‎Massimiliano Locanto‎
‎Stravinsky and the Musical Body. Creative Process and Meaning‎

‎, Brepols, 2022 Hardback, xiii + 398 pages, Size:210 x 270 mm, Language: English. ISBN 9782503597782.‎

Reference : 64939

‎Summary The idea that the body plays an essential role in music has stimulated a wide range of new approaches in recent musicology. This book tries to apply them to the music of Igor Stravinsky from the perspective of the creative process and the construction of meaning. Most of the works examined are compositions for theatre and dance, and the analyses address many other features of the spectacle, such as choreography, scenography, stage, and television direction. That said, many compositions not intended for the stage are also considered from the perspective of the 'embodied' creative process and their implicit bodily expressiveness. Each chapter focuses on a number of Stravinsky's most famous and significant works, from the Firebird to the late serial compositions. A special place is reserved for the latter, which undoubtedly constitute the least well-known part of Stravinsky's output. The chapters are accompanied by a large number of analyses that invite readers to go 'beyond' the musical text while still relying on it, allowing them to understand how the strong physicality clearly perceived in Stravinsky's music can be associated with some of its formal and structural characteristics. In so doing, the book encourages the reader to overcome overly rigid dichotomies such as formalist/contextualist, or historical/ analytical. TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgements Notes on Musical Examples, Abbreviations and Conventions Chapter One In Search of the Musical Body Part I: Body, Voice, and Music in Stravinsky's Theatre Premise: Stravinsky's Bodily Topics The Emergence of an Anti-Realistic Vision of the Body Against Logos Part II,: Analytic Issues Music Analysis, Meaning, and Embodiment: The Problem of 'Formalist' Analysis Music Gestures as Energetic Continuities An Example: Variations for Orchestra Source for the Choreo-Musical Analysis: Some Issues The Firebird between Tradition and 'Reconstruction' A Collaboration Reconsidered Chapter Two Representing the Body in The Firebird A Collaborative Project Excursus: Composing Music in the 'Old' Ballet Composing Music for a 'New' Ballet A 'New' Collaborative Method Words, Gestures, Movements Movements, Actions, Processions 'Improvising' Ballet Music 'Improvising' with Leitmotifs Opposite Characters, Opposite Bodies Conclusion: After The Firebird Chapter Three «Il ne faut pas mépriser les doigts»: Composing with Hands, Composing with Intervals Part I: Composing with Hands Thee 'Musical Idea' and the 'Composer's Mind' The Body and the Hands: A Theoretical Framework From Keyboard to Paper: Improvisation and Composition Piano vs Orchestra? Ways of the Hand, Keys, Steps Symmetries over the Keyboard: From Rimsky-Korsakov to Stravinsky A 'Danse' of the Hands Part II: Composing with Intervals 'Change of Life' What Is a Motif ? From Steps to Rows From Motifs to Rows From Rows to Motifs Movements? over the Keyboard Conclusion: Theory and Practice Chapter Four Supernatural Beings, Human Bodies: The Flood as an Anti-Realistic Television Opera Intellectuals and Mass Culture A Collective Work Between Theatre and Television: The Problem of 'Realism Different Styles, Different Bodies From Heaven to Earth Bibliography Index of Names‎