‘Inner Necessity’

2020 ◽  
pp. 60-90
Author(s):  
John Michael Cooper
Keyword(s):  
Tonal Structure ◽  
History Texts ◽  
Compositional History

This chapter argues that Felix Mendelssohn’s Lobgesang represents a profound rethinking of the rhetorical and musical processes of the symphony as a genre. Rather than a unilinear array of symphonic movements whose telos is the coda of its finale, the chapter argues, the Lobgesang is a study in symphonic bitemporality—one in which a central, previously enacted parable-like narrative (Nos. 2–8) is framed by a symphonic introduction (No. 1) and a vocal-symphonic conclusion (Nos. 9–10) whose music and theological import derive from the memory of that central narrative. This view of the Lobgesang as a parable enfolded within a sermon is supported by evidence from the work’s compositional history, texts, and tonal structure.

Performing the Mass in B Minor in an Age of Choices

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel R. Melamed
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Johann Sebastian Bach ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Performance History ◽  
History Of ◽  
Compositional History

Every performance of Johann Sebastian Bach’'s Mass in B Minor makes choices. The work’s compositional history and the nature of the sources that transmit it require performers to make decisions about its musical text and about the performing forces used in its realization. The Mass’s editorial history reflects deeply ideological views about Bach’s composition and how it should sound, not just objective reporting on the piece, with consequences for performances that follow specific editions. Things left unspecified by the composer need to be filled in, and every decision—including the choice to add nothing to Bach’s text—represents an interpretation. And the long performance history of the Mass offers a range of possibilities, reflecting a tension between the performance of a work like the Mass in Bach’s time and the tradition inherited from the nineteenth century. Every performance thus represents a point of view about the piece; —there are no neutral performances.

Introduction

2020 ◽  
pp. xx-4
Author(s):  
Brad E. Kelle ◽  
Brent A. Strawn
Keyword(s):  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Topic Area ◽  
Critical Nodes ◽  
History Texts ◽  
Modern Sense

This brief chapter introduces the Oxford Handbook of the Historical Books of the Hebrew Bible. It notes the secondary and constructed nature of the category “Historical Books” (which is not native to the Hebrew Bible) and how this category might be potentially misleading as to the content and genre of these books, many of which are devoid of historiographic intent in anything like the modern sense. With these caveats entered, the introduction next explains how the essays in the book touch on four critical nodes: context (sources, history, texts), content (themes, concepts, issues), approaches (composition, synthesis, theory), and reception (literature, traditions, figures). Further, each essayist was asked to speak to how the topic/area/issue addressed in the essay relates to the Historical Books, as well as how the topic/area/issue helps one better interpret the Historical Books. In conclusion, this introduction notes the diversity that marks recent research in these books.

Brahms, Beethoven, and a Reassessment of the Famous Footsteps

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-14
Author(s):  
Styra Avins
Keyword(s):  
Alternative View ◽  
Great Success ◽  
Substantial Evidence ◽  
Specific Instance ◽  
Powerful Effect ◽  
History Of ◽  
Compositional History ◽  
Primary Focus ◽  
The Way ◽  
Musical Forces

To speak of Brahms and Beethoven in the same breath is almost a cliché: Brahms was intimately conscious of Beethoven's music from early youth. This article describes the details of his youthful involvement, the compositions he had in his repertoire as well as those other works which had a powerful effect on his development. By age 20, Brahms was frequently compared to Beethoven by people who met him or heard him play. My interest is in the way he was influenced by Beethoven and the manner in which he eventually found his own voice. The compositional history of his First Symphony provides the primary focus: its long gestation, and the alleged quote by Brahms given in Max Kalbeck's massive biography: ‘I'll never write a symphony, you have no idea what it feels like … to hear the footsteps of a giant behind one’. The reference is presumably to Beethoven, but there exists no corroborating evidence that Brahms ever said those words. They gained credence as one writer after another simply accepted Kalbeck's word. Yet substantial evidence exists that in writing his biography, Kalbeck distorted and even invented ‘facts’ when it suited his purposes, including a specific instance dealing with writing a symphony. An alternative view of the symphony's long gestation is based on a view of Brahms's compositional history. He wrote for musical forces he knew at first hand, and only from 1872 to 1875 did he have command of an orchestra. Intriguingly, while fulfilling the contemporary accepted demands of a symphony after Beethoven, Brahms devised an unusual strategy for the final movement, the basis of its great success.

The Ancient Near East: History, Texts, Etc.

2021 ◽  
Vol 44 (2) ◽  
pp. 347-376
Author(s):  
Christopher T. Begg ◽  
Victor H. Matthews
Keyword(s):  
Near East ◽  
Ancient Near East ◽  
History Texts

The Core of the Sacrificial Calendar in Num 28–29 and Its Compositional History

2021 ◽  
Vol 133 (3) ◽  
pp. 299-311
Author(s):  
Itamar Kislev
Keyword(s):  
Editorial Process ◽  
The Core ◽  
Independent Analysis ◽  
Current Context ◽  
Compositional History

Abstract To date, scholarly examination of the developed legal section in Numbers 28–29 has taken place in the context of its relationship to the Lev 23 festival calendar and other pentateuchal calendars (Exod 23:14–19; 34:18–26; Deut 16:1–17) and its place in the formation of the Pentateuch. Independent analysis of this unit has the ability to illuminate this unit’s formation, probably the product of a long editorial process, enables isolation of the stage at which it was integrated in its current context, and reveals the purpose underlying its integration.

The Ancient Near East: History, Texts, etc

2021 ◽  
Vol 44 (3) ◽  
pp. 670-687
Author(s):  
Christopher T. Begg
Keyword(s):  
Near East ◽  
Ancient Near East ◽  
History Texts

The tonal structure of Kele (Lokele)

1943 ◽  
Vol 2 (4) ◽  
pp. 193-209 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. F. Carrington
Keyword(s):  
Tonal Structure

Rethinking Intellectual History: Texts, Contexts, Language

1984 ◽  
Vol 89 (4) ◽  
pp. 1048
Author(s):  
Hans Kellner ◽  
Dominick Lacapra
Keyword(s):  
Intellectual History ◽  
History Texts
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