By Houston A. Baker, Jr. (NHC Fellow, 1982–83) Relating the blues to American social and literary history and to Afro-American expressive culture, Houston A. Baker, Jr., offers the basis for a broader study of American culture at its "vernacular" level. He shows how the "blues voice" and its economic undertones are both central to the … Continued
Edited by R. Larry Todd (NHC Fellow, 2007–08) Fanny Mendelssohn received a lyrical piano piece as a birthday present from her brother Felix in 1828; he wrote it out in her music album, and she called it “Lied ohne Worte ” (Song without Words). Mendelssohn wrote such songs for piano, “true music, which fill a … Continued
By Blake Wilson (NHC Fellow, 2016–17) A primary mode for the creation and dissemination of poetry in Renaissance Italy was the oral practice of singing and improvising verse to the accompaniment of a stringed instrument. Singing to the Lyre is the first comprehensive study of this ubiquitous practice, which was cultivated by performers ranging from … Continued
By Tim Carter (NHC Fellow, 2015–16)
By Philip Rupprecht (NHC Fellow, 2005–06) British Musical Modernism explores the works of eleven key composers to reveal the rapid shifts of expression and technique that transformed British art music in the post-war period. Responding to radical avant-garde developments in post-war Europe, the Manchester Group composers – Alexander Goehr, Peter Maxwell Davies, and Harrison Birtwistle … Continued
By Thomas Brothers (NHC Fellow, 2003–04) In the early twentieth century, New Orleans was a place of colliding identities and histories, and Louis Armstrong was a gifted young man of psychological nimbleness. A dark-skinned, impoverished child, he grew up under low expectations, Jim Crow legislation, and vigilante terrorism. Yet he also grew up at the … Continued
By Keith Howard (NHC Fellow, 2017–18) Famously reclusive and secretive, North Korea can be seen as a theatre that projects itself through music and performance. The first book-length account of North Korean music and dance in any language other than Korean, Songs for "Great Leaders" pulls back the curtain on this theatre for the first time. Renowned … Continued
By Christian Thorau (NHC Fellow, 2008–09) “What is still a description in any other art is already a metaphor in the art of music.” Eduard Hanslick already pointed out the special role of metaphors in understanding music in his work Vom Musikalisch-Schönen (1854). From sound to metaphor takes up the metaphor-theoretical discussions of the 20th and … Continued
By Jann Pasler (NHC Fellow, 2006–07) In a book that challenges modernist ideas about the value and role of music in Western society, Composing the Citizen demonstrates how music can help forge a nation. Deftly exploring the history of Third Republic France, Jann Pasler shows how French people from all classes and political persuasions looked to music … Continued
By Carol J. Oja (NHC Fellow, 1995–96) New York City witnessed a dazzling burst of creativity in the 1920s. In this pathbreaking study, Carol J. Oja explores this artistic renaissance from the perspective of composers of classical and modern music, who along with writers, painters, and jazz musicians, were at the heart of early modernism … Continued