From the agile beauty of Mozart's "Jupiter" and the fierce power of Beethoven's Fifth to the celebration of heroism in Shostakovich's "Leningrad," the symphony has long held a prime place in the Western musical pantheon. Now, in The Symphony, renowned teacher and critic Michael Steinberg offers music lovers a monumental guide to this most celebrated of musical forms, with perceptive commentaries on some 118 works by 36 major composers. Enriched by biographical detail, historical background, musical examples, and many finely nuanced observations, this volume is a treasury of insight and information. Readers will find illuminating discussion of the complete symphonies of Beethoven, Schumann, Brahms, Elgar, Sibelius, and Mahler, as well as of the most loved symphonic works of Schubert, Bruckner, Dvorak, Tchaikovsky, Vaughan Williams, Prokofiev, and others. We learn, for example, how to listen more sharply for Haydn's humor, to Mozart's singular combination of pathos with grace, and to the evolution of Beethoven's musical ideas in his epoch-making nine symphones. The range and variety of composers are remarkable--Schumann's musical poetry, Tchaikovsky's melodic genius, Mendelssohn's patrician elegance, Mahler's wild and beautiful innovations, Bruckner's mighty cathedrals in tone, the brooding mysteries of Sibelius, Stravinsky's fascinating engagements with the past, and Aaron Copland's ebullient American athleticism--and all are illuminated by Steinberg's deft, inviting, and intensely personal essays. The book boasts generous coverage of American composers, with sections on Howard Hanson, Walter Piston, Roger Sessions, Aaron Copland, William Schuman, and John Harbison. Steinberg gives us such a vivid portrait of each composer's personality that we get the most immediate sense of how the work is a direct expression of the person from whose soul and brain it has sprung. Tracing the ways in which composers have dealt with the extraordinary musical challenges that have engaged them throughout the centuries, Steinberg takes us through the revolutions of expression, sound, and form that have shaped the symphony's remarkable history. Whether beginners or veterans, music lovers will listen to the symphony with enlivened interest and deeper understanding with Steinberg's masterful guide in hand.

The Symphony: A Listener's Guide

Arts & Photography

Steinberg, Michael

Music

Oxford University Press

Michael Steinberg's 1996 volume The Symphony: A Reader's Guide received glowing reviews across America. It was hailed as "wonderfully clear...recommended warmly to music lovers on all levels" (Washington Post), "informed and thoughtful" (Chicago Tribune), and "composed by a master stylist" (San Francisco Chronicle). Seiji Ozawa wrote that "his beautiful and effortless prose speaks from the heart." Michael Tilson Thomas called The Symphony "an essential book for any concertgoer." Now comes the companion volume--The Concerto: A Listener's Guide. In this marvelous book, Steinberg discusses over 120 works, ranging from Johann Sebastian Bach in the 1720s to John Adams in 1994. Readers will find here the heart of the standard repertory, among them Bach's Brandenburg Concertos, eighteen of Mozart's piano concertos, all the concertos of Beethoven and Brahms, and major works by Mendelssohn, Schumann, Liszt, Bruch, Dvora'k, Tchaikovsky, Grieg, Elgar, Sibelius, Strauss, and Rachmaninoff. The book also provides luminous introductions to the achievement of twentieth-century masters such as Arnold Schoenberg, Be'la Barto'k, Igor Stravinsky, Alban Berg, Paul Hindemith, Sergei Prokofiev, Aaron Copland, and Elliott Carter. Steinberg examines the work of these musical giants with unflagging enthusiasm and bright style. He is a master of capturing the expressive, dramatic, and emotional values of the music and of conveying the historical and personal context in which these wondrous works were composed. His writing blends impeccable scholarship, deeply felt love of music, and entertaining whimsy. Here then is a superb journey through one of music's richest and most diverse forms, with Michael Steinberg along as host, guide, and the best of companions.

The Concerto: A Listener's Guide

Michael Steinberg's highly successful listener's guides--The Symphony and The Concerto--have been universally praised for their blend of captivating biography, crystal clear musical analysis, and delightful humor. Now Steinberg follows these two greatly admired volumes with Choral Masterworks: A Listener's Guide, the only such guide available to this most popular of musical forms. Here are more than fifty illuminating essays on the classic choral masterworks, ranging from Handel's Messiah, Bach's Mass in B Minor, and Beethoven's Missa Solemnis, to works by Haydn, Brahms, Mendelssohn, and many others. Steinberg spans the entire history of classical music, from such giants of the Romantic era as Verdi and Berlioz, to leading modern composers such as Elgar, Rachmaninoff, Vaughan Williams, and Stravinsky, to contemporary masters such as John Adams and Charles Wuorinen. For each piece, Steinberg includes a fascinating biographical account of the work's genesis, often spiced with wonderful asides, such as the true story of Mozart's Requiem--Salieri had nothing to do with the composition of it, nor did he poison Mozart, who most likely died of rheumatic fever. The author also includes an astute musical analysis of each piece, one that casual music lovers can easily appreciate and that musicians and more serious fans will find invaluable. The book also includes basic information such as the various movements of the work, the organization of the chorus and orchestra, and brief historical notes on early performances. More than twenty million Americans perform regularly in choirs or choruses. Choral Masterworks will appeal not only to concert goers and CD collectors, but also to this vast multitude of choral performers, an especially engaged and active community.

Choral Masterworks: A Listener's Guide

Biographies & Memoirs

Arts & Literature

Enriched by biographical detail, historical background, musical examples, and many finely nuanced observations, this volume is a treasury of insight and information. Readers will find illuminating discussion of the complete symphonies of Beethoven, Schumann, Brahms, Sibelius, and Mahler, as well as of the most loved symphonic works of Schubert, Bruckner, Dvorak, Tchaikovsky, Prokofiev, and others. We learn how to listen more sharply for Haydn's humor, to Mozart's singular combination of pathos with grace, and to the evolution of Beethoven's musical ideas in his nine symphonies. This remarkable range and variety of composers are illuminated by Steinberg's deft, inviting, and intensely personal essays, which give such a vivid portrait of each composer's personality that the reader gets an immediate sense of how the work is a direct expression of the person from whose soul and brain it has sprung. Tracing the ways in which composers have dealt with the musical challenges that have engaged them throughout the centuries, Steinberg takes us through the revolutions of expression, sound, and form that have shaped the symphony's remarkable history. Whether beginners or veterans, music lovers will listen to the symphony with enlivened interest and deeper understanding with Steinberg's masterful guide in hand.

The Concerto: A Listener's Guide (Listener's Guide Series)

The power of music, the way it works on the mind and heart, remains an enticing mystery. Now two noted writers on classical music, Michael Steinberg and Larry Rothe, explore the allure of this melodious art--not in the clinical terms of social scientists--but through stories drawn from their own experience. In For the Love of Music, Steinberg and Rothe draw on a lifetime of listening to, living with, and writing about music, sharing the delights and revelatory encounters they have had with Mozart, Brahms, Stravinsky, and a host of other great (and almost-great) composers. At once highly personal and immediately accessible, their writings shed light on those who make music and those who listen to it--drawing readers into the beautiful and dangerous terrain that has meant so much to the authors. In recounting how they themselves came to love music, Steinberg and Rothe offer keys for listening. Here you will find the story of a boy discovering a lifelong passion as he huddled in an alley behind a movie theater in World War II England, listening to the Fantasia soundtrack. You will meet the man who created the sound of Hollywood's Golden Age. You will learn how composers have addressed issues as contemporary as AIDS and the terrorist attacks of September 11. You will sit in on strange and enlightening listening sessions with one of America's quirkiest music critics. And you will enter a world of mind- and soul-nourishing pleasures. Articulate and impassioned, sophisticated but never esoteric, Steinberg and Rothe offer invigorating reflections on music that will delight both the beginning and the seasoned listener.

For the Love of Music: Invitations to Listening

Rothe, Larry

Michael Steinberg's highly successful listener's guides--The Symphony and The Concerto--have been universally praised for their blend of captivating biography, crystal clear musical analysis, and delightful humor. Now Steinberg follows these two greatly admired volumes with Choral Masterworks, the only such guide available to this most popular of musical forms. Here are more than fifty illuminating essays on the classic choral masterworks, ranging from Handel's Messiah, Bach's Mass in B Minor, and Beethoven's Missa solemnis, to works by Haydn, Brahms, Mendelssohn, and many others. Steinberg spans the entire history of classical music, from such giants of the Romantic era as Verdi and Berlioz, to leading modern composers such as Elgar, Rachmaninoff, Vaughan Williams, and Stravinsky, to contemporary masters such as John Adams and Charles Wuorinen. For each piece, Steinberg includes a fascinating biographical account of the work's genesis, often spiced with wonderful asides. The author includes an astute musical analysis of each piece, one that casual music lovers can easily appreciate and that more serious fans will find invaluable. The book also provides basic information such as the various movements of the work, the organization of the chorus and orchestra, and brief historical notes on early performances. More than twenty million Americans perform regularly in choirs or choruses. Choral Masterworks will appeal not only to concert goers and CD collectors, but also to this vast multitude of choral performers, an especially engaged and active community. "What sets Steinberg's writing apart is its appealing mixture of impregnable authority (he knows this music) and purely personal asides (by the end of the book, we know this man). Choral Masterworks can be read by anybody, from a professional musician to any young listener newly braced by the stoic pessimism of the Brahms 'German Requiem.'" --Washington Post Book World

The power of music, the way it works on the mind and heart, remains an enticing mystery. Now two noted writers on classical music, Michael Steinberg and Larry Rothe, explore the allure of this melodious art--not in the clinical terms of social scientists--but through stories drawn from their own experience. In For the Love of Music, Steinberg and Rothe draw on a lifetime of listening to, living with, and writing about music, sharing the delights and revelatory encounters they have had with Mozart, Brahms, Stravinsky, and a host of other great (and almost-great) composers. At once highly personal and immediately accessible, their writings shed light on those who make music and those who listen to it--drawing readers into the beautiful and dangerous terrain that has meant so much to the authors. In recounting how they themselves came to love music, Steinberg and Rothe offer keys for listening. You will meet the man who created the sound of Hollywood's Golden Age and you will learn how composers have addressed issues as contemporary as AIDS and the terrorist attacks of September 11.

For The Love of Music: Invitations to Listening

Whether writers, readers or scholars, the individuals who read this book will gain much from it. A unique, special genre, creative nonfiction offers its readers a wealth of treasures. It provides the writer's singular voice as an active participant in his or her own experience. It may offer the writer's attempt to establish or define an identity, to explore and chronicle personal discoveries and changes, to examine personal conflicts, to interrogate his or her own opinion, and to connect him or herself to a larger heritage and community. It can be lyrical, expository, meditative, informational , reflective, self-interrogative, exploratory, analytical, or whimsical. But whatever form and meaning it takes, the creative nonfiction in this book provides its readers with the pleasure of reading great tales and dramas and with the learning experience of understanding the process through which to write these literary achievements. An anthology of work by major figures in creative nonfiction, this book offers the most thorough introduction to this cutting-edge genre. Its approach is both literary and writerly, focusing on the form and acknowledging the literary impulse in nonfiction as a fourth genre equivalent in scope to the three genres of poetry, fiction, and drama. Part I compiles an anthology of contemporary essays, memoirs, literary journalism, and personal cultural criticism. Part II presents articles discussing the forms and issues surrounding the fourth genre. Part II pairs essays and memoirs with articles by their authors explaining their composing process when they wrote the essays. Included are contributions by Scott Russell Sanders, Richard Selzer, Anne Dillard, Mary Clearman Blew, Tracy Kidder, Donald Murray, and other noted writers. Writers, readers, scholars and teachers.

Fourth Genre, The: Contemporary Writers of/on Creative Nonfiction

Literature & Fiction

Robert Root

Essays & Correspondence

Pearson

The Fourth Genre: Contemporary Writers of/on Creative Nonfiction, 2/e is a comprehensive and indispensable introduction and guide to the way creative nonfiction is written today. The selections represent a wide range of contemporary creative nonfiction, including examples in essay, memoir, literary journalism, and cultural criticism. These readings establish a thorough grounding in the nature of the genre and provide excellent models for writing. The articles about nonfiction forms, issues, and writing strategies in Part II, mostly written by authors whose work appears in Part I, give readers an inside view of the writers' creative processes. Part III consists of essays and memoirs paired with articles by their authors discussing the essays' creation and the writers' methods and strategies. Introductions to each part provide an overview of that section, preparing readers for the selections to come. Two alternative tables of contents organize the readings by subgenres and approaches, connecting the three distinctive sections of the book. For anyone interested in writing creative non-fiction.

The Fourth Genre: Contemporary Writers of/on Creative Nonfiction (2nd Edition)

Longman

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Steinberg, Michael. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Steinberg, Michael

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Steinberg, Michael. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

The Symphony: A Listener's Guide

The Concerto: A Listener's Guide

Choral Masterworks: A Listener's Guide

The Symphony: A Listener's Guide

The Concerto: A Listener's Guide (Listener's Guide Series)

For the Love of Music: Invitations to Listening

Choral Masterworks: A Listener's Guide

For The Love of Music: Invitations to Listening

Fourth Genre, The: Contemporary Writers of/on Creative Nonfiction

The Fourth Genre: Contemporary Writers of/on Creative Nonfiction (2nd Edition)