Review (PDF) Bruckner's Symphonies: Analysis, Reception And Cultural Politics
Despite significant advances in Bruckner scholarship, many problems persist. Although the relationship between Bruckner's music, post-Wagnerian ideology and, ultimately, Nazism has been carefully reconstructed, questions of how such matters should condition our responses to the music remain unaddressed. This important study isolates problematic issues of interpretation, analysis, reception, and historical location, and offers potential solutions through case studies of individual works.
Paperback: 296 pages
Publisher: Cambridge University Press; Reissue edition (September 18, 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0521081858
ISBN-13: 978-0521081856
Product Dimensions: 6.7 x 0.6 x 9.6 inches
Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review: 1.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
Best Sellers Rank: #2,434,397 in Books (See Top 100 in Books) #26 in Books > Humor & Entertainment > Sheet Music & Scores > Composers > Bruckner #354 in Books > Humor & Entertainment > Sheet Music & Scores > Forms & Genres > Symphonies #769 in Books > Humor & Entertainment > Sheet Music & Scores > Instrumentation > Orchestra
It's really bad. This is one of those scholarly treatises in which the focus is so minutely narrow as to be of little interest to almost anyone other than a handful of other academics. But, that's not the worst of it. The book continually veers into what's become a favorite focal point for academics dealing with Bruckner, which is his non-existent connection to the future Nazi party in Germany. The fact that it didn't exist in Bruckner's lifetime, and that Bruckner had zero bigoted interests of any kind [he was far too busy trying make enough money to feed himself, while finding precious time to compose music], doesn't stop today's gung-ho academic jokers from building up a straw man case for their profane and disgusting theories and then plowing ahead as if their inventions were actual fact.When it comes to composers or musicians of any stripe, academics usually scurry around like rodents sniffing for some sort of sexual angle; actually, homosexual angle. If they can't find one, they'll make something up. That game's a bit hard to do with Bruckner, since he had no homosexual interests, and limited his amorous attentions to young women. Undeterred, Horton and his fellow academics engage in some Friday night intellectual-party-time amateur speculation about the source of Bruckner's musical inspiration. Thus, in one chapter, Horton starts spinning the most transparently ludicrous twaddle about Bruckner's musical genius deriving from some juvenile need to please his father, etc., etc. It's both stupid funny and sickening at the same time.In the end, this is one of those books that leaves you knowing less about the topic then when you started reading it, and makes you curse the time you'd wasted with it. Pass on this one.
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