Harrison Birtwistle Studies

This collection represents current research on Birtwistle's music, reflecting the diversity of his work through a wide range of perspectives.

David Beard (Edited by), Kenneth Gloag (Edited by), Nicholas Jones (Edited by)

9781107093744, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 9 April 2015

334 pages, 17 b/w illus. 18 tables 81 music examples
25.4 x 18.2 x 1.9 cm, 0.83 kg

This collection of essays celebrates the work of Sir Harrison Birtwistle, one of the key figures in European contemporary music. Representing current research on Birtwistle's music, this book reflects the diversity of his work in terms of periods, genres, forms, techniques and related issues through a wide range of critical, theoretical and analytical interpretations and perspectives. Written by a team of international scholars, all of whom bring a deep research-based knowledge and insight to their chosen study, this collection extends the scholarly understanding of Birtwistle through new engagements with the man and the music. The contributors provide detailed studies of Birtwistle's engagement with electronic music in the 1960s and 1970s, and develop theoretical explanations of his fascination with pulse, rhythm and time. They also explore in detail Birtwistle's interest in poetry, instrumental drama, gesture, procession and landscape, and consider the compositional processes that underpin these issues.

Preface David Beard, Kenneth Gloag and Nicholas Jones
1. 'Let it drift': Birtwistle's late-modernist music dramas Arnold Whittall
2. Mechanical song: Birtwistle's rhythmic imagination Philip Rupprecht
3. Before the mask: Birtwistle's electronic music collaborations with Peter Zinovieff Tom Hall
4. Birtwistle's 'eloquently gestural music' Kenneth Gloag
5. 'The life of my music': what the sketches tell us David Beard
6. The sound of Raasay: Birtwistle's Hebridean experience Nicholas Jones
7. Birtwistle and the labyrinthine processional Edward Venn
8. On taking a walk Aleksandra Voj?i?
9. Gigue machine and other gigs: Birtwistle in Europe and beyond Mark Delaere
10. Of shadows and mirrors: reflections on Birtwistle in the new millennium Jonathan Cross
Appendix: a selected inventory of Birtwistle manuscripts acquired by the British Library in 2013 David Beard.

Subject Areas: Individual composers & musicians, specific bands & groups [AVH], 20th century & contemporary classical music [AVGC6], Music reviews & criticism [AVC]