Nicholas E. Tawa

The coming of age of American art music : New England's classical Romanticists

Preface Composer, Music, and Community Nourishing the Composer Artistic Frames of Reference John Knowles Paine (1839-1906) George Whitefield Chadwick (1854-1931) Edward MacDowell (1860-1908) Three Composers: Parker, Foote, Beach Evaluating the Six Composers and Their Music Selected Bibliography Musical Examples Index

High-Minded and Low-Down: Music in the Lives of Americans, 1800-1861

From Americas beginnings, our homes, churches, and public spaces have resounded with music. A preeminent musicologist now explores the relevance of music to Americans during the countrys formative years, from the dawn of the nineteenth century to the Civil War.Rather than reexamining composers or musical compositions, Nicholas E. Tawa focuses instead on the cultural interests and values of antebellum Americans -- men and women, white and black, wealthy and poor, educated and uneducated, sophisticated and uncultivated -- to show how their tastes in music reflected their times. By looking back at how people thought about music, what they expected of it, how they acquired it, and how they employed it in their daily activities, Tawa seeks to determine how music enriched their lives and helped establish the national identity.Distilling thirty years of research in a vast array of primary sources, Tawa depicts scenes of domesticity and worship, wooing and recreation, toil and travel, illustrating how the music of a citizenry struggling to define its government evolved from ordinary, everyday experiences. His book recreates the spirit that helped bind a young nation together and holds up a new and valuable mirror to early American musical life and society.

New World Symphonies: How American Culture Changed European Music

This groundbreaking book shows for the first time the profound and transformative influence of American literature, music, and mythology on European music. Acknowledging the impact of European tradition on American composers, Jack Sullivan contends that, beginning in the nineteenth century, an even more powerful musical current flowed from the New World to the Old.

American Composers and Their Public: A Critical Look

In all of the writings about twentieth-century American art music, scarcely any attempt has been made to examine the relationship between the composer and the general audience, and least of all what composers and members of the music public have had to say about each other. The consequences of the elimination of common guidelines agreed to by artist and audience, the lack of balance between rights and responsibilities of all concerned with retaining the viability of new music, and the indifference of modern composers and the general music public to each other have proved disastrous. Yet there continue to be composers who write qualitatively excellent works that do please many listeners. Tawa addresses these issues. Anyone interested in the course taken by twentieth-century American music and the crisis now facing art music will find Tawas analysis of great value. The book is recommended for musicians, music lovers, and educators.

[Review] [1] A Most Wonderous Babble: American Art Composers, Their Music, and the American Scene, 1950-1985. [2] Art Music in the American Society: The Condition of Art Music in the Late Twentieth Century.

Preface Postwar Turbulence and Change The World of the Modern Composer The Music of Serialism and Atonality Musical Countercurrents Modern Music, Visionary Connections The Traditional Mainstream Venturesome Composers of the Traditional Mainstream Reconciliations Discography of Works Referred to in Chapters 3 through 7 A Selective Bibliography of Works Consulted