The Oboe
The Oboe

Author: Geoffrey Vernon Burgess

Publisher: Yale University Press

Published: 2004-01-01

Total Pages: 444

ISBN-13: 9780300093179

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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.

The Imagination of Experiences
The Imagination of Experiences

Author: Alan Taylor

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2021-02-03

Total Pages: 114

ISBN-13: 1000374726

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Aimed at lay, student, and academic readers alike, this book concerns the imagination and, specifically, imagination in music. It opens with a discussion of the invalidity of the idea of the creative genius and the connected view that ideas originate just in the individual mind. An alternative view of the imaginative process is then presented, that ideas spring from a subconscious dialogue activated by engagement in the world around. Ideas are therefore never just of our own making. This view is supported by evidence from many studies and corresponds with descriptions by artists of their experience of imagining. The third subject is how imaginations can be shared when musicians work with other artists, and the way the constraints imposed by trying to share subconscious imagining result in clearly distinct forms of joint working. The final chapter covers the use of the musical imagination in making meanings from music. The evidence is that music does not communicate meanings directly, and so composers or performers cannot be looked to as authorities on its meaning. Instead, music is commonly heard as analogous to human experience, and listeners who perceive such analogies may then imagine their own meanings from the music.

Oboe Unbound
Oboe Unbound

Author: Libby Van Cleve

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield

Published: 2014-10-16

Total Pages: 143

ISBN-13: 0810886723

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After decades of experimentation, musicians have begun to utilize a strikingly colorful palette of sounds on woodwind instruments. Flute, clarinet, and saxophone players, in many different musical settings, regularly use sounds that were unheard of in the middle of the twentieth century. Oboists, in comparison, have lagged somewhat behind their more adventurous colleagues. In writing Oboe Unbound: Contemporary Techniques, author Libby Van Cleve opens up the tradition-bound assumptions of the instrument’s capabilities. Not only does she include descriptions of the instrument’s standard technique from range and reeds to the use of vibrato, but she also discusses recent techniques, such as multiphonics, microtones, altered timbres, and extended range, to name a few. Van Cleve bolsters this book with numerous music examples and professionally-tested fingering charts, and concludes with basic information about the use of electronics for amplification, recording, and sound enhancement. The book’s appendixes include a substantial bibliography of music and literature and a discography including jazz, non-western, and art music recordings. The revised edition incorporates new information about resources now available through the internet and marks the launch of a website that includes examples of all the contemporary sounds as well as audio and video recordings of unreleased compositions.

American Mavericks
American Mavericks

Author: Susan Key

Publisher: Univ of California Press

Published: 2001

Total Pages: 170

ISBN-13: 9780520233058

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Inspired by the San Francisco Symphony's highly successful American music festival last June, this book and its accompanying CD provide an entertaining survey of some of America's best-known composers--all of them controversial in their day.

The Muse that Sings
The Muse that Sings

Author: Ann McCutchan

Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA

Published: 2003

Total Pages: 282

ISBN-13: 9780195168129

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The Muse That Sings is a unique behind-the-scenes look at both twentieth-century music and the nuts and bolts of creative work. Here, twenty-five of America's leading composers--from Adams to Zorn, from Bolcom to Vierk--talk candidly about their craft, their motivations, their difficulties, and how they how proceed from musical idea to finished composition. While focusing on the process and the stories behind specific works, the composers also touch on topics that will interest anyone involved in creative work. They discuss teachers and mentors, the task of revision, relationships with performers, and the ongoing struggle for a balance between freedom and discipline. They reveal sources of inspiration, artistic goals, and the often unexpected ways their musical ideas develop. Some describe personal tonal systems; others discuss the impact of computers and other electronic tools on their work; still others reflect philosophically on the inner impulses and outer influences that continue to drive them. While serious music has a reputation for being difficult and inaccessible, The Muse That Sings provides a powerful antidote. The composers in this book speak clearly and thoughtfully in response to key questions of concern to all readers interested in contemporary music. Each interview has been edited to stand alone as a concise meditation on muse and technique, and the book includes selected discographies as well as brief biographical sketches. Anyone with an interest in twentieth-century music or in the creative process will find this lively collection a valuable source of inspiration and insight.

Making Music Together
Making Music Together

Author: James Freeman

Publisher: Page Publishing Inc

Published: 2022-01-14

Total Pages: 410

ISBN-13: 1662440456

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This book is the result of our love for music, for our families, our musical colleagues, and even our dogs. The story is by no means chronological, though after a "Prelude," it does follow very loosely accounts of our youth, our education, our musical experiences, and adventures. Those experiences have included playing with the Pittsburgh Symphony, the Boston Pops, Peter Nero's Philly Pops, our concerts in Moscow (in the midst of a revolution), St. Petersburg, Carnegie Hall, the Salzburg Festival, Havana, Puerto Rico, Mexico, Japan, Taiwan, Slovenia, Denmark, Norway, Italy, England, Germany, Peru, and the Library of Congress. It is also a history of Orchestra 2001, the Swarthmore College- and Philadelphia-based contemporary music ensemble I founded and directed from 1988 to 2015. It includes in the appendices a complete list of O2001's concerts, repertoire, and recordings, as well as highlights and critical commentary about many of those performances and CDs.