Ornamentation in Baroque and Post-Baroque Music, with Special Emphasis on J.S. Bach

Ornamentation in Baroque and Post-Baroque Music, with Special Emphasis on J.S. Bach
Author: Frederick Neumann
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Total Pages: 644
Release: 2020-05-05
Genre: Music
ISBN: 0691213348

Ornaments play an enormous role in the music of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and ambiguities in their notation (as well as their frequent omission in the score) have left doubt as to how composers intended them to be interpreted. Frederick Neumann, himself a violinist and conductor, questions the validity of the rigid principles applied to their performance. In this controversial work, available for the first time in paperback, he argues that strict constraints are inconsistent with the freedom enjoyed by musicians of the period. The author takes an entirely new look at ornamentation, and particularly that of J. S. Bach. He draws on extensive research in England, France, Germany, Italy, and the United States to show that prevailing interpretations are based on inadequate evidence. These restrictive interpretations have been far-reaching in their effect on style. By questioning them, this work continues to stimulate a reorientation in our understandiing of Baroque and post-Baroque music.

Devilish Details. Ornament-related Passages in Selected Works of Johann Sebastian Bach

Devilish Details. Ornament-related Passages in Selected Works of Johann Sebastian Bach
Author: Sebestyen Nyiro
Publisher:
Total Pages:
Release: 2017
Genre: Electronic dissertations
ISBN:

The objects of this study are some selected passages from the keyboard works of Johann Sebastian Bach (1685—1750). The passages were chosen for the specific purpose to demonstrate on the one hand, how Baroque ornamentation can be realized and executed in certain examples, and on the other hand, how the presence of certain ornaments creates performance implications for the musical context, sometimes even influencing general aspects of the compositions. Chapter one addresses the role of performer as mediator and re-creator from the time of Louis Couperin (1626—1661) on. It also discusses the role of modern performer in a â€historically informed performance.†The second chapter overviews the background information related directly and indirectly to the ornamentation practice of J. S. Bach. It also discusses some ornament tables which are accepted as relevant to J. S. Bach’s ornamentation practice. The dissertation’s main themes in the practical part, chapter three and chapter four, are ornamentation and tempo, simultaneous ornamentation (arrangement and timing between different ornaments), and compositional ornamentation. It touches upon the connection between compositional ornamentation and sign-ornamentation as well. Its primary contribution to music theory (in the original and broadest sense of the word, Î ̧ÎμÏ‰Ï Î ̄α, looking) lies in setting out an original position on the analysis of the selected passages to establish another way of looking at ornaments—a small, but organic part of the whole composition.

The Keyboard Music of J.S. Bach

The Keyboard Music of J.S. Bach
Author: David Schulenberg
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 534
Release: 2013-05-13
Genre: Music
ISBN: 1136091467

The Keyboard Music of J.S. Bach provides an introduction to and comprehensive discussion of all the music for harpsichord and other stringed keyboard instruments by Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750). Often played today on the modern piano, these works are central not only to the Western concert repertory but to musical pedagogy and study throughout the world. Intended as both a practical guide and an interpretive study, the book consists of three introductory chapters on general matters of historical context, style, and performance practice, followed by fifteen chapters on the individual works, treated in roughly chronological order. The works discussed include all of Bach's individual keyboard compositions as well as those comprising his famous collections, such as the Well-Tempered Clavier, the English and French Suites, and the Art of Fugue.

Ornamentation and Improvisation in Mozart

Ornamentation and Improvisation in Mozart
Author: Frederick Neumann
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Total Pages: 315
Release: 2019-01-15
Genre: Music
ISBN: 0691656843

This book is a sequel to Frederick Neumann's Ornamentation in Baroque and Post-Baroque Music, With Special Emphasis on J.S. Bach (Princeton, 1978). In the present volume, the first work on this subject for Mozart's music, the author continues his important contributions to the search for historically correct performance practices, and to the liberation of the performer from improperly conceived and overly restrictive interpretation of musical scores. The first part of this book attempts to free ornamentation in Mozart from rigorism that has resulted from confusing the pure abstraction of ornament tables with concrete musical situations. The second part deals with pitches that were not written in the score yet often intended to be added when Mozart left "white spots" in his notation. These additions range from single notes to lengthy cadenzas. The problem addressed is the question of where such additions are possible or necessary and how they might best be designed. Professor Neumann draws on an immense knowledge of the literature written during Mozart's time and on his own comprehension of the subtleties of Mozart's music and musical styles. Refusing to interpret the sources dogmatically, he frees performers of Mozart from the rigid princples too often imposed by modern scholars. Frederick Neumann is Professor of Music Emeritus at the University of Richmond. Originally published in 1986. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

The Keyboard Music of J.S. Bach

The Keyboard Music of J.S. Bach
Author: David Schulenberg
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 546
Release: 2013-05-13
Genre: Music
ISBN: 1136091548

The Keyboard Music of J.S. Bach provides an introduction to and comprehensive discussion of all the music for harpsichord and other stringed keyboard instruments by Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750). Often played today on the modern piano, these works are central not only to the Western concert repertory but to musical pedagogy and study throughout the world. Intended as both a practical guide and an interpretive study, the book consists of three introductory chapters on general matters of historical context, style, and performance practice, followed by fifteen chapters on the individual works, treated in roughly chronological order. The works discussed include all of Bach's individual keyboard compositions as well as those comprising his famous collections, such as the Well-Tempered Clavier, the English and French Suites, and the Art of Fugue.

Performing Bach's Keyboard Music

Performing Bach's Keyboard Music
Author: George A. Kochevitsky
Publisher: John Deere Publishing
Total Pages: 108
Release: 1996
Genre: Music
ISBN: 9781577840008

This text on performing Bach's keyboard music presents in capsule form the various opinions current in late-1990s musicology, approaching controversial questions from a critical point of view.