Synopses & Reviews
Designed to serve music students at the college level, this informal approach to music theory relates the technical aspects of music with the expressive character of the art. The approach is holistic in the sense that it focuses on the interrelationships between the piece as heard by a socially conditioned listener and the notated, performed score: it aims to bridge the gap between the technical and expressive aspects of music. The composers addressed are: Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin, Schumann, Brahms, Wagner, Debussy, and Schoenberg. There are separate chapters on the problems of meaning in music and on the interdependence of aesthetic and ethical value-judgments. This novel and exciting approach to music theory will be a welcome addition to the musical analysis literature.
About the Author
HUGH AITKEN recently retired as Professor of Music at The William Paterson College of New Jersey.
Table of Contents
Preface
Introduction
Chopin: Prelude No. 7 in A Major
The Split Fifth: A Cautionary Tale
Chopin: Prelude No. 4 in E Minor
On Meaning in Music
Mozart: Some Excerpts
Beethoven: Fifth Symphony
Three Beethoven Excerpts
Aesthetics: Aesthetics Meets Ethics
Two Schumann Songs and a Bit of Brahms
J. S. Bach: From The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book I
Wagner: Tristan and Isolde, Prelude
Debussy: Prelude; The Afternoon of a Faun
The Analysis of Twentieth Century Music
Selected Bibliography