After Wagner

Histories of Modernist Music Drama from Parsifal to Nono
UK Auflage
ISBN: 978-1-84383-968-2
Verlag: Boydell & Brewer

Buch, Englisch, 325 Seiten, Print PDF, Format (B × H): 164 mm x 241 mm, Gewicht: 622 g

Offers histories of music drama beginning with Wagner's Parsifal and then looking at works by Arnold Schoenberg, Richard Strauss, Luigi Dallapiccola, Luigi Nono and Hans Werner Henze.

This book is both a telling of operatic histories 'after' Richard Wagner, and a philosophical reflection upon the writing of those histories. Historical musicology reckons with intellectual and cultural history, and vice versa. The 'after' of the title denotes chronology, but also harmony and antagonism within a Wagnerian tradition. Parsifal, in which Wagner attempted to go beyond his achievement in the Ring, to write 'after' himself,is followed by two apparent antipodes: the strenuously modernist Arnold Schoenberg and the æstheticist Richard Strauss. Discussion of Strauss's Capriccio, partly in the light of Schoenberg's Moses und Aron, reveals amore 'political' work than either first acquaintance or the composer's 'intention' might suggest.
Then come three composers from subsequent generations: Luigi Dallapiccola, Luigi Nono, and Hans Werner Henze. Geographical context is extended to take in Wagner's Italian successors; the problem of political emancipation in and through music drama takes another turn here, confronting challenges and opportunities in more avowedly 'politically engaged' art. A final section explores the world of staging opera, of so-called Regietheater, as initiated by Wagner himself. Stefan Herheim's celebrated Bayreuth production of Parsifal, and various performances of Lohengrin are discussed, before looking back to Mozart (Don Giovanni) and forward to Alban Berg's Lulu and Nono's Al gran sole carico d'amore. Throughout, the book invites us to consider how we might perceive the æsthetic and political integrity of the operatic work 'after Wagner'.
After Wagner will be invaluable to anyone interested in twentieth-century music drama and its intersection with politics and cultural history. It will also appeal to those interested in Richard Wagner's cultural impact on succeeding generations of composers.

MARK BERRY is Senior Lecturer in Music at Royal Holloway, University of London.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Berry, Mark

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Musikwissenschaft Geschichte der Musik Geschichte der Musik: Klassische Musik des 20./21. Jahrhunderts
• Geisteswissenschaften Musikwissenschaft Musikgattungen Opernmusik
• Geisteswissenschaften Musikwissenschaft Geschichte der Musik Geschichte der Musik: Romantik (ca. 1830-1900)
• Geisteswissenschaften Musikwissenschaft Musikwissenschaft Allgemein Musikwissenschaft: Rezeption, Einflüsse und Beziehungen

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Introduction: 'After Wagner'
Wagner 'After Wagner': Parsifal
Arnold Schoenberg's 'Biblical Way': Towards Moses und Aron
Richard Strauss: Paths to [and from] Capriccio
Luigi Dallapiccola, Il Prigioniero: Imprisonment, Liberty, and the Word
Luigi Nono, Intolleranza 1960
Hans Werner Henze: The Path to [and from] Natascha Ungeheuer
Stefan Herheim's Parsifal
Staging Lohengrin, or not
From Wagner to Nono
Bibliography

Über Autor(innen)

MARK BERRY is Lecturer at the Department of Music, Royal Holloway, University of London.