German Music Criticism in the Late Eighteenth Century: Aesthetic Issues in Instrumental Music

by Mary Sue Morrow

• ISBN13: 9780521027458
• ISBN10: 0521027454
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2006-11-02
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Summary

Music aesthetics in late-eighteenth-century Germany has always been problematic because there was no aesthetic theory to evaluate the enormous amount of high-quality instrumental music produced by composers such as Haydn and Mozart. This book derives a practical aesthetic theory from an analysis of 1,300 reviews of instrumental music published in Germany between 1760 and 1798. The reviews document an intersection with trends in literature and philosophy, and reveal interest in criteria such as genius, the expressive power of music, and the necessity of unity, several decades earlier than has previously been supposed.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	xi
Author's note	xiii
Introduction: terms of discourse	1
1 What does instrumental music mean?	4
2 Answering with a unified voice	19
3 Answering with a German voice	45
4 Answering with aesthetic criteria	66
5 The importance of being correct	79
6 The reign of genius	99
7 A call to order	134
8 Epilogue: segue to the nineteenth century	151
Notes	158
Bibliography	235
Index	246