The Life of Richard Wagner


Book Description

Newman's Life of Wagner, published between 1933 and 1947, the culmination of forty years' research, is a classic biography.










The Life of Richard Wagner


Book Description

Ernest Newman's four-volume Life of Wagner, originally published between 1933 and 1947, remains a classic work of biography. The culmination of forty years' research on the composer and his works (Newman's first Study of Wagner was first published in 1899), these books present a detailed portrait of perhaps the most influential, the most controversial and the most frequently reviled composer in the whole history of western music. Newman was aware that no biography can ever claim to be complete or completely accurate: 'The biographer...




Wagner in Retrospect


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Story of the Century


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A colourful and concise telling of the fascinating story behind Richard Wagner's extraordinary masterpiece, Ring of the Nibelung. The Ring is one of the most epic and compelling stories of the nineteenth century, created by a composer who was, alongside Dickens, Tolstoy and Victor-Hugo, also one of the century's master storytellers. But the story of how Wagner created the work is one full of intrigue and triumphs against unlikely odds - as well as controversy, due to the composer's anti-semitic views and popularity with the Nazi party. In Story of the Century, Michael Downes combines cultural history and biography to offer this accessible and insightful introduction to The Ring and its mythology. He tells the story of how and why this extraordinary masterpiece came into being, why it takes the form it does, why it fascinates and obsesses so many and horrifies others, and why it matters.




Ernest Newman


Book Description

Frontcover -- Contents -- List of Figures -- Preface and Acknowledgements -- Chronology of Newman's Life and Works -- Abbreviations -- 1 Ernest Newman and the Challenge of Critical Biography -- PART I The Freethought Years -- 2 Formation of a Critical Sensibility: The 1880s and 1890s -- 3 Social, Literary and Musical Criticism: 1893-1897 -- 4 A Rationalist Manifesto: Pseudo-Philosophy at the end of the Nineteenth Century, 1897 -- 5 Music History and the Comparative Method: Gluck and the Opera, 1895 -- PART II The Mainstream Years -- 6 From Manchester to Moscow: Essays on Music, 1900-1920 -- 7 'The World of Music': Essays in the Sunday Times, 1920-1958 -- 8 Biographical and Musicological Tensions: The Man Liszt, 1934 -- 9 Sceptical and Transforming: Books on Wagner, 1899-1959 -- 10 Conclusion: Ernest Newman Remembered -- Appendix: Newman's Freethought Lectures, 1894-1896 -- Bibliography -- Index







SCORES OF BEING


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