Gerhard on Music : Selected Writings

Catalan-born composer Roberto Gerhard (1896?1970) left significant legacies- both musical and documentary. Exiled in Cambridge with the onset of the Spanish Civil War, he gradually achieved wide recognition by performers and conductors, in both Britain and America, as a composer whose music was essential to the modern repertoire. In this, the first book in English to be devoted to Gerhard, Meirion Bowen collects many of the composer?s articles, reviews, lectures and broadcasts to demonstrate the full extent and continuity of Gerhard?s artistic and creative thinking.

The writings have been arranged thematically to emphasise the evolution of Gerhard?s musical interests. His early attachment to Spanish and Catalonian traditions broadened into a fascination with folk music of all kinds. His studies with Schoenberg in the mid 1920s gave him the key to his own creative individuality; thereafter, his imaginative vitality led him eventually to experiment with electronic and concrete music and he continued breaking new ground, even in his final years.

For those new to Gerhard and his music, this collection will provide an understanding of his intentions and accomplishments. His writings reveal great speculative skill and offer, with humour and humility, fascinating insights into the nature of creativity amongst both artists and scientists. They testify to Gerhard as a composer of enduring international stature and quality.

CONTENIDO:

Chronology of Gerhard?s life and work
Introduction
Composer and public: Listening to music (1930)
The composer and his audience (1960)
Sound and symbol (1957)
The contemporary musical situation (1956)
Tradition and innovation: Music at the court of Alfonso V the Magnanimous (1936)
A note on Felipe Pedrell (c. 1940)
New musical methods (1930):
- prelude
- chorale
- fugue
- fugue (ending)
- coda
- variations
- functional music
Music and poetry (1935)
Contemporary composers 1929-1939:
- Hanns Eisler (1898-1982)
- Bartók
- Ildebrando Pizzetti
- Baltasa Samper
- Some composers from Madrid
-- Ernesto Halffter
-- New musical publications
-- Roldolfo Halffter: Sonatas de Escorial (1931)
Music and drama:
Opera (1930)
Music and film (1930)
The Duenna (1949)
The Duenna - revised (1951)
Music and ballet:
- Ballet music (1951)
- Don Quixote: a synopsis (1956)
New horizons:
Schoenberg, twelve-note music and serialism:
- Schoenberg in Barcelona (1932)
- A conversation with Schoenberg (1931)
- Reminiscences of Schoenberg (1955)
- Reluctant revolutionary: on studying composition with Schoenberg (1961)
On composition with twelve notes (1954)
Tonality in twelve-tone music (1952)
Developments in twelve-tone technique (1956)
Alban Berg: obituary (1936)
Webern:
- Webern in Barcelona (1932)
- Webern?s The Path to the New Music (1961)
Twelve-note technique in Stravinsky (1957)
Functions of the series in twelve-note composition (1960)
Music in a post-war context:
England, spring 1945
Concrete music and electronic sound composition (1959):
- Introduction to Lament for the Death of a Bullfighter (1960)
Sound observed (1965)
The plague (1964)
Introduction to Symphony No. 2 (1959)
"Is modern music growing old?" (1960)
Art and anarchy (1961)
The muse and music today (1962)
An inaugral lecture (1961)
Notes
Appendix I: Chronological list of Gerhard?s writings
Appendix II: List of musical compositions by Gerhard and selected discography
Selected bibliography
Index