Hugo Riemann and the Birth of Modern Musical Thought

Demonstrates how Riemann's theories advanced an understanding of the tonal tradition as both natural and German.

Alexander Rehding (Author)

9780521820738, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 1 May 2003

230 pages, 47 music examples
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.7 cm, 0.51 kg

Review of the hardback: '… this is a magnificent study. The writing throughout is sympathetic, witty, engaged, quietly ambitious; and Rehding is wonderfully sensitive to the poignancy of Riemann's tale.' Nineteenth-Century Music Review

Generally acknowledged as the most important German musicologist of his age, Hugo Riemann (1849–1919) shaped the ideas of generations of music scholars, not least because his work coincided with the institutionalisation of academic musicology around the turn of the last century. This influence, however, belies the contentious idea at the heart of his musical thought, an idea he defended for most of his career - harmonic dualism. By situating Riemann's musical thought within turn-of-the-century discourses about the natural sciences, German nationhood and modern technology, this book reconstructs the cultural context in which Riemann's ideas not only 'made sense' but advanced an understanding of the tonal tradition as both natural and German. Riemann's musical thought - from his considerations of acoustical properties to his aesthetic and music-historical views - thus regains the coherence and cultural urgency that it once possessed.

1. Riemann's moonshine experiment
2. The responsibilities of nineteenth-century music theory
3. Riemann's musical logic and the 'as if'
4. Musical syntax, nationhood and universality
5. Beethoven's deafness and tone imaginations
Epilogue
Glossary: Riemann's key terms as explained in the Musik-Lexikon (5th edn, 1900).

Subject Areas: Music [AV]