After Wagner : histories of modernist music drama from Parsifal to Nono / Mark Berry.

Format:

• Book

Author/Creator:

• Berry, Mark, 1974- author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

• Opera--Europe--20th century--History and criticism.
• Opera--Europe--19th century--History and criticism.

Physical Description:

x, 315 pages : music ; 25 cm

Place of Publication:

Woodbridge, Suffolk, UK : Boydell Press, 2014.

Summary:

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 'stheticist Richard Strauss. Discussion of Strauss's Capriccio, partly in the light of Schoenberg's Moses und Aron, reveals a more '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 Aiban Berg's Lulu and Nono's Al gran sole carico d'amore. Throughout, the book invites us to consider how we might perceive the aesthetic 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. Book jacket.

Contents:

• In the shadow of German idealism : from Parsifal to Capriccio. Wagner "after Wagner" : Parsifal ; Arnold Schoenberg's "Biblical way" : towards Moses und Aron ; Richard Strauss : Paths to (and from) Capriccio
• Composition after the Second World War : from Germany to Italy, and back again? Luigi Dallapiccola : Il prigioniero : imprisonment, liberty, and the word ; Luigi Nono, Intolleranza 1960 ; Hans Werner Henze : Paths to (and from) Natascha Ungeheuer
• Performance and the fruitful instability of the work : from Parsifal to Nono. Stefan Herheim's Parsifal ; Staging Lohengrin, or not ; From Wagner to Nono.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 275-296) and index.

ISBN:

• 1843839687
• 9781843839682

OCLC:

880566306