Ligeti, Kurtag, And Hungarian Music During The Cold War
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  • Ligeti, Kurtag, And Hungarian Music During The Cold War

Ligeti, Kurtag, And Hungarian Music During The Cold War

Catalogue No: 9780521827331
A study situating the music of the Hungarian composers Ligeti and Kurtág in political context.
£83.00

Rachel Beckles Willson


Drawing on key elements from musical thought in interwar Hungary, this book provides a new perspective on the nation’s musical heritage both inside and outside Hungary’s borders during the Cold War. Although Ligeti became part of the Western avant-garde after he left Hungary in 1956, archival sources illuminate his ongoing contact with Hungarian musicians, and their shifting perspective on his work. Kurtág’s music was more obviously involved with Hungarian traditions, was entangled with the Soviet occupation, and was a contributing part of the city’s diverse musical culture. However, from the mid-1960s onwards, critics identified his music as an artistic and moral ‘truth’ distinct from the broader music life of Budapest: it was an idealised symbol of life beyond the everyday in Hungary. Grounding her interpretations of works in these complex political circumstances, Beckles Willson is nonetheless sympathetic to arguments by Ligeti, Kurtág, and Budapest music critics that their music might have a life beyond nationalist and Cold War ideology.


Bibliographic Details


42 music examples


Contents

  • Introduction
  • Part I: 1. After 1920: on land, language and music
  • 2. After 1945: a New Empire forms
  • Part II: 3. After 1956: parted ways
  • 4. After 1968: Budapest, Kurtág, events
  • 5. After the west: Ligeti looks back
  • 6. After Budapest: out of Hungary?
  • Epilogue: On Hungary, and (our) longing for Moscow
  • Personalia.
9780521827331

Specifications

Product Format
Book
Publication Date
06/09/2007
ISBN
9780521827331 (0521827337)
Language
English
Author
Rachel Beckles Willson