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Music in Ancient Greece and Rome
by John G LandelsMusic in Ancient Greece and Rome provides a comprehensive introduction to the history of music from Homeric times to the Roman emperor Hadrian, presented in a concise and user-friendly way. Chapters include: * contexts in which music played a role * a detailed discussion of instruments * an analysis of scales, intervals and tuning * the principal types of rhythm used * and an exploration of Greek theories of harmony and acoustics.Music in Ancient Greece and Rome also contains numerous musical examples, with illustrations of ancient instruments and the methods of playing them.
Music in Chopin's Warsaw
by Halina GoldbergMusic in Chopin's Warsaw examines the rich musical environment of Fryderyk Chopin's youth--largely unknown to the English-speaking world--and places Chopin's early works in the context of this milieu. Halina Goldberg provides a historiographic perspective that allows a new and better understanding of Poland's cultural and musical circumstances. Chopin's Warsaw emerges as a vibrant European city that was home to an opera house, various smaller theaters, one of the earliest modern conservatories in Europe, several societies which organized concerts, musically active churches, spirited salon life, music publishers and bookstores, instrument builders, and for a short time even a weekly paper devoted to music. Warsaw was aware of and in tune with the most recent European styles and fashions in music, but it was also the cradle of a vernacular musical language that was initiated by the generation of Polish composers before Chopin and which found its full realization in his work. Significantly, this period of cultural revival in the Polish capital coincided with the duration of Chopin's stay there--from his infancy in 1810 to his final departure from his homeland in 1830. An uncanny convergence of political, economic, social, and cultural circumstances generated the dynamic musical, artistic, and intellectual environment that nurtured the developing genius. Had Chopin been born a decade earlier or a decade later, Goldberg argues, the capital--devastated by warfare and stripped of all cultural institutions--could not have provided support for his talent. The young composer would have been compelled to seek musical education abroad and thus would have been deprived of the specifically Polish experience so central to his musical style. A rigorously-researched and fascinating look at the Warsaw in which Chopin grew up, this book will appeal to students and scholars of nineteenth century music, as well as music lovers and performers.
Music in Shakespeare: A Dictionary (Continuum Shakespeare Dictionaries)
by Christopher R. Wilson Michela CaloreMusical references, allusions to music, and music stage directions abound in Shakespeare, ranging from simple trumpet flourishes to sophisticated, philosophical allegory. Music in Shakespeare: A Dictionary identifies all musical terms found in the Shakespeare canon. An A-Z of over 300 entries includes a definition of each musical term in its historical and theoretical context, and explores the extent of Shakespeare's use of musical imagery across the full range of his dramatic and poetic work. Music in Shakespeare also analyses the usage of musical instruments and sound effects on the Shakespearean stage, providing descriptions of the instruments employed in the Elizabethan and Jacobean theatres. This is a comprehensive reference guide for scholars and students with interests ranging from the thematic and allegorical relevance of music in Shakespeare's works to the history of performance. It is also aimed at the growing number of directors and actors concerned with recovering the staging conditions of the early modern theatre.
Music in Shakespeare: A Dictionary (Arden Shakespeare Dictionaries #Vol. 1)
by Christopher R. Wilson Michela CaloreWith an A-Z of over 300 entries, Music in Shakespeare is the most comprehensive study of all the musical terms found in Shakespeare's complete works. It includes a definition of each musical term in itshistorical and theoretical context, and explores the diverse extent of musical imagery across the full range of Shakespeare's dramatic and poetic work, as well as analysing the usage of instruments and sound effects on the Shakespearean stage. This is a comprehensive reference guide for scholars and students with interests in the thematic and allegorical relevance of music in Shakespeare, and the history of performance. Identifying all musical terms found in the Shakespeare canon, it will also be of use to the growing number of directors and actors concerned with recovering the staging conditions of the early modern theatre.
Music in the Air: The Selected Writings of Ralph J. Gleason
by Ralph J. GleasonThe co-founder of Rolling Stone magazine, Ralph J. Gleason was among the most respected journalists, interviewers, and critics writing about popular music in the latter half of the twentieth century. As a longtime contributor to the San Francisco Chronicle, Down Beat, and Ramparts, his expertise and insights about music, musicians, and cultural trends were unparalleled, whether his subject was jazz, folk, pop, or rock and roll. He was the only music journalist included on President Richard Nixon’s infamous “Enemies List,” which Gleason himself considered “the highest honor a man’s country can bestow upon him.” This sterling anthology, edited by Gleason’s son Toby, himself a forty-year veteran of the music business, spans Ralph J. Gleason’s four decades as popular music’s preeminent commentator. Drawing from a rich variety of sources, including Gleason’s books, essays, interviews, and LP record album liner notes, it is essential reading for writers, historians, scholars, and music lovers of every stripe.
Music in the Dark
by Sally MagnussonJamesina Ross is long finished with men. But one night a stranger seeking lodgings knocks on the door of her tenement flat. He doesn't recognise her, but she remembers him at once. Not that she plans to mention it. She has no intention of trusting anyone enough to let herself be vulnerable again. A lifetime ago Jamesina Ross was bent on becoming a writer. She had a facility with words. She made up songs about the Highland glen where she lived and the kin who had worked that land for generations. When her community was threatened with eviction, she gave voice to that too. The women stood together, defiant and determined, but Jamesina's music was no match for one of the most brutal confrontations of the Highland Clearances. Jamesina has borne the disfigurements of that day ever since, on her face and inside her head. It marked the end of a life of promise and the beginning of a very different one. Her lodger thinks that if she would only dare to open the past, she might have the chance of a future. A beautiful exploration of unlooked-for love in later life, its contrariness and its awkward, surprising joys, this is a story about resilience, memory, resurrection - and those parts of who we are that nobody can take away.
Music Love Drugs War
by Geraldine QuigleyA clever multiple-narrative account of teenage kicks and sectarian strife in early 80s Northern Ireland . . . this debut marks out Quigley as a writer of compassion and humour' GuardianThe end of the school year is approaching, and siblings Paddy and Liz McLaughlin, Christy Meehan, Kevin Thompson and their friends will soon have to decide what they're going to do with the rest of their lives. But it's hard to focus when there's the allure of their favourite hangout place, the dingy 'Cave', where they go to drink and flirt and smoke. Most days, Christy, Paddy and Kevin lie around listening to Dexys and Joy Division. Through a fog of marijuana, beer and budding romance, the future is distant and unreal.But this is Derry in 1981, and they can't ignore the turmoil of the outside world. A friend is killed, and Christy and Paddy, stunned out of their stupor, take matters into their own hands. Some choices are irreversible, and choosing to fight will take hold of their lives in ways they never imagined.With humour and compassion, Geraldine Quigley reveals the sometimes slippery reasons behind the decisions we make, and the unexpected and intractable ways they shape our lives.'A novel that is warm but also unsettling and exhilarating. That's some feat' Roddy Doyle'A poignant and powerful coming-of-age story' Sunday Mirror
Music, Mathematics and Language: The New Horizon of Computational Musicology Opened by Information Science
by Keiji Hirata Satoshi Tojo Masatoshi HamanakaThis book presents a new approach to computational musicology in which music becomes a computational entity based on human cognition, allowing us to calculate music like numbers. Does music have semantics? Can the meaning of music be revealed using symbols and described using language? The authors seek to answer these questions in order to reveal the essence of music. Chapter 1 addresses a very fundamental point, the meaning of music, while referring to semiotics, gestalt, Schenkerian analysis and cognitive reality. Chapter 2 considers why the 12-tone equal temperament came to be prevalent. This chapter serves as an introduction to the mathematical definition of harmony, which concerns the ratios of frequency in tonic waves. Chapter 3, “Music and Language,” explains the fundamentals of grammar theory and the compositionality principle, which states that the semantics of a sentence can be composed in parallel to its syntactic structure. In turn, Chapter 4 explains the most prevalent score notation – the Berklee method, which originated at the Berklee School of Music in Boston – from a different point of view, namely, symbolic computation based on music theory. Chapters 5 and 6 introduce readers to two important theories, the implication-realization model and generative theory of tonal music (GTTM), and explain the essence of these theories, also from a computational standpoint. The authors seek to reinterpret these theories, aiming at their formalization and implementation on a computer. Chapter 7 presents the outcomes of this attempt, describing the framework that the authors have developed, in which music is formalized and becomes computable. Chapters 8 and 9 are devoted to GTTM analyzers and the applications of GTTM. Lastly, Chapter 10 discusses the future of music in connection with computation and artificial intelligence.This book is intended both for general readers who are interested in music, and scientists whose research focuses on music information processing. In order to make the content as accessible as possible, each chapter is self-contained.
Music, Mind, and Language in Chinese Poetry and Performance: The Voice Extended (Global Asias)
by Casey Schoenberger"Poetry puts intent into words; singing lengthens words"—this is one of the earliest Chinese comments on artistic expression. Poetic language extends the reach of a sentiment beyond the individual, and musicality extends the reach of poetic language, not only across a room, but across geography and generations. The "extended mind thesis" (EMT) views minds as extending beyond individual nervous systems to include material and social environments. Music, Mind, and Language in Chinese Poetry and Performance: The Voice Extended offers a comprehensive overview of the interwoven histories of traditional Chinese poetry and performing arts. It employs cognitive and quantitative methods such as EMT, and a database of over six thousand traditional melodies, to describe cyclical, continuous interactions between social minds and material artifacts. From the ancient Canon of Poetry to the song-lyrics (ci) of the late medieval period and the dramatic arias of Kun and Beijing operas, Casey Schoenberger introduces the rhythms, melodies, pronunciation, and grammatical stylistics of the major Chinese verse and performance traditions. In doing so, he gleans insights from cognitive neuroscience, digital humanities, musicology, and linguistics to explain not only the trajectory of Chinese arts, but also bigger phenomena, like vernacularisation and improvisation.
Music, Mind, and Language in Chinese Poetry and Performance: The Voice Extended (Global Asias)
by Casey Schoenberger"Poetry puts intent into words; singing lengthens words"--this is one of the earliest Chinese comments on artistic expression. Poetic language extends the reach of a sentiment beyond the individual, and musicality extends the reach of poetic language, not only across a room, but across geography and generations. The "extended mind thesis" (EMT) views minds as extending beyond individual nervous systems to include material and social environments. Music, Mind, and Language in Chinese Poetry and Performance: The Voice Extended offers a comprehensive overview of the interwoven histories of traditional Chinese poetry and performing arts. It employs cognitive and quantitative methods such as EMT, and a database of over six thousand traditional melodies, to describe cyclical, continuous interactions between social minds and material artifacts. From the ancient Canon of Poetry to the song-lyrics (ci) of the late medieval period and the dramatic arias of Kun and Beijing operas, Casey Schoenberger introduces the rhythms, melodies, pronunciation, and grammatical stylistics of the major Chinese verse and performance traditions. In doing so, he gleans insights from cognitive neuroscience, digital humanities, musicology, and linguistics to explain not only the trajectory of Chinese arts, but also bigger phenomena, like vernacularisation and improvisation.
Music of a Distant Drum: Classical Arabic, Persian, Turkish, and Hebrew Poems
by Bernard LewisMusic of a Distant Drum marks a literary milestone. It collects 129 poems from the four leading literary traditions of the Middle East, all masterfully translated into English by Bernard Lewis, many for the first time. These poems come from diverse languages and traditions--Arabic, Persian, Turkish, and Hebrew--and span more than a thousand years. Together they provide a fascinating and unusual window into Middle Eastern history. Lewis, one of the world's greatest authorities on the region's culture and history, reveals verses of startling beauty, ranging from panegyric and satire to religious poetry and lyrics about wine, women, and love. Bernard Lewis, one of the world's greatest authorities on the region's culture and history, offers a work of startling beauty that leaves no doubt as to why such poets were courted by kings in their day. Like those in the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, the poems here--as ensured by Lewis's mastery of all the source languages and his impeccable style and taste--come fully alive in English. They are surprising and sensuous, disarmingly witty and frank. They provide a fascinating and unusual glimpse into Middle Eastern history. Above all, they are a pleasure to read.They range from panegyric and satire to religious poetry and lyrics about wine, women, and love. Lewis begins with an introduction on the place of poets and poetry in Middle Eastern history and concludes with biographical notes on all the poets.This treasure trove of verse is aptly summed up by a quote from the ninth-century Arab author Ibn Qutayba: "Poetry is the mine of knowledge of the Arabs, the book of their wisdom, the muster roll of their history, the repository of their great days, the rampart protecting their heritage, the trench defending their glories, the truthful witness on the day of dispute, the final proof at the time of argument.?In one hand the Qur'vn, in the other a wineglass,Sometimes keeping the rules, sometimes breaking them.Here we are in this world, unripe and raw,Not outright heathens, not quite Muslims.--Mujir (12th century)
The Music of Bees: A heartwarming and redemptive story about the families we choose for ourselves
by Eileen GarvinSet in the gorgeous, sprawling countryside of the Pacific Northwest, Eileen Garvin's THE MUSIC OF BEES is about finding friendship in the most unlikely of places, and the families we choose for ourselves. Heart-warming, inspirational and redemptive, it is perfect for fans of THE LANGUAGE OF FLOWERS and Rachel Joyce.'It's simultaneously heartbreaking and uplifting, and I loved it' Abi Daré, New York Times bestselling author of The Girl with the Louding Voice'It's the bees, with all their wonder and intricacy and intrigue, that make this story sing' Laurie FrankelAfter the sudden death of her husband, Alice Holtzman finds herself a social outsider. Reclusive, middle-aged, childless, and with only 850,000 honeybees for company. On the other side of town, Jake Stevenson and his enormous black mohawk had a bright future in front of them studying music, all until an accident at a high school party leaves him in a wheelchair. So when Alice nearly crashes her pick-up truck, packed with thousands of restless honeybees, into Jake, the last thing she expects from the near-miss is to find that Jake has a gift: not only is he a natural with bees, but he can hear their buzzing as a form of music. . .And when Harry, a twenty-four-year-old with debilitating social anxiety, also arrives at the farm looking for work, unexpected friendships begin to blossom.As these new friends begin to heal one another, all seems right with their world - until the buzzing stops. With a pesticide company threatening the local honeybee population, and everything they have worked for, this trio must unite to defend their bees.Praise for The Music of Bees. . .'Genuinely touching'Publishers Weekly'A hopeful, heart-warming, uplifting story about the power of chosen family'Laurie Frankel, New York Times bestselling author of This Is How It Always Is'A special treat for nature lovers, The Music of Bees is full of warmth and hope and decency'Rebecca Hardiman, author of Good Eggs'The Music of Bees is an enchanting book of belonging, overcoming adversity and the journey to find a hive of one's own'Kira Jane Buxton, author of Hollow Kingdom 'A delightful book!'Netgalley Reviewer, 5 stars
The Music of Bodies
by Maxim JakubowskiMaxim Jakubowski demonstrates with quiet elegance how varied erotic writing can be at its best, with six outstanding tales about men and women and the ties that bind their bodies in minds in ever so subtle ways, between the sheets, behind the words.Six uncollected short stories by Maxim Jakubowski, one of the controversial stars of the world of erotic writing and a further demonstration of his ability to break boundaries and imbue the most diverse of tales with the exhilaration of sex, be it ancient India at the time of the Kama Sutra, Times Square in New York in the sordid 1950s or Venice at Carnival Time. Every story is pretext for a celebration of the body and the senses and reaches parts few other writers even approach.THE MUSIC OF BODIESCan a blind man also be a voyeur? In the realm of memories and the imagination he can, drawing exquisite images of skin, bodies and forbidden parts with an anatomical but tender precision. But is the experience as good as reality or maybe even better?THE RISE AND FALL OF THE BURLESQUE EMPIREAn involuntary time-traveller lands in Time Square in New York in the 1950s and comes across a seductive young woman in a burlesque show only to lose her. He returns at several years' interval as the Manhattan vice landscape tuns even more sordid. Is his love affair doomed to repeat itself and fail again?THE TALE OF THE DROWNING MANIn ancient India a young man falls head over heels in love with an unattainable young woman and spies her bathing nude in the river from far away. How one of the legendary sexual positions in the famed Kama Sutra was involuntarily created!G IS FOR GYPSYFrom one side of the partition, a man in a hotel room listens to a couple in the next room noisily make love. The memories this evokes are most troubling and the temptations of sex take him onto the Internet as he arranges a dangerous encounter of his own as a form of penance.TAKE ME TO CARNEVALEA couple's relationship is slowly disintegrating and they journey to Venice in an attempt to save it. When they meet a mysterious older man who invites them to an unusual party at Carnival time, their whole world is turned upside down and they find themselves involved in a world of sex they had not previously even imagined.THAT TIME WITH SARAH JANESarah Jane is submissive in her relationships with men. She is seeking a Master and will do anything to achieve her purposes. As the sexual encounters she finds herself drawn towards become ever more extreme and painful, she reaches a point where a fatal decision must be taken. Will she emerge on the other side of sanity and happiness?
The Music of Chance (Faber Fiction Classics Ser. #Vol. 305)
by Paul Auster'By the time Nashe understood what was happening to him, he was past the point of wanting it to end . . .'Paul Auster fuses Samuel Beckett, Franz Kafka and The Brothers Grimm in this brilliant and unsettling parable. Following the death of his father, Jim Nashe takes to the open road in pursuit of a 'life of freedom'. But as the money runs out he finds that his sense of disillusionment has only been compounded by his year on the road. However, after picking up Pozzi, a hitchhiking gambler, Nashe finds himself drawn into a dangerous game of high-stakes poker with two eccentric and reclusive millionaires. 'A rare experience of contemporary fiction at its most thrilling.' New Statesman
The Music of Love
by Kate McCabeKirsty O'Neill has always known her own mind. At thirty-one years old, she is already running her own successful fashion business, and has decided that the handsome Robbie Hennessy is the man she'll build her future with. So when her widowed mother announces that she's bringing home a complete stranger from her holiday in Marbella - a young pianist named Antonio - Kirsty has strong feelings. Suspicious of his intent, she decides to waste no time in ridding him from her mother's life. As Kirsty's relationship with Robbie begins to falter, and it looks as though future plans may not come to be after all, she watches on in horror as Antonio's career begins to take off. Will he ever leave Ireland, and her mother, behind? What is he doing here, anyway? And why oh why, with her life in complete disharmony, does his music sound so alluring?
The Music Of The Spheres
by Elizabeth RedfernLondon, the summer of 1795: a season of revolutionary fervour, scientific discovery and vicious murders. The British government is in disarray, unable to stem the flood of secrets to Paris; betrayals that doom her war efforts to failure. In rural Kensington a group of French emigr-s are pursuing a scientific dream, the discovery of a planet they call Selene. The group has fallen under the spell of a beautiful and amoral woman - Auguste de Montpellier who is at once their muse and dark angel. Meanwhile a killer lurks in the back streets of the capital: the victims are all prostitutes and have been paid in French Louis d'Or, the currency of France's spies. Jonathan Absey is a Home Office clerk whose official task is to smash the French spy ring. Privately however, he has become obsessed with the murders. These interests intersect when he finds himself drawn into the Montpellier circle, yet his pursuit for truth remains obscured through coded letters, opium and conspiracy. Absey must uncover the mystery before the summer dies; an invasion fleet is being prepared to set sail across the channel and the lives of those on board now rest on his discoveries.
Music of the Swamp
by Lewis Nordan“This is not merely a stellar book. It is absolute ballad put to page.” —Southern LivingLewis Nordan’s fiction invents its own world--always populated by madly heroic misfits. In Music of the Swamp, he focuses his magic and imagination on a boy’s utterly helpless love for his utterly hopeless father--a man who attracts bad luck like a magnet. Nordan evokes ten-year-old Sugar Mecklin’s world with dazzling clarity: the smells, the tastes, and most surely the sounds of life in this peculiar, somewhat bizarre, Delta town. Sugar discovers that what his daddy says is true: “The Delta is filled up with death”; but he also finds an endless supply of hope.An ALA Notable BookMississippi Institute of Arts and Letters Fiction Award
The Music of Time: Poetry in the Twentieth Century
by John BurnsideA revelatory and deeply personal history of twentieth-century poetry by prize-winning poet and memoirist John BurnsidePoetry helps us to make sense of our world, transforming what the Russian poet Osip Mandelstam called the "noise of time" into a kind of music. The Music of Time is a unique history of twentieth-century poetry by one of today's most acclaimed poets, blending incandescent personal meditations with rare insights about a broad range of poets who distilled the essence of the moment, gave voice to our griefs and joys, and shaped our collective memory.Bringing together poets from times and places as diverse as Tsarist Russia, 1960s Harlem, and Ireland at the height of the Troubles, Burnside reveals how poetry responded to the dramatic events of the century while shaping our impressions of them. He takes readers from the trenches of World War I to a prison cell in Nazi Germany, and from Rilke's grave in the Swiss Alps to Dylan Thomas's Welsh seaside. His luminous narrative is woven through with insights into the poet's creative process as well as lyrical and thought-provoking digressions on topics ranging from marriage to the Kennedy assassination.A spellbinding work of literary history, The Music of Time reveals how poets engaged with the most important issues and events of the twentieth century, and bears personal witness to the beauty and power of an art form unlike any other.
The Music of Time: Poetry in the Twentieth Century
by John BurnsideA revelatory and deeply personal history of twentieth-century poetry by prize-winning poet and memoirist John BurnsidePoetry helps us to make sense of our world, transforming what the Russian poet Osip Mandelstam called the "noise of time" into a kind of music. The Music of Time is a unique history of twentieth-century poetry by one of today's most acclaimed poets, blending incandescent personal meditations with rare insights about a broad range of poets who distilled the essence of the moment, gave voice to our griefs and joys, and shaped our collective memory.Bringing together poets from times and places as diverse as Tsarist Russia, 1960s Harlem, and Ireland at the height of the Troubles, Burnside reveals how poetry responded to the dramatic events of the century while shaping our impressions of them. He takes readers from the trenches of World War I to a prison cell in Nazi Germany, and from Rilke's grave in the Swiss Alps to Dylan Thomas's Welsh seaside. His luminous narrative is woven through with insights into the poet's creative process as well as lyrical and thought-provoking digressions on topics ranging from marriage to the Kennedy assassination.A spellbinding work of literary history, The Music of Time reveals how poets engaged with the most important issues and events of the twentieth century, and bears personal witness to the beauty and power of an art form unlike any other.
The Music of Verse: Metrical Experiment in Nineteenth-Century Poetry
by Joseph PhelanThrough its recovery of the metrical principles underlying the work of some of the century's major poets, this study highlights the intricacy of the relation between the 'music' of verse and its meaning, and helping us to understand the way in which the ferment of metrical experiment eventually led to the emergence of free verse.
Music on the Bamboo Radio
by Martin BoothNicholas Highgate, separated from his parents during the Japanese invasion of Hong Kong, is smuggled to the mainland by his Chinese nurse and disguised as a Chinese boy. As he grows to manhood he witnesses the atrocities and deprivations of the Japanese occupation and is himself drawn into the Communist resistance activities. The book ends when the Japanese surrender and Nicholas is reunited with what remains of his family.
The Music Shop: A Novel
by Rachel JoyceFrom the author of the world-wide bestseller, The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry: ' A beautiful novel, a tonic for the soul and a complete joy to read.' Joanna Cannon, author of The Trouble with Goats and Sheep.1988. Frank owns a music shop. It is jam-packed with records of every speed, size and genre. Classical, jazz, punk – as long as it’s vinyl he sells it. Day after day Frank finds his customers the music they need. Then into his life walks Ilse Brauchmann.Ilse asks Frank to teach her about music. His instinct is to turn and run. And yet he is drawn to this strangely still, mysterious woman with her pea-green coat and her eyes as black as vinyl. But Ilse is not what she seems. And Frank has old wounds that threaten to re-open and a past he will never leave behind ...'Hits all the right notes...a love story that’s as much about the silences between words as what is said – the spaces between people that can be filled with mystery, confusion and misunderstanding as well as hope." ObserverA BBC RADIO 4 'BOOK AT BEDTIME'.
Music & Silence: Winner of the Whitbread Novel Award 1999
by Rose TremainFrom the author of The Gustav SonataWinner of the Whitbread Novel AwardIn the year 1629, a young English lutenist named Peter Claire arrives at the Danish Court to join King Christian IV's Royal Orchestra. From the moment when he realises that the musicians perform in a freezing cellar underneath the royal apartments, Peter Claire understands that he's come to a place where the opposing states of light and dark, good and evil, are waging war to the death.Designated the King's 'Angel' because of his good looks, he finds himself falling in love with the young woman who is the companion of the King's adulterous and estranged wife, Kirsten. With his loyalties fatally divided between duty and passion, how can Peter Claire find the path that will realise his hopes and save his soul?Over a million Rose Tremain books sold‘A writer of exceptional talent ... Tremain is a writer who understands every emotion’ Independent I‘There are few writers out there with the dexterity or emotional intelligence to rival that of the great Rose Tremain’ Irish Times‘Tremain has the painterly genius of an Old Master, and she uses it to stunning effect’ The Times‘Rose Tremain is one of the very finest British novelists’ Salman Rushdie‘Tremain is a writer of exemplary vision and particularity. The fictional world is rendered with extraordinary vividness’ Marcel Theroux, Guardian
The Music Teacher
by Barbara HallIn The Music Teacher, a penetrating and richly entertaining look into the heart and mind of a woman who has failed both as an artist and as a wife, Barbara Hall, award-winning creator and writer of such hit television series as Judging Amy and Joan of Arcadia, tells the story of a violinist who has accepted the limitations of her talent and looks for the casual satisfaction of trying to instill her passion for music in others. She gets more than she bargains for, however, when a young girl named Hallie enters her life. For here at last is the real thing: someone with the talent and potential to be truly great. In her drive to shape this young girl into the artist the teacher could never be, she makes one terrible mistake. As a result she is forced to reevaluate her whole life and come to terms with her future. Hall has crafted a thoroughly engrossing novel that examines the pitfalls of failure and holds up a mirror to the face of a culture that places success and achievement above all else.
Music, Text, and Culture in Ancient Greece
by Armand D'Angour Tom PhillipsWhat difference does music make to performance poetry, and how did the ancients themselves understand this relationship? Although scholars have long recognized the importance of music to ancient performance culture, little has been written on the specific effects that musical accompaniment, and features such as rhythmical structure and melody, would have created in individual poems. This volume attempts to answer these questions by exploring more fully the relationship between music and language in the poetry of ancient Greece. Arranged into two parts, the essays in the first half engage closely with the evidential and interpretative challenges posed by the interaction of ancient music and poetry, and propose original readings of a range of texts by authors such as Homer, Pindar, and Euripides, as well as later poets such as Seikilos and Mesomedes. While they emphasize different formal features, they also argue collectively for a two-way relationship between music and language: attention to the musical features of poetic texts, insofar as we can reconstruct them, enables us to better understand not only their effects on audiences, but also the various ways in which they project and structure meaning. In the second part, the focus shifts to ancient attempts to conceptualize interactions between words and music; the essays in this section analyse the contested place that music occupied in the works of Plato, Aristotle, Plutarch, and other critical writers of the Hellenistic and Imperial periods. Thinking about music is shown to influence other domains of intellectual life, such as literary criticism, and to be vitally informed by ethical concerns. These essays illustrate the importance of music for intellectual culture in ancient Greece and the ancients' abiding concern to understand and control its effects on human behaviour.