A broad-ranging introduction to classical chamber music. The book provides a rich trove of historical background information on 77 composers ranging from Haydn and Boccherini through Mozart, Beethoven and Brahms to Bartok, Stravinsky and Philip Glass. The descriptions and analysis of 253 chamber works have been crafted to enhance the enjoyment of the listener. Also provided are performance commentaries by distinguished chamber musicians including Bruce Adolphe, James Bonn, James Dunham, Daniel Epstein, Ralph Evans, Bert Lucarelli, Stuart Malina, Robert Martin, Peter Orth, Susan Salm, David Shifrin, Arnold Steinhardt and Philip Ying. As stated in the Introduction by Richard Weinert, President of Concert Artists Guild: Program notes are ubiquitous but highly variable. Every recital program contains some notes, generally provided by the performers, that tell the audience something about the works they are about to hear. Some of these notes are highly technical, others are biographical. Lucy Miller's program notes stand apart. First of all, Lucy is a wonderful writer and goes to great effort to make her notes literary gems. Second, while deeply musical and knowledgeable, she is...unconstrained by conventions and seeks a slant on each work that interests her. Third, she delves widely into literature and history as well as musicology for insights and perspectives. (The book) is a fun and enlightening read and a wonderful companion to playing and listening. The composers whose historical backgrounds and compositions are discussed include Adams, Antheil, Arensky, Arriaga, Barber, Bartok, Bax, Beethoven, Berg, Bloch, Boccherini, Borodin, Brahms, Bridge, Britten, Bruch, Bruckner, Carter, Chausson, Chopin, Clarke, Copland, Debussy, Dohnanyi, Dvorak, Elgar, Enesco, Faure, Finzi, Foss, Franck, Ginastera, Glass, Glazunov, Glinka, Goossens, Grieg, Harrison, Haydn, Hermann, Hindemuth, Ives, Janacek, Kirchner, Kletski, Korngold, Martinu, Mendelssohn, Messiaen, Milhaud, Mozart, Panni, Penderecki, Poulenc, Prokofiev, Rachmaninoff, Ravel, Roger, Resphighi, Rossini, Schafer, Schnittke, Schoenberg, Schubert, Schulhoff, Schumann, Shostakovich, Spohr, Stranz, Strauss, Stravinsky, Suk, Tchaikovsky, Turina, Webern, Wolf and Zemlinsky.
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Editorial Reviews
Review
As a concert presenter and program annotator, Lucy Miller has long been an effective proponent for good and great chamber music. Her collected program notes are a wonderfully broad-ranging introduction to chamber music repertoire from Haydn and Boccherini to a few still-active composers like John Adams and Philip Glass. Though a capable musician herself, Lucy Miller's concerns are not the technical demands of a piece, but the human emotions and cultural setting the music evokes. Take for example, her note-perfect characterization of Poulenc's Sextet for Piano and Winds: In this work abounding with Parisian wit, (Poulenc) pays homage to Stravinsky's Concerto for Piano and Wind Instruments (1924) but in ways peculiar only to Poulenc. Filled with comic gestures and dissonances that suddenly turn lyrical, the work continuously pulls the listener back and forth between pathos and humor. One senses, in Poulenc, one foot in the salon and one in the grave. . . . The first movement opens with the full` effects of a Parisian traffic jam interrupted by a lament from the oboe . . . If I didn't already own it, I would rush out to buy the score. The book includes performance commentaries by fine chamber musicians, ranging from amusing gossip and shameless self-promotion to a few observations that really help us hear the music. I love Philip Ying's description of one audience's response to the second Janacek string quartet: I don't think there are many pieces in the chamber music repertoire that would incite a roomful of psychiatric patients to leap to their feet and start shouting at one another. . . . (We) have also discovered that this same Janácek quartet can instantly engage a classroom full of high school students. . . . In the (First and Second) Quartets is music at the farthest reaches of love, anger, hope, despair, frustration, longing, jealousy, exaltation, intimacy, fear and lust. It is music that strains at the bounds of written notation. Lucy Miller's guide is a treasure-trove for an amateur musician. It fills a largely vacant niche: not criticism, not musicology, but unabashedly friendly advocacy for 253 pieces Lucy likes, with persuasive reasons why you might like them too. --Ted Rust in Music for the Love of It, April 2006
About the Author
LUCY MILLER Lucy Miller is Founding Director of Market Square Concerts, the distinguished chamber music series in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, which celebrates its 25th anniversary in the 2006/2007 season. Market Square Concerts presents a wide repertoire of chamber music performed by artists of international acclaim as well as emerging young artists such as recent Concert Artists Guild winners Alpin Hong, Soyeon Lee, Peter Kolkay, Antares, Avalon Quartet, Eighth Blackbird, Enso Quartet, Imani Winds, Pacific Quartet, and Trio Johannes. She has written program notes for the Fine Arts Quartet, Concertante Chamber Ensemble, the Ying Quartet, Trio Solisti, The Bard Festival, The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, the Tuscan Sun Festival, Concert Artists Guild, the Russian American Youth Orchestra, and the chamber music programs of the Harrisburg Symphony Orchestra. Her articles on music have appeared in, Chamber Music, the national publication of Chamber Music America and in Philadelphia Music Makers. Her fiction has appeared in Prism International and Phase and received awards in 2004 and 2005 from WITF, a National Public Radio affiliate. As a pianist, she participates regularly in amateur chamber music workshops including the Raphael Trio Workshop, the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center Amateur Workshop, Canadian Amateur Musicians, and the Garth Newel Music Center Amateur Program. She was vice president and board member of Chamber Music America and currently serves on the boards of Amateur Chamber Music Players (ACMP) and The Bard Music Festival.
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Not Friendly Enough,
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This review is from: Adams to Zemlinsky, A Friendly Guide to Chamber Music (Paperback)
To be honest,I don't think it is good for either performers or listeners,because the contents is a series of introductions of "a select list of compositions",the bulk of which most people haven't even heard of.It might be good for those who seek to know every esoteric work well or want to play them all.
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