"The Premier Oboist of Europe": A Portrait of Gustave Vogt describes the life and achievements of the most prolific composer of oboe music in the nineteenth century. This book attempts to stimulate appreciation of Gustave Vogt (1781-1870) as musician and historical personality. It brings together portraiture, personal correspondence, concert reviews, autographs, and countless other documents including Vogt's Conservatoire exam reports, a detailed work list of Vogt's compositions, and the first complete transcription and translation of his unpublished oboe method. Despite his exceptional career and the seminal position in the history of the oboe, Vogt's long and active career have been largely passed over. He is remembered primarily for being the teacher of oboists who took up posts in France and England. In truth, however, during his long life Vogt witnessed huge transformations, affecting not only musical fashion but the social fabric of the world about him. After being trained at the Paris Conservatoire, he earned considerable repute from his appearances in concert hall and salon. Like most artists of his day, Vogt performed his own compositions but was also praised for his skill as a chamber musician, most notably in the wind quintet that premiered the works of Anton Reicha. As well as reawakening appreciation of a musician, known in his day as Europe's greatest oboist, this book posits an alternative viewpoint by writing history from the perspective of a musician caught up in the flow of his times-an extraordinary personality who was representative of the place and time in which he lived, rather than an exception to them.

The oboe, including its earlier forms the shawm and the hautboy, is an instrument with a long and rich history. In this book two distinguished oboist-musicologists trace that history from its beginnings to the present time, discussing how and why the oboe evolved, what music was written for it, and which players were prominent. Geoffrey Burgess and Bruce Haynes begin by describing the oboe's prehistory and subsequent development out of the shawm in the mid-seventeenth century. They then examine later stages of the instrument, from the classical hautboy to the transition to a keyed oboe and eventually the Conservatoire-system oboe. The authors consider the instrument's place in Romantic and Modernist music and analyze traditional and avant-garde developments after World War II. Noting the oboe's appearance in paintings and other iconography, as well as in distinctive musical contexts, they examine what this reveals about the instrument's social function in different eras. Throughout the book they discuss the great performers, from the pioneers of the seventeenth century to the traveling virtuosi of the eighteenth, the masters of the romantic period and the legends of the twentieth century such as Gillet, Goossens, Tabuteau, and Holliger. With its extensive illustrations, useful technical appendices, and discography, this is a comprehensive and authoritative volume that will be the essential companion for every woodwind student and performer.

What is rhetorical music? In The Pathetick Musician, Bruce Haynes and Geoffrey Burgess illustrate the vital place of rhetoric and eloquent expression in the creation and performance of Baroque music. Through engaging explorations of the cantatas of J.S. Bach, the authors explode the conventional notion of historical authenticity in music, proposing adventurous new directions to reinvigorate the performance of early music in the modern setting. Along the way, Haynes and Burgess investigate intersections between music and oratory, dance, gesture, poetry, painting and sculpture, and offer insights into figural elaboration, articulation, nuance and temporality. Aimed primarily at performers of Baroque music, the book situates the study of performance practice in a broader cultural context, and as much as an invaluable resource for advanced study, it contains a wealth of information that pertains directly to anyone working in the field of early music. Based on a draft sketched by celebrated Baroque oboist and early music scholar Bruce Haynes before his death in 2011, The Pathetick Musician is the fruit of the combined wisdom of two musicians renowned equally for their contributions as performers and scholars. Drawing on an impressive array of Classical treatises on oratory, musical autographs and performance accounts, it is an essential companion to Haynes' controversial The End of Early Music. Geoffrey Burgess has taken up the broader claims of Haynes' philosophy to create a practical, accessible text that will be stimulating for all musicians interested in the rediscovery of early music. With copious musical examples, contemporaneous works of art, and a companion website with supplementary audio recordings, The Pathetick Musician is an invaluable resource for all interested in exploring new expressive possibilities in the performance and study of Baroque music.