The 1990s work of six British composers forms the focus of this collection of essays, arising from a conference that took place at University of Surrey Roehampton in February 1999. The composers whose music is discussed are James Dillon, Thomas Ades, Harrison Birtwistle, Jonathan Harvey, Edwin Roxburgh and Sebastian Forbes. Reflecting the aims of the conference, this volume brings together composers and musicologists to discuss significant works from the last decade of the twentieth century, and also some of the wider issues surrounding British music. Arnold Whittall and Julian Johnson provide perspectives on the plurality of contemporary British music. Edwin Roxburgh offers a personal account of 'The Artists' Dilemma', whilst the essays that follow explore aspects of musical form and structure in a variety of works. The second half of the book comprises interviews with most of the composers whose music is discussed in Part I, adding a further dimension to our understanding of the preoccupations of British composition at the end of the twentieth century.

Pierre Boulez's first piano pieces date from his youth, prior to his studies in Paris with Messiaen, and his subsequent meteoric rise to international acclaim as the leader of the musical avant-garde during the 1950s. His most recent published work is a solo piano piece, Une page d'ephemeride, written some sixty years after his first attempts at composition. The piano has remained central to Boulez's creative work throughout his career, and although his renown as a conductor has to some extent overshadowed his other achievements, it was as a performer of his own piano music that his practical gifts first found expression. Peter O'Hagan has given performances of various unpublished piano works by Boulez, including Antiphonie from the Third Sonata and Trois Psalmodies. In this study, he considers Boulez's writing for the piano in the context of the composer's stylistic evolution throughout the course of his development. Each of the principal works is considered in detail, not only on its own terms, but also as a stage in Boulez's ongoing quest to invent radical solutions to the renewal of musical language and to reinvigorate tradition. The volume includes reference to hitherto unpublished source material, which sheds light on his working methods and on the interrelationship between works.

The 1990s work of six British composers forms the focus of this collection of essays, arising from a conference that took place at University of Surrey Roehampton in February 1999. The composers whose music is discussed are James Dillon, Thomas Ades, Harrison Birtwistle, Jonathan Harvey, Edwin Roxburgh and Sebastian Forbes. Reflecting the aims of the conference, this volume brings together composers and musicologists to discuss significant works from the last decade of the twentieth century, and also some of the wider issues surrounding British music. Arnold Whittall and Julian Johnson provide perspectives on the plurality of contemporary British music. Edwin Roxburgh offers a personal account of 'The Artists' Dilemma', whilst the essays that follow explore aspects of musical form and structure in a variety of works. The second half of the book comprises interviews with most of the composers whose music is discussed in Part I, adding a further dimension to our understanding of the preoccupations of British composition at the end of the twentieth century.

Pierre Boulez's first piano pieces date from his youth, prior to his studies in Paris with Messiaen, and his subsequent meteoric rise to international acclaim as the leader of the musical avant-garde during the 1950s. His most recent published work is a solo piano piece, Une page d'ephemeride, written some sixty years after his first attempts at composition. The piano has remained central to Boulez's creative work throughout his career, and although his renown as a conductor has to some extent overshadowed his other achievements, it was as a performer of his own piano music that his practical gifts first found expression. Peter O'Hagan has given performances of various unpublished piano works by Boulez, including Antiphonie from the Third Sonata and Trois Psalmodies. In this study, he considers Boulez's writing for the piano in the context of the composer's stylistic evolution throughout the course of his development. Each of the principal works is considered in detail, not only on its own terms, but also as a stage in Boulez's ongoing quest to invent radical solutions to the renewal of musical language and to reinvigorate tradition. The volume includes reference to hitherto unpublished source material, which sheds light on his working methods and on the interrelationship between works.

Pierre Boulez is acknowledged as one of the most important composers in contemporary musical life. This collection explores his works, influence, reception and legacy, shedding new light on Boulez's music and its historical and cultural contexts. In two sections that focus firstly on the context of the 1940s and 1950s, and secondly on the development of the composer's style, the contributors address recurring themes such as Boulez's approach to the serial principle and the related issues of form and large-scale structure. Featuring excerpts from Boulez's correspondence with a range of his contemporaries here published for the first time, the book illuminates both Boulez's relationship with them and his thinking concerning the challenges which confronted both him and other leading figures of the European avant-garde. In the final section, three chapters examine Boulez's relationship with audiences in the United Kingdom, and the development of the appreciation of his music.