| Abstract |
Though known chiefly as a writer of novels and stories, Paul Bowles thought of himself first and foremost as a composer. Drawing together the work he did at the intersection of his two passions and professions, writing and music, this volume collects the music criticism the author published between 1935 and 1946, with an interview conducted by Irene Herrmann shortly before his death. An intimate of Aaron Copland and a protege of Virgil Thomson, the author was a musical sophisticate acquainted with an enormous range of music. The criticism collected here--the author published first in Modern Music and later in the New York Herald Tribune--brilliantly illuminates not only the whole range of modernist composition but also film scores, jazz, Mexican and Moroccan music, and many other genres. As a reviewer he reports on established artists and young hopefuls, symphonic concerts indoors and out, and important premieres of works by Copland, Thomson, Cage, Shostakovich, and Stravinsky, among others. These reviews, written with the austere grace of the author's better-known literary works, enhance our picture of an important era in American music history as well as our sense of the author's own accomplishments and his extraordinary contribution to twentieth-century culture. |
