Rossini in Restoration Paris: The Sound of Modern Life (Cambridge Studies in Opera) [Hardcover]

Benjamin Walton (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0521870607 | ISBN-13: 978-0521870603 | Publication Date: February 4, 2008

Best remembered for such light-hearted works as Il barbiere di Siviglia, Gioachino Rossini produced a sequence of large-scale serious French operas after his move to Paris in 1824 which overwhelmed audiences with their musical power, and responded to the French Restoration. Rather than presenting a traditional account of Rossini's life and works, Benjamin Walton traces instead the shifting patterns of Rossinian criticism from before the composer's arrival in Paris to the end of the 1820s, outlining a type of musical history that uses immersion in a narrow time period as a way to reconceive the relationships between opera and the wider currents of life outside the opera house. In place of the comic Rossini of later memory, this book argues for a composer whose music resonated with the experience of contemporary life, and was integrally bound up in the struggle to define French romanticism at the time.

Editorial Reviews

Review

Review of the hardback: 'Rossini in Restoration Paris is an excellent essay in historical and stylistic defamiliarzation, with contemporary evidence, solid musical analysis, insightful observations and an evocative writing style blending to create a Restoration resplendent in its contradictions.' Nineteenth-Century Music Review

Book Description

Best known for light-hearted works such as Il barbiere di Siviglia, Gioachino Rossini produced a sequence of large-scale serious works after moving to Paris in 1924. In place of the comic Rossini of later memory, this book portrays a composer whose powerful music resonated with the experience of contemporary life.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 368 pages
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press (February 4, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0521870607
• ISBN-13: 978-0521870603
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.3 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,381,398 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #62 in Books > Arts & Photography > Music > Theory, Composition & Performance > Sheet Music & Scores > Composers > Rossini

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An Outstanding Work on Rossini in Paris, August 14, 2011

By 

Basil F. Walsh "Published Author" (South Florida) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Rossini in Restoration Paris: The Sound of Modern Life (Cambridge Studies in Opera) (Paperback)

This is a wonderful book dealing with a period of Rossini's life that has not had much in depth coverage previously. Despite his fame and the perception of his musical imapct on the city, it turns out that Rossini really only composed one "original" opera for Paris... and what an opera it was, the momnumental work, Guillaume Tell. It was also to be the great composer's last opera, even though he was only 37 at the time. He lived for many more years without ever composing another opera.

The Book provides an interesting insight into Paris, and its musical personalities at a period when the city was considered the most important musical center for opera in Europe. It was also a time when Paris was going through great changes politically and culturally. It was before the other great Italian composers, Donizetti, Bellini or Verdi emerged on the scene in Paris.

All together an interesting book. Very well written, informatiave and educational for any scholar of the great operatic bellcanto period in Europe.

BASIL WALSH