Musical Revolutions in German Culture: Musicking against the Grain, 1800-1980 (Studies in European Culture and History)

Musical Revolutions in German Culture explores the persistence of a critical-deconstructive philosophy toward musical production, consumption, and reception in Germany over the past two centuries. Drawing upon the cultural-revolutionary insights of Friedrich Schlegel, Walter Benjamin, Theodor W. Adorno, and Blixa Bargeld, this book investigates how radical musical discourses and practices engage sound as a powerful site of cultural creativity, critique, and resistance. Intellectual historian Mirko M. Hall shows how music, when intentionally situated within certain counterhegemonic aesthetic practices, can decisively transform everyday consciousness in the service of human freedom.