The Beethoven Quartets [Paperback]

Joseph Kerman (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 17, 1979

A critical study of the structure, style, and significance of the sixteen string quartets.

Beethoven's quartets show a technical mastery, depth of thought, and intensity of musical inspiration unsurpassed by any other composer. This brilliant survey, by one of America's leading musical scholars, has already achieved classic status.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Joseph Kerman (born 1924) is a writer on music and a musicologist. He is a professor emeritus at University of California, Berkeley. His many works include The Elizabethan Madrigal (1962), The Beethoven Quartets (1967), The Kafka Sketchbook (1970), The Masses and Motets of William Byrd (1980), The New Grove Beethoven (1983, with Alan Tyson), Contemplating Music: Challenges to Musicology (1985), Opera as Drama (1988), Write All These Down (1994), Opera and the Morbidity of Music (2008), and many more.

Product Details

• Paperback: 408 pages
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company (April 17, 1979)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0393009092
• ISBN-13: 978-0393009095
• Product Dimensions: 7.7 x 5.1 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #436,735 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #84 in Books > Arts & Photography > Music > Theory, Composition & Performance > Sheet Music & Scores > Composers > Beethoven

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

44 of 57 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Not for someone who has not had formal training in music, June 12, 2001

By 

Ramon Kranzkuper (Gainesville, FL) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Beethoven Quartets (Paperback)

I am unqualified to write a review of this highly acclaimed book, because I am neither a musicologist nor a student of music.

If you have training in music, please ignore this review. I give it 5 stars merely because it is highly acclaimed.

I'm writing this mostly because it is not mentioned here on Amazon, or elsewhere, what the book consists of, and whether "casual listeners" can read it. The answer is "no".

I purchased this book because I love the late quartets intensely, and I was looking for something that would be a pleasure to read, and something that might deepen my understanding of the quartets (especially the late quartets).

I found that I could not comprehend more than a few sentences in the entire book. Almost nothing is said about the non-musicological aspects of the quartets; nothing that evokes wonder or inerest - for the casual listener, of course. Although I would not use the word "casual" to describe myself as a listener - I've been listening to the quartets for more than a decade now, and find something new every time - it remains that without formal training, this book is entirely incomprehensible. It is a series of technical analyses, and might as well have been written in Japanese as far as I am concerned.

If you're like me - someone who loves the quartets but does not have a formal grounding in music - this book is not for you. Read Sullivan's "Beethoven" if you haven't read it already.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Very rewarding if you read closely, November 26, 2009

By 

Eugene Gaub - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Beethoven Quartets (Paperback)

To get anything out of this book, you need to have scores and recordings of the quartets. What's more, you need to have scores with measure numbers: the Dover reprint of the Breitkopf und Härtel edition of the scores is a great bargain, but lacks measure numbers, which you have to write in -- a slightly tedious, but indispensable task. (Use pencil, because it's easy to make mistakes.) Once you've done this, though, you're in for a transformative experience. Mapping Kerman's analysis onto the scores is occasionally like a treasure hunt, but what treasure there is! If you're like me, and have known and loved these pieces as a listener for a long time, the insights and aesthetic wonderment to be gleaned from close study of this book can take your enjoyment and appreciation to an entirely new level.

9 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars very interesting book, June 19, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: The Beethoven Quartets (Paperback)

Don't be scared away from this book, which is actually very interesting and well writen. I don't have a degree in music but have read little bit about music history, hamony, fugue and some music forms, which seems enough to comprehend this book. I do prefer the music analysis in detail rather than a few sentence of descriptions or generization of a piece of music, especially from the great composer like Beethoven. I just got this book and have read only a few pages, but it already attracts me. It has very detailed historical background of each Beethoven's string quartet and the analysis of it. I am really pleased to have this book!