Pierre Boulez and the piano : a study in style and technique / Peter O'Hagan.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

O'Hagan, Peter, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Boulez, Pierre, 1925-2016. Piano music.

Boulez, Pierre.

Piano music (Boulez, Pierre).

Piano music--Analysis, appreciation.

Piano music.

Physical Description:

xix, 344 pages ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, 2017.

Summary:

Pierre Boulez's first piano pieces date from his youth, prior to his studies in Paris with Messiaen, and his subsequent meteoric rise to international acclaim as the leader of the musical avant-garde during the 1950s. His most recent published work is a solo piano piece, Une page d'éphéméride, written some sixty years after his first attempts at composition. The piano has remained central to Boulez's creative work throughout his career, and although his renown as a conductor has to some extent overshadowed his other achievements, it was as a performer of his own piano music that his practical gifts first found expression. Peter O'Hagan has given performances of various unpublished piano works by Boulez, including Antiphonie from the Third Sonata and Trois Psalmodies. In this study, he considers Boulez's writing for the piano in the context of the composer's stylistic evolution throughout the course of his development. Each of the principal works is considered in detail, not only on its own terms, but also as a stage in Boulez's ongoing quest to invent radical solutions to the renewal of musical language and to reinvigorate tradition. The volume includes reference to hitherto unpublished source material, which sheds light on his working methods and on the interrelationship between works. Book jacket.

Contents:

1 A Parisian Apprenticeship 9

2 Towards twelve-note technique 31

3 First Sonata ... à René Leibowitz ... 49

4 Second Sonata 69

5 Chance and inspiration in Structures premier livre 118

6 The expansion of serialism 163

7 Alea 185

8 At the limits of serialism 241

9 Sonate, "Que me Veux-tu" 261

10 A competition piece and its consequences 285

11 A codetta 317.

Notes:

"An Ashgate book".

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9780754653196

0754653196

OCLC:

945072493

Publisher Number:

99970019168