Bøger af Nicholas Cook

The central theme of this book is the relationship between the reflections about and the realization of a musical composition. In his essay "Words about Music, or Analysis versus Performance," Nicholas Cook states that words and music can never be aligned exactly with one another. He embarks on a quest for models of the relationship between analytical conception and performance that are more challenging than those in general currency. Peter Johnson's essay, "Performance and the Listening Experience: Bach's 'Erbarme dich'" shows that a performance is an element within the intentionality of the work itself. He looks for scientific methods capable of proving the artisticity of a performance. And the composer Hans Zender, in his "A Road Map for Orpheus?," states that a composer must be capable of questioning obvious basic principles (such as equal temperament) and finding creative solutions.

Beethoven's Ninth Symphony is acknowledged as one of the masterpieces of the Western tradition, yet early critics rejected it as cryptic and eccentric, the product of a deaf and ageing composer. Nicholas Cook charts this dramatic transformation.

This book interprets the music theory of Henrich Schenker (1868-1935), as part of a project encompassing musical reform and social and political critique. It sets his work into the contexts of Viennese modernism, German cultural conservatism, and Schenker's position as a Jewish immigrant to the city where modern anti-semitism first developed.

In this extremely practical introduction to musical analysis, the author explores the factors that give unity and coherence to musical masterpieces, seeking the answers mainly in the formal and harmonic structure of individual compositions.

A selection of sixteen essays covers the period from 1987 to 2004 and brings out the development of the author's ideas over these years. This title explores a variety of topics, ranging from Beethoven to Schenker, from Chinese qin music to jazz and rock, from perceptual psychology to sketch studies and analysis of record sleeves.