Listening in Paris

A Cultural History

James H. Johnson (Autor)

Buch | Softcover

363 Seiten

1996
University of California Press (Verlag)
978-0-520-20648-9 (ISBN)

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Presents 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. This book offers an analysis of political, musical, and aesthetic factors that produced more engaged listening.

Beginning with the simple question, 'Why did audiences grow silent?' "Listening in Paris" gives 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.

James H. Johnson is Assistant Professor of History at Boston University.

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
LIST OF MUSICAL EXAMPLES
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
INTRODUCTION

PART ONE: THE RENDEZVOUS OF THE RICH
1
Opera as Social Duty
2
Expression as Imitation

PART TWO: A SENSITIVE PUBLIC
3
Tears and the New Attentiveness
4
Concerts in the Old Regime
5
Harmony's Passions and the Public

PART THREE: THE EXALTATION OF THE MASSES
6
Entertainment and the Revolution
7
Musical Experience of the Terror
8
Musical Expression and Jacobin Ideology
Epilogue
Thermidor and the Return of Entertainment

PART FOUR: RESPECTABILITY AND THE BOURGEOISIE
9
Napoleon's Show
10
The Theatre Italien and Its Elites
11
The Birth of Public Concerts
12
In Search of Harmony's Sentiments
13
The Social Roots of Silence

PART FIVE: THE MUSICAL
EXPERIENCE OF ROMANTICISM
14
Operatic Rebirth and the Return of Grandeur
15
Beethoven Triumphant
16
The Musical Experience of Romanticism

AFTERWORD
NOTES
BIBLIOGRAPHY
INDEX

Erscheint lt. Verlag	4.12.1996
Reihe/Serie	Studies on the History of Society and Culture ; 21
Verlagsort	Berkerley
Sprache	englisch
Maße	152 x 229 mm
Gewicht	590 g
Themenwelt	Kunst / Musik / Theater ► Musik ► Klassik / Oper / Musical
Themenwelt	Geisteswissenschaften ► Geschichte ► Regional- / Ländergeschichte
ISBN-10	0-520-20648-7 / 0520206487
ISBN-13	978-0-520-20648-9 / 9780520206489
Zustand	Neuware