The Triumph of Music: The Rise of Composers, Musicians and Their Art (Tim Blanning) lands on the shelves of my shop, where it will be found in my Music section. priced at just £6.00!
Cambridge: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2008, (First Edition) Hardback in dust wrapper.
Contains: Black & white photographs; Facsimiles; Chronological tables [1]; Tables;
From the cover: A distinguished historian chronicles the rise of music and musicians in the West from lowly balladeers to masters retained by fickle patrons, to the great composers of genius, to todays rock stars. How, he asks, did music progress from subordinate status to its present position of supremacy among the creative arts? Mozart was literally booted out of the service of the Archbishop of Salzburg with a kick to my arse, as he expressed it. Yet, less than a hundred years later, Europes most powerful ruler Emperor William I of Germany paid homage to Wagner by travelling to Bayreuth to attend the debut of The Ring at the recently completed Festspielhaus. Today Bono, who was touted as the next president of the World Bank in 2006, travels the world, advising politicians and they seem to listen.
The path to independence, fame, wealth and power began when new instruments allowed musicians to showcase their creativity, and music publishing allowed masterworks to be performed widely in concert halls erected to accommodate growing public interest. No longer merely an instrument to celebrate the greater glory of a reigning sovereign or Supreme Being, music was, by the nineteenth century, to be worshipped in its own right. In the twentieth century, new technological, social and spatial forces combined to make music ever more popular and ubiquitous.
In a concluding chapter, Tim Blanning considers music in conjunction with nationalism, race and sex. Although not always in step, he shows, music, society and politics march in the same direction.
Very Good in Very Good Dust Wrapper. Top corner of the first blank clipped.
Quarter-bound Blue on Black boards with Gilt titling to the Spine. [X] 416 pages. 9½” x 6¼”.
