Music And Criticism (Paperback)

MUSIC AND CRITICISM A SYMPOSIUM EDITED BY RICHARD E. FRENCH t, t HARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS Cambridge, Massachusetts 1948 COPYRIGHT, 1948 BY THE PRESIDENT AND FELLOWS OF HARVARD COLLEGE NORWOOD PRESS S. GUSHING CO. BERWICK AND SMITH CO. C. B. FLEMING CQ. NORWOOD, MASSACHUSETTS, U. S. A. r PREFACE The addresses which appear in this small volume were delivered at a Symposium on Music Criticism, held at Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, dur ing the first three days of May, 1947. The meetings and concerts of the Symposium were attended by more than eight hundred guests of the University, representing a variety of musical professions and interests, who came to Cambridge from more than forty states. The Sym posium was conceived, formulated, and executed under the direction of Professor A. Tillman Merrin, Chair man of the Department of Music in Harvard University, and was financed through the generosity of Mrs. A. W. Erickson, Mr. and Mrs. John Nicholas Brown, Profes sor Walter Piston, and the Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge Foundation in the Library of Congress. For further ad vice and assistance, the Department of Music is indebted to Provost Paul H. Buck, to the curators of the Lucius W. Nieman Foundation, to Professors Theodore Spen cer, Paul Sachs, and Harry Levin, and to Mr. William Pinkerton of the Harvard University News Office. It is tempting to allow these papers to speak for them selves, to refrain from any comment whatsoever. Pro fessor Davisons introductory remarks reveal the feel ing of the Department that someone ought to do t JM vi PREFACE something about music criticism, and the titles of the addresses, which were selected by the Department to be delivered in the order inwhich they appear in this volume, indicate the topics which the Department felt could be treated to advantage in such a series of meet ings. The papers of Mr. Forster and Mr. Sessions were to deal with critical problems of a general and philo sophical nature those of Mr. Wind, Mme Samaroff, and Mr. Thomson were to take as their point of departure the discussion of individual works of art from the stand point of the creator, the interpreter, and the audience and those of Mr. Kinkeldey, Mr. Lang, and Mr. Cairns were to treat technical matters of immediate importance. The reader should bear in mind, however, that the Sym posium was conceived not as a sequence of meetings which would give final answers to difficult questions, but as the initial impulse to a succession of thoughts and actions which might contribute to the effectiveness of the music critic in our musical life. This was the specific purpose of the Symposium, and it is worth a preface to state it in plain language because by so doing, attention can be drawn to at least three ideas which are engagingly and disastrously easy to infer First, that the well-trained music critic is the panacea for all our musical ills. This is patent nonsense. The music critic can be effective only in so far as he is a useful member of a society which wants and uses music and though a discussion of music in our society can be approached from the standpoint of the duties and re PREFACE vii sponsibilities of the music critic, the discussion be comes abstract and futile if it fails to consider all the other factors musical and non-musical which affect those duties and responsibilities and vice versa. The com poser, the scientist, and the businessman, toname only three and to understate the case, are of equal importance with the critic in directing a satisfactory musical ex pression. Second, that the music critic can find in these papers a resolution of all his difficulties. This is precisely what he cannot find, search as he will. What he may come upon is a series of ideas and observations which may help him to think more clearly about his profession. But thinking is only a portion of his lot...

General

Imprint:	Read Books
Country of origin:	United Kingdom
Release date:	March 2007
First published:	March 2007
Authors:	Richard Ffrench
Dimensions:	216 x 140 x 11mm (L x W x T)
Format:	Paperback - Trade
Pages:	192
ISBN-13:	978-1-4067-3913-8
Categories:	Books > Arts & Architecture > Music > General Books > Music > General
LSN:	1-4067-3913-8
Barcode:	9781406739138

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