important monograph on Maria Callas. John Hunt has published discographies of over 80 performing artists, several of which have run into two or more editions.

During the nineteenth century, nearly one hundred symphonies were written by over fifty composers living in the United States. With few exceptions, this repertoire is virtually forgotten today. In the award-winning Orchestrating the Nation: The Nineteenth-Century American Symphonic Enterprise, author Douglas W. Shadle explores the stunning stylistic diversity of this substantial repertoire and uncovers why it failed to enter the musical mainstream. Throughout the century, Americans longed for a distinct national musical identity. As the most prestigious of all instrumental genres, the symphony proved to be a potent vehicle in this project as composers found inspiration for their works in a dazzling array of subjects, including Niagara Falls, Hiawatha, and Western pioneers. With a wealth of musical sources at his disposal, including never-before-examined manuscripts, Shadle reveals how each component of the symphonic enterprise-from its composition, to its performance, to its immediate and continued reception by listeners and critics-contributed to competing visions of American identity. Employing an innovative transnational historical framework, Shadle's narrative covers three continents and shows how the music of major European figures such as Beethoven, Schumann, Wagner, Liszt, Brahms, and Dvorak exerted significant influence over dialogues about the future of American musical culture. Shadle demonstrates that the perceived authority of these figures allowed snobby conductors, capricious critics, and even orchestral musicians themselves to thwart the efforts of American symphonists despite widespread public support of their music. Consequently, these works never entered the performing canons of American orchestras. An engagingly written account of a largely unknown repertoire, Orchestrating the Nation shows how artistic and ideological debates from the nineteenth century continue to shape the culture of American orchestral music today.

About the compiler: John Hunt was born in Windsor and Graduated from University College London, in German language and literature. He has worked in personnel administration, record retailing and bibliographic research for a government agency and is on the lecture panel of the National Federation of Music Societies. In his capacity as Chairman of the Furtwangler Society UK, John Hunt has attended conventions in Rome, Paris and Zurich and has contributed to important reference works about Furtwangler by John Ardoin and Joachim Matzner. He has also translated from the German Jurgen Kesting's important monograph on Maria Callas. John Hunt has published discographies of over 80 performing artists, several of which have run into two or more editions.

..". a joy to read." -- Choice

..".spiritedly written... " -- Music and Letters

Although theRussian piano concerto had inauspicious beginnings, its development during the19thcentury laid superb artistic foundations for the monumental concerti of the 20thcentury. Insights gained here will help performers and teachers to understand laterdevelopments in concerto writing.

Before his death in 1994, Norman Del Mar was acknowledged as one of the world's foremost authorities on the orchestra. "Anatomy of the Orchestra" is written not only for fellow conductors, players, students, and professional musicians, but also for everyone interested in the performance of orchestral music.