| ISBN |
9780199343638 (hbk.) |
|
0199343632 (hbk.) |
| Description |
xiii, 375 p. : ills. ; 25 cm. |
| Note |
Formerly CIP. Uk |
| Bibliog. |
Includes bibliographical references and index. |
| Contents |
Orpheus and Pythagoras -- Isomorphic resonance -- Expression: The separation of powers ; Music and language ; Music as language ; Mimesis -- Beauty -- Form: Form as number ; Form as content -- Autonomy: Material autonomy ; Ethical autonomy -- Disclosure: The composer as oracle ; Beautiful insights ; Cosmic insights -- Wagner's "absolute" music -- Hanslick's "pure" music: Hanslick the conventional ; Hanslick the radical ; Hanslick the ambivalent -- Liszt's "program" music -- Polemics -- Reconciliation -- Qualities recast: Expression ; Beauty ; Form ; Autonomy ; Disclosure ; Epilogue : since 1945. |
| Summary |
What is music, and why does it move us? From Pythagoras to the present, writers have struggled to isolate the essence of "pure" or "absolute" music in ways that also account for its profound effect. In Absolute Music: The History of an Idea, Mark Evan Bonds traces the history of these efforts across more than two millennia, paying special attention to the relationship between music's essence and its qualities of form, expression, beauty, autonomy, as well as its perceived capacity to disclose philosophical truths. The core of this book focuses on the period between 1850 and 1945. |
| Subject |
Hanslick, Eduard, 1825-1904.
|
|
Absolute music.
|
|
Music -- Philosophy and aesthetics.
|
|
