The art of appreciation : music and middlebrow culture in modern Britain / Kate Guthrie.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Guthrie, Kate, 1987- author.

Series:

California Studies in 20th-Century Music

California Studies in 20th-Century Music ; 30

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Music appreciation--Great Britain--History--20th century.

Music appreciation.

Music--Social aspects--Great Britain--History--20th century.

Music.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (306 p.)

Place of Publication:

Oakland, California : University of California Press, [2021]

Language Note:

In English.

Summary:

From the BBC Proms to Bernstein's Young People's Concerts, initiatives to promote classical music have been a pervasive feature of twentieth-century musical life. The goal of these initiatives was rarely just to reach a larger and more diverse audience but to teach a particular way of listening that would help the public ";appreciate"; music. This book examines for the first time how and why music appreciation has had such a defining and long-lasting impact—well beyond its roots in late-Victorian liberalism. It traces the networks of music educators, philanthropists, policy-makers, critics, composers, and musicians who, rather than resisting new mass media, sought to harness their pedagogic potential; and explores how listening became embroiled in a nexus of modern problems around citizenship, leisure, and education. In so doing, it ultimately reveals how a new cultural milieu—the middlebrow—emerged at the heart of Britain's experience of modernity.

Contents:

Frontmatter

Contents

List of Figures and Music Examples

1. The Art of Appreciation

2. “Audiences of the Future”. The Robert Mayer Concerts for Children (1924–1939)

3. Victorians on Radio. Music and the Ordinary Listener (1926–1939)

4. Music Education on Film. Instruments of the Orchestra (1946)

5. Outside the Ivory Tower. Extra- Mural Music at the University of Birmingham (1948–1964)

6. The Avant- Garde Goes to School. O Magnum Mysterium (1960)

7. Epilogue. The Middlebrow in an Age of Cultural Pluralism

Notes

Bibliography

Index

Notes:

Description based on print version record.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9780520975897

0520975898

OCLC:

1226805270