The New Music: The Avant-garde since 1945 [Paperback]

Reginald Smith Brindle (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 6, 1987

This guide to the more adventurous evolutions of music since 1945--pointillism, post-Webernism, integral serialism, free dodecaphony, aleatory and indeterminate music, graphics, musique concrete, electronic music, and theatre music--was first published in 1975 and has been reprinted several times. For this second edition, Smith Brindle has added a new chapter reviewing developments over the decade since first publication. He discusses the decline of experimentalism and the reaction against increasing cerebralism and complexity as variously illustrated by the more recent works of Stockhausen, the minimalist works of Reich and Glass, and the partial return to romanticism. He also reviews the technological revolution which has taken place in computer music and concludes that the future of music will for the time being be most closely associated with technological change and development, rather than with radical changes in compositional techniques.

Editorial Reviews

Review

'A lively, well-organized, lucid, historically aware, and concise survey of the techniques, aspirations, interaction, and sociology of the avant garde as it has evolved since the end of World War II...a book that might easily be used as a text for an undergraduate course. Moreover, it could, with careful and intelligent application, be used for study by non-musicians.' Notes reviewing the first edition

Product Details

• Paperback: 230 pages
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA; 2 edition (August 6, 1987)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0193154684
• ISBN-13: 978-0193154681
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.8 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,361,418 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A great source for the new music, July 16, 2004

By 

Aye Yasak (ANKARA, Cankaya Turkey) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The New Music: The Avant-garde since 1945 (Paperback)

As to talk about the new music and go further deeply into it, one has to clearly define the roots, social situation, paradigms, early tendencies of pioneers, theoretical backround of art in general with its relation to the overall world view and so on... Brindle's success on figuring out these concepts deserves an appreciation. The book achieves to provide a wide understanding of twentieth century music with almost all aspects of the reasoning of artistic creativity of our age. One of the most important qualities of this book also underlies in it's perfectly selected musical examples provided quite often within the text that are also including new technics used in the "new" music. From this point of view alone, it would be evaluated as the second book after Erhard Karkoschka's "Notation in New Music". Though it is mostly in charge of musicologists who are in search of a comprehensive twentieth century music source rather than composers especially focusing on compositional tools but anyway it is a must have book for both.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Fine synopsis of post-war trends in the avant garde, May 25, 2001

By 

Charles Sieracki "an explorer of mindscapes" (Irving, TX USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The New Music: The Avant-garde since 1945 (Paperback)

Worthwhile addition to the library of books devoted to contemporary music. The presentation is quite lucid and the topics covered are quite relevant for today's composer, or those interested in modern techniques. There is very little coverage of the most recent composers, namely those working in neo-tonal contexts, but there is a mention of this trend in an epilogue. I find the graphical information in the book some of the best content in the book. Some chapters try to cover somewhat technical topics too quickly, but if you read it carefully enough, it's comprehensible.