Grazyna Bacewicz, The 'First Lady of Polish Music'

Grazyna Bacewicz, The 'First Lady of Polish Music'

Author: Diana Ambache

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2022-08-18

Total Pages: 171

ISBN-13: 1108910300

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This Element explores the life and work of Grażyna Bacewicz (1909-1969), as a composer, violinist, pianist and author. She lived a remarkable life in Poland, navigating the complex world of Polish communist society and Soviet dominance after the Second World War, and brought Polish music to wider European attention. The Element describes the historical context of her life, her major achievements, and the language and development of her compositions, which attracted notable interest in Polish musical life. She wrote a wide range of pieces, making a significant contribution to the string repertoire, with important String Quartets and violin works. In her sixty years she achieved impressive triumphs as a women composer, served the Polish Composers Union and often judged major international competitions.


The Life and Work of Rudolf Bruči

The Life and Work of Rudolf Bruči

Author: Ivana Medić

Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing

Published: 2021-10-15

Total Pages: 225

ISBN-13: 1527576132

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This volume is the first collection of essays in English devoted to the work of the outstanding Yugoslavian composer Rudolf Bruči. It approaches Bruči’s work from a remarkably broad number of angles, and the chapters underline that fact that his work was multivalent. The book emphasizes his wider relevance in the ever-expanding field of musicology dealing with the fascinatingly diverse outputs produced in the Balkans in general, but reminds us of the considerable international reputation that the composer enjoyed far beyond the borders of the former Yugoslavia. Bruči’s creative mind was extraordinarily wide-ranging, and this text also explores his engagement with the wider culture around him. In the context of post-war Yugoslavia, an artist was also a cultural worker, expected to carry out many duties, and contribute to the advancement of the country’s self-governing socialist society.


The Life and Works of Andrzej Panufnik (1914–1991)

The Life and Works of Andrzej Panufnik (1914–1991)

Author: Beata Boles?awska

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2017-07-05

Total Pages: 350

ISBN-13: 1351542923

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Sir Andrzej Panufnik was born in Warsaw and studied in the newly independent Poland in the 1930s, as well as in Vienna and Paris just before the outbreak of the Second World War. During the German occupation he formed a piano duo with his friend and fellow composer Witold Lutoslawski, and they performed in caf around Warsaw. After the war, Panufnik quickly established himself as a leading Polish composer, and as a conductor he played a significant role in the re-establishment of first the Krak nd then the Warsaw Philharmonic. Although he was considered Polands leading composer for some years after the war, Panufnik was subsequently put under intolerable pressure both musically and politically. Frustrated by the continuing rejection of his compositions and the unending political demands inflicted on him by the country‘s post-war Communist regime, he made a daring escape to England in 1954. He briefly became Principal Conductor of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, a post he relinquished after two years to devote all his time to composition. His works were in demand by major figures such as Leopold Stokowski who conducted the first performances of Sinfonia Elegiaca, Katyn Epitaph and Universal Prayer, Yehudi Menuhin who commissioned the Violin Concerto, Seiji Ozawa in Boston and Sir Georg Solti in Chicago who both commissioned symphonies for the centenaries of their famous orchestras; also Mstislav Rostropovich with the London Symphony Orchestra, who together commissioned the Cello Concerto. Beata Boleslawska has written the first book on the life and artistic output of Panufnik, setting his significance alongside the political and cultural scene of twentieth-century Europe. The account of the composer‘s life is based on numerous archival documents, as well as the personal accounts contributed by his family and friends. Panufnik‘s compositional style and techniques are also analysed. This book will be of interest not only to those devoted


The Contribution of Grażyna Bacewicz (1909-1969) to Polish Music

The Contribution of Grażyna Bacewicz (1909-1969) to Polish Music

Author: Sharon Guertin Shafer

Publisher: Edwin Mellen Press

Published: 1992

Total Pages: 108

ISBN-13:

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The music of Grazyna Bacewicz occupies an important place in the 20th century. Though she wrote more than 200 compositions, from the symphonic cycle down to the single movement art song, it is her large compositional forms that have received the most attention, both in performance and analysis. This work provides an analysis of 12 songs written by Bacewicz between 1934 and 1956. They are analyzed with a consideration of text setting, melodic line and vocal range, formal structure, harmony, texture and tonality. An English translation of each Polish poem is also included.


The Woman Composer

The Woman Composer

Author: Jill Halstead

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2017-07-05

Total Pages: 285

ISBN-13: 1351539434

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Unlike previous anthologizing examinations of women and musical composition, this book concentrates on the reasons why there have been, and continue to be, so few women composers. Jill Halstead focuses on the experiences of nine composers born in the twentieth century (Avril Coleridge Taylor, Grace Williams, Elizabeth Maconchy, Minna Keal, Ruth Gipps, Antoinette Kirkwood, Enid Luff, Judith Bailey and Bryony Jagger) to explore the physiological, social and political factors that have inhibited women from pursuing careers as composers. Is there a biological argument for inferior female creativity? Do social structures, such as marriage, serve to restrict potential women composers? Is the gender of a composer reflected in the music they write? If so, how would this manifest itself? The conclusions that are reached are as complex and challenging as the questions that are raised. This powerful and provocative book aims to open up debate on these issues, which have all too often be avoided by critics and musicologists whose writings have perpetuated arguments that denigrate women's ability to compose. By confronting these arguments, this study will hopefully begin a reassessment of attitudes towards women and music, so that women composers are less of a rarity by the end of the next century.


Chamber Music

Chamber Music

Author: John H Baron

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2010-06-10

Total Pages: 797

ISBN-13: 1135848289

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Chamber Music: A Research and Information Guide is a reference tool for anyone interested in chamber music. It is not a history or an encyclopedia but a guide to where to find answers to questions about chamber music. The third edition adds nearly 600 new entries to cover new research since publication of the previous edition in 2002. Most of the literature is books, articles in journals and magazines, dissertations and theses, and essays or chapters in Festschriften, treatises, and biographies. In addition to the core literature obscure citations are also included when they are the only studies in a particular field. In addition to being printed, this volume is also for the first time available online. The online environment allows for information to be updated as new research is introduced. This database of information is a "live" resource, fully searchable, and with active links. Users will have unlimited access, annual revisions will be made and a limited number of pages can be downloaded for printing.


String Quartets

String Quartets

Author: Mara Parker

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2013-05-13

Total Pages: 514

ISBN-13: 1135848343

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This research guide is an annotated bibliography of sources dealing with the string quartet. This second edition is organized as in the original publication (chapters for general references, histories, individual composers, aspects of performance, facsimiles and critical editions, and miscellaneous topics) and has been updated to cover research since publication of the first edition. Listings in the previous volume have been updated to reflect the burgeoning interest in this genre (social aspects, newly issued critical editions, doctoral dissertations). It also offers commentary on online links, databases, and references.


Lutoslawski on Music

Lutoslawski on Music

Author: Witold Lutosławski

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield

Published: 2007

Total Pages: 372

ISBN-13: 081084804X

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The writings of twentieth-century Polish composer Witold Lutoslawski reveal many important aspects of his approach to music and his viewpoints as an artist and as a man. In Lutoslawski on Music, the first full collection of writings by this famous composer, Zbigniew Skowron has amassed an exciting assortment of essays, speeches, lectures, and articles, many of which are newly translated in English and previously unpublished. After an introductory autobiography, the writings, grouped in five parts, illustrate various aspects of the composer's creativity, and discuss musical form, compositional technique, and perception. Lutoslawski examines his own works as well as those of other composers, and expresses his views on crucial aspects of twentieth-century music, including the role of Schoenberg and Debussy and the impact of the western avant-garde of the 1950s. The book also contains Lutoslawski's Artistic Diary, his "notebook of ideas" written from 1959 to 1984 containing intensely personal reflections that do not appear in his public speeches and writings. Concluding with a select bibliography, this collection will give readers a unique and comprehensive overview of the man and his music, encouraging a full appreciation of Lutoslawski's compositional technique and aesthetic views, as well as his position in the history of twentieth-century music.