Listening in Paris

by James H. Johnson

• ISBN13: 9780520085640
• ISBN10: 0520085647
• Format: Nonspecific Binding
• Copyright: 2023-04-28
• Publisher: University of California Press

Summary

Beginning with the simple question, "Why did audiences grow silent?"Listening in Parisgives a spectator's-eye view of opera and concert life from the Old Regime to the Romantic era, describing the transformation in musical experience from social event to profound aesthetic encounter. James H. Johnson recreates the experience of audiences during these rich decades with brio and wit. Woven into the narrative is an analysis of the political, musical, and aesthetic factors that produced more engaged listening. Johnson shows the gradual pacification of audiences from loud and unruly listeners to the attentive public we know today. Drawing from a wide range of sources--novels, memoirs, police files, personal correspondence, newspaper reviews, architectural plans, and the like--Johnson brings the performances to life: the hubbub of eighteenth-century opera, the exuberance of Revolutionary audiences, Napoleon's musical authoritarianism, the bourgeoisie's polite consideration. He singles out the music of Gluck, Haydn, Rossini, and Beethoven as especially important in forging new ways of hearing. This book's theoretical edge will appeal to cultural and intellectual historians in many fields and periods.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations
List of Musical Examples
Acknowledgments
Introduction	p. 1
Opera as Social Duty	p. 9
Expression as Imitation	p. 35
Tears and the New Attentiveness	p. 53
Concerts in the Old Regime	p. 71
Harmony's Passions and the Public	p. 81
Entertainment and the Revolution	p. 99
Musical Experience of the Terror	p. 116
Musical Expression and Jacobin Ideology	p. 137
Epilogue: Thermidor and the Return of Entertainment	p. 155
Napoleon's Show	p. 165
The Theatre Italien and Its Elites	p. 182
The Birth of Public Concerts	p. 197
In Search of Harmony's Sentiments	p. 206
The Social Roots of Silence	p. 228
Operatic Rebirth and the Return of Grandeur	p. 239
Beethoven Triumphant	p. 257
The Musical Experience of Romanticism	p. 270
Afterword	p. 281
Notes	p. 287
Bibliography	p. 349
Index	p. 379
Table of Contents provided by Blackwell. All Rights Reserved.