Classical and Romantic Performing Practice 1750-1900 [Hardcover]

Clive Brown (Author), Sir Roger Norrington (Foreword)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 23, 2000

The past ten years have seen a rapidly growing interest in performing and recording Classical and Romantic music with period instruments; yet the relationship of composers' notation to performing practices during that period has received only sporadic attention from scholars, and many aspects of composers' intentions have remained uncertain. Brown here identifies areas in which musical notation conveyed rather different messages to the musicians for whom it was written than it does to modern performers, and seeks to look beyond the notation to understand how composers might have expected to hear their music realized in performance. There is ample evidence to demonstrate that, in many respects, the sound worlds in which Mozart, Beethoven, Wagner, and Brahms created their music were more radically different from ours than is generally assumed.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Brown has produced a work of the greatest scholarship and utility....Recommended--required!--for all libraries with music collections serving upper-division undergraduates and above."--Choice

"His substantial book presents many new findings and demonstrates new approaches. Brown has contributed greatly to our understanding of period technique, especially for string instruments" --Notes

About the Author

Clive Brown is Professor of Applied Musicology, University of Leeds; and Consultant, London Classical Players

Product Details

• Hardcover: 680 pages
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA (March 23, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0198161654
• ISBN-13: 978-0198161653
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 6.4 x 1.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,074,025 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Clive's Bible, October 10, 2011

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This review is from: Classical and Romantic Performing Practice 1750-1900 (Paperback)

This is the single most important work on this topic for any musicians serious about informing themselves of the practices of musicians and composers of European music in the 18th and 19th centuries. Almost everything you need to know is right here. Clive Brown has collated all the data, done all the research and distilled it into this single tome of brilliance. Every musician who plays this repertoire should own this book and heed its contents.

6 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Very useful, but certainly not even close to all-inclusive., November 2, 2004

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J. Schreier (Columbia, MD) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Classical and Romantic Performing Practice 1750-1900 (Paperback)

I realize it's impossible to cover a century-and-a-half of performance practice in just over 600 pages, but I was disappointed to see the accompaniment of recitative virtually ignored. Given the numbers of operas by Mozart alone and the prevalence of secco and recitative accompagnato, I certainly expected some discussion - at least a paragraph! There really is NONE. There's an 8 page section termed "Recitative Accompaniment" and I got all excited when I saw it! But it only talks about the movement in the early 19th century to move away from using keyboard instruments to more cello and strings in general. I didn't need an expensive book to tell me that.