Pleasures of music : an anthology of writing about music and musicians from Cellini to Bernard Shaw / edited & with a new preface by Jacques Barzun.
| Other author/creator | Barzun, Jacques, 1907-2012, editor, writer of preface. |
| Format | Book and Print |
| Edition | First Phoenix edition. |
| Publication Info | Chicago : University of Chicago Press, 1977. |
| Description | x, 371 pages ; 21 cm. |
| Subject(s) |
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| Series | A Phoenix book Phoenix books (Chicago, Ill.) ^A770836 |
| Contents | Preface / Jacques Barzum -- Criticism -- Music at large. Making the rounds / Romain Rolland -- Music with meals / G. K. Chesterton -- The secret power of musick / Robert Burton -- The spirit of jazz / Constant Lambert -- Music is infinite / Sidney Lanier -- The unity of music / Ferruccio Busoni -- Music and nature / Jules Renard and Maurice Ravel -- How music imitates / Thomas De Quincey -- In praise of music / Martin Luther -- The ear is not enough / P. E. Vernon -- Music and the deity / Sir Thomas Browne -- The idea of a song / Philip Heseltine -- Music and drama. The Paris opera in 1760 / Jean-Jacques Rousseau -- Semi-operas / Roger North -- Banish the libretto / Stendhal -- The passionate style / Claudio Monteverdi -- Mangled operas and the star system / Thomas Love Peacock -- A new kind of opera / Beaumarchais -- The greatness of Wagner / Friedrich Nietzsche -- The limits of music / Hector Berlioz -- The composer as psychologist / Camille Saint-Saens -- Bury the programme / W. J. Turner -- Composers and performers. Palestrina / Charles Gounod Johann Sebastian Bach / Romain Rolland -- Lulli and Rameau / Voltaire -- Beethoven's day / Richard Wagner -- The conductor / Claude Debussy -- Handel / Samuel Butler -- Cesar Franck is inspired / Vincent d'Indy -- Sir George Grove and Beethoven / Bernard Shaw -- Chopin a national poet / Franz Liszt -- Mozart and modernism / Eugène Delacroix -- Meyerbeer's achievement / Joseph Mazzini -- The Paris of Berlioz and Liszt / Heinrich Heine -- Wagner as actor / Friedrich Nietzsche -- Rossini's "Barber of Seville" / Stendhal -- The Russian school / Hugo Wolf -- Some premieres. Johann Strauss in London / Ignaz Moscheles -- The First Handel festival / Charles Burney -- Beethoven's "Third" and Fifth" / Various Hands -- First baton in London / Louis Spohr -- La Traviata in Venice / Giuseppe Verdi and Luis Engel -- Boris Godunov / Vladimir Stassov -- Bizet's L'Arlesienne / Lafcadio Hearn -- Brahms' Second Symphony / Eduard Hanslick -- The musical life. Politics and patronage. Art and revolution / George Sand -- Statement to the Soviet / Sergei Prokofiev -- An Interview with the police / Hector Berlioz -- Patron and professional / Moliere -- An opera is rehearsed / Leo Tolstoy -- Coaching the aspirant / James Agate -- When to applaud / Hugo Wolf -- Rameau's nephew / Denis Diderot -- What gives us pause / Bernard van Dieren and Ferruccio Busoni -- Apropos of instruments. The organ blower's complaint / Thomas Hardy -- The Russian horn / Arthur Schopenhauer -- Of bells / Chateaubriand -- The solitary 'cello / Charles Dickens -- The flute / Hector Berlioz -- An instrument for war and peace / Jeremy Collier -- The concert hall / Frederic Harrison -- The barrel organ / Princess Lieven -- Music on records / B. H. Haggin -- Notes on drums / Tom S. Wotton -- The orchestra / Anonymous -- Fantasies and confessions. Sonata form in food / W. F. Apthorp -- The Prayer from Moses / Gioacchino Rossini -- Musical memories / Leigh Hunt -- The value of a deaf left ear / Jean-Paul Richter -- My taste in classics / P.I. Tchaikovsky -- Music and my father / Benvenuto Cellini and Michel de Montaigne -- A cantata, with comments by other hands / Jonathan Swift -- Musical brows / Rudolf Kassner -- My life and works / Modeste Moussorgsky -- Sing for your life / Brillat-Savarin -- Correspondence. Johann Sebastian Bach ; Lord Chesterfield ; Empress Maria Theresa and Count de Mercy-Argenteau ; The Mozarts ; Christoph Willibald Gluck ; Joseph Haydn ; Napoleon ; Lord Byron ; Ludwig van Beethoven ; Thomas Lovell Beddoes ; The Mendelssohns ; Robert Schumann ; Johann Wolfgang von Goethe ; Niccolò Paganini ; Johannes Brahms ; Charles Baudelaire ; Emmanuel Chabrier ; Sydney Smith ; Giuseppe Verdi ; Franz Schubert -- Maxims and good stories. Wisdom and faith -- Derision and invective -- Taradiddle -- Classic tales -- Envoy. |
| Abstract | In the course of his own wide reading, the editor discovered many enlightening comments on music written by men of intellect, talent, and wit. His enjoyment of these works suggested to him that the inherent pleasures of music are enhanced by reading about the subject. In this classic anthology of brilliant and entertaining writing, the editor has provided excerpts with the discerning taste of a true connoisseur. The wide range of his selections suggests the surprising harmonies of literature, music, and art. It includes criticism by Burney, Constance Lambert, Chesterton, De Quincey, and Luther; letters by individuals as disparate as Jefferson and Maria Theresa, Goethe and Napoleon, the Mozarts and the Schumanns; eulogies of Palestrina by Gounod, of Beethoven by Wagner, of Chopin by Liszt, of Mozart by Delacroix, of Rossini by Stendhal. The sensitive critic, the perceptive listener, the lover of words and music will find this one of the most diverse and diverting collections of writings on music. It is a browsing book for people who approach the arts with wit and insight. More important, it is for the civilized individual who understands and values tradition. |
| General note | Abridgement of the 1951 edition. |
| Bibliography note | Includes bibliographical references (pages 365-371). |
| LCCN | 77073691 |
| ISBN | 0226038564 |
| ISBN | 9780226038568 |
| ISBN | 0226038548 (pbk.) |
| ISBN | 9780226038544 (pbk.) |
Available Items
| Library | Location | Call Number | Status | Item Actions | |
| Music | Music Stacks | ML55 .B285 1977 | ✔ Available | Place Hold |