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Music at the Limits
"Music at the Limits" is the first book to bring together three decades of Edward W. Said's essays and articles on music. Addressing the work of a variety of composers, musicians, and performers, Said carefully draws out music's social, political, and cultural contexts and, as a classically trained pianist, provides rich and often surprising assessments of classical music and opera.
"Music at the Limits" offers both a fresh perspective on canonical pieces and a celebration of neglected works by contemporary composers. Said faults the Metropolitan Opera in New York for being too conservative and laments the way in which opera superstars like Pavarotti have "reduced opera performance to a minimum of intelligence and a maximum of overproduced noise." He also reflects on the censorship of Wagner in Israel; the worrisome trend of proliferating music festivals; an opera based on the life of Malcolm X; the relationship between music and feminism; the pianist Glenn Gould; and the works of Mozart, Bach, Richard Strauss, and others.
Said wrote his incisive critiques as both an insider and an authority. He saw music as a reflection of his ideas on literature and history and paid close attention to its composition and creative possibilities. Eloquent and surprising, "Music at the Limits" preserves an important dimension of Said's brilliant intellectual work and cements his reputation as one of the most influential and groundbreaking scholars of the twentieth century.
"Music at the Limits" offers both a fresh perspective on canonical pieces and a celebration of neglected works by contemporary composers. Said faults the Metropolitan Opera in New York for being too conservative and laments the way in which opera superstars like Pavarotti have "reduced opera performance to a minimum of intelligence and a maximum of overproduced noise." He also reflects on the censorship of Wagner in Israel; the worrisome trend of proliferating music festivals; an opera based on the life of Malcolm X; the relationship between music and feminism; the pianist Glenn Gould; and the works of Mozart, Bach, Richard Strauss, and others.
Said wrote his incisive critiques as both an insider and an authority. He saw music as a reflection of his ideas on literature and history and paid close attention to its composition and creative possibilities. Eloquent and surprising, "Music at the Limits" preserves an important dimension of Said's brilliant intellectual work and cements his reputation as one of the most influential and groundbreaking scholars of the twentieth century.
325 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2007
31 people are currently reading
514 people want to read
About the author
Edward W. Said
232 books4,243 followers(Arabic Profile إدوارد سعيد)
Edward Wadie Said was a professor of literature at Columbia University, a public intellectual, and a founder of the academic field of postcolonial studies. A Palestinian American born in Mandatory Palestine, he was a citizen of the United States by way of his father, a U.S. Army veteran.
Educated in the Western canon, at British and American schools, Said applied his education and bi-cultural perspective to illuminating the gaps of cultural and political understanding between the Western world and the Eastern world, especially about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the Middle East; his principal influences were Antonio Gramsci, Frantz Fanon, Aimé Césaire, Michel Foucault, and Theodor Adorno.
As a cultural critic, Said is known for the book Orientalism (1978), a critique of the cultural representations that are the bases of Orientalism—how the Western world perceives the Orient. Said’s model of textual analysis transformed the academic discourse of researchers in literary theory, literary criticism, and Middle-Eastern studies—how academics examine, describe, and define the cultures being studied. As a foundational text, Orientalism was controversial among the scholars of Oriental Studies, philosophy, and literature.
As a public intellectual, Said was a controversial member of the Palestinian National Council, because he publicly criticized Israel and the Arab countries, especially the political and cultural policies of Muslim régimes who acted against the national interests of their peoples. Said advocated the establishment of a Palestinian state to ensure equal political and human rights for the Palestinians in Israel, including the right of return to the homeland. He defined his oppositional relation with the status quo as the remit of the public intellectual who has “to sift, to judge, to criticize, to choose, so that choice and agency return to the individual” man and woman.
In 1999, with his friend Daniel Barenboim, Said co-founded the West–Eastern Divan Orchestra, based in Seville, which comprises young Israeli, Palestinian, and Arab musicians. Besides being an academic, Said also was an accomplished pianist, and, with Barenboim, co-authored the book Parallels and Paradoxes: Explorations in Music and Society (2002), a compilation of their conversations about music. Edward Said died of leukemia on 25 September 2003.
Edward Wadie Said was a professor of literature at Columbia University, a public intellectual, and a founder of the academic field of postcolonial studies. A Palestinian American born in Mandatory Palestine, he was a citizen of the United States by way of his father, a U.S. Army veteran.
Educated in the Western canon, at British and American schools, Said applied his education and bi-cultural perspective to illuminating the gaps of cultural and political understanding between the Western world and the Eastern world, especially about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the Middle East; his principal influences were Antonio Gramsci, Frantz Fanon, Aimé Césaire, Michel Foucault, and Theodor Adorno.
As a cultural critic, Said is known for the book Orientalism (1978), a critique of the cultural representations that are the bases of Orientalism—how the Western world perceives the Orient. Said’s model of textual analysis transformed the academic discourse of researchers in literary theory, literary criticism, and Middle-Eastern studies—how academics examine, describe, and define the cultures being studied. As a foundational text, Orientalism was controversial among the scholars of Oriental Studies, philosophy, and literature.
As a public intellectual, Said was a controversial member of the Palestinian National Council, because he publicly criticized Israel and the Arab countries, especially the political and cultural policies of Muslim régimes who acted against the national interests of their peoples. Said advocated the establishment of a Palestinian state to ensure equal political and human rights for the Palestinians in Israel, including the right of return to the homeland. He defined his oppositional relation with the status quo as the remit of the public intellectual who has “to sift, to judge, to criticize, to choose, so that choice and agency return to the individual” man and woman.
In 1999, with his friend Daniel Barenboim, Said co-founded the West–Eastern Divan Orchestra, based in Seville, which comprises young Israeli, Palestinian, and Arab musicians. Besides being an academic, Said also was an accomplished pianist, and, with Barenboim, co-authored the book Parallels and Paradoxes: Explorations in Music and Society (2002), a compilation of their conversations about music. Edward Said died of leukemia on 25 September 2003.
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Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews
June 11, 2012
I've bonded with Said over our mutual love for Maurizio Pollini, but I feel like I need to scold him a little for his mild disrespecting of Vladimir Ashkenazy. ("...Pollini's career communicates a feeling of growth, purpose, and form. Sadly, most pianists...seem merely to wish to remain in power. I have thought this, perhaps unfairly of Vladimir Horowitz and Rudolf Serkin. These are men with tremendous gifts, and much dedication and energy; they have given great pleasure to their audiences. But their work today strikes me as simply going on. This can also be said about fine but much less interesting pianists like Andre Watts, Bella Davidovitch, Vladimir Ashkenazy, and Alexis Weissenberg," wrote Said in 1985.) I've never heard a bad Ashkenazy recording (never heard him live, either), and he seems like such a nice guy. Not a narcissist, or even an extrovert, just a very honest person who knows himself very well and will tell an interviewer what his strengths and weaknesses are.
In 1989 Said was still disliking Andre Watts: "Watts clearly fancies himself a very stylish man, but the phrase that echoed through my mind as I sat through his effortless athleticism was 'meaningless fluency.' Watts is one of the few performers whose technique and apparent popularity keep provoking the question, Why does he play the piano? So utterly pointless does the whole exercise seem, so without thought or even care, so without statement or plan is his playing."
I'm tiring somewhat of the Glenn Gould fetishizing. Gould was someone who created fetishes - the chair, the low sitting position, the humming and singing - which may or may not have been outgrowths of Asperger's. Who knows. (I do think he had Asperger's, I just don't know if his pianistic eccentricities were due to it.) And the music world then made a fetish of Gould the man. I really don't care about all the peripheral stuff; I'm only interested in the music he makes, and the interpretations he decides on. I'm not interested in them because it's Glenn Gould, but because it's music being made. Maybe we're in a quiescent Gould period now; these pieces Said wrote in the 1980s and 90s, in the years following Gould's death, when he entered the popular culture through books and films. Of the several pieces on Gould here, one is on Gould the intellectual, relating him to Adorno. I would direct your attention to Alfred Brendel's comments about Gould in Me of All People: Alfred Brendel in Conversation with Martin Meyer. Brendel wasn't impressed by Gould, who he thought illuminated works from without, when they ought to be illuminated from within.
I thoroughly enjoyed reading all these pieces, most of which were published in the Nation. Said of course was an intellectual and academic. He was also a polymath, a skilled amateur pianist, not a professional music critic or a music theorist. There are spots where his criticism is not all that insightful, and I chalk that up to being an amateur. The people who have the most insightful things to say about music are, perhaps unsurprisingly, often professional musicians. Still, his knowledge of music is vast. I was especially impressed with his opera chops. Most of the criticism here is either about opera, or piano music. He administers a pleasing beating to the Metropolitan Opera, which is staid (in its unrisky programming choices) yet also flashy (mounting crowdpleasing works). Often we get a strongly expressed opinion: "Encores...are appalling, like food stains on a handsome suit. They serve to illustrate that the art of building a program is still a primitive one." Sometimes we get a delicious sentence like: "It [Strauss's opera Die Frau ohne Schatten] requires a conductor and performers with immense staying power, who must also be blissfully unaware of the solemn idiocy in which they are involved."
Said disappointed me, though, with the "unplayable" cliché: "I am now convinced that aside from the concerti, most of Mozart's piano works are fundamentally unplayable; Gould succeeded in demonstrating that point by the way he interpreted the sonatas throughout his career." I really have no idea what that means. Having played many of the sonatas myself, and heard many others do so (Glenn Gould aside), I know that they are playable. So Said is trying to be clever here, I'm just not sure why. He later calls the final fugue of Beethoven's "Hammerklavier" sonata unplayable, in a review of Pollini. Of course, Pollini had just played the fugue in recital, so obviously it was playable. What's the point of using a word that is so obviously an exaggeration, not to mention false? A pianist performs Liszt's Réminiscences de Don Juan, "an impossible waterfall of nervous octaves, thirds and chromatic runs," except that it's not actually impossible. Many pianists have done it. It makes Said sound like a rube, frankly.
The book has an almost comically appalling, distracting level of typos (I counted 37). I think the worst one I saw was essential spelled essennal. There are inconsistencies in italicizations and diacritical marks. You need to pick either Schoenberg or Schönberg; you can't toggle back and forth between them, and have all the Schoenberg references in your index but none of the Schönberg ones.
In 1989 Said was still disliking Andre Watts: "Watts clearly fancies himself a very stylish man, but the phrase that echoed through my mind as I sat through his effortless athleticism was 'meaningless fluency.' Watts is one of the few performers whose technique and apparent popularity keep provoking the question, Why does he play the piano? So utterly pointless does the whole exercise seem, so without thought or even care, so without statement or plan is his playing."
I'm tiring somewhat of the Glenn Gould fetishizing. Gould was someone who created fetishes - the chair, the low sitting position, the humming and singing - which may or may not have been outgrowths of Asperger's. Who knows. (I do think he had Asperger's, I just don't know if his pianistic eccentricities were due to it.) And the music world then made a fetish of Gould the man. I really don't care about all the peripheral stuff; I'm only interested in the music he makes, and the interpretations he decides on. I'm not interested in them because it's Glenn Gould, but because it's music being made. Maybe we're in a quiescent Gould period now; these pieces Said wrote in the 1980s and 90s, in the years following Gould's death, when he entered the popular culture through books and films. Of the several pieces on Gould here, one is on Gould the intellectual, relating him to Adorno. I would direct your attention to Alfred Brendel's comments about Gould in Me of All People: Alfred Brendel in Conversation with Martin Meyer. Brendel wasn't impressed by Gould, who he thought illuminated works from without, when they ought to be illuminated from within.
I thoroughly enjoyed reading all these pieces, most of which were published in the Nation. Said of course was an intellectual and academic. He was also a polymath, a skilled amateur pianist, not a professional music critic or a music theorist. There are spots where his criticism is not all that insightful, and I chalk that up to being an amateur. The people who have the most insightful things to say about music are, perhaps unsurprisingly, often professional musicians. Still, his knowledge of music is vast. I was especially impressed with his opera chops. Most of the criticism here is either about opera, or piano music. He administers a pleasing beating to the Metropolitan Opera, which is staid (in its unrisky programming choices) yet also flashy (mounting crowdpleasing works). Often we get a strongly expressed opinion: "Encores...are appalling, like food stains on a handsome suit. They serve to illustrate that the art of building a program is still a primitive one." Sometimes we get a delicious sentence like: "It [Strauss's opera Die Frau ohne Schatten] requires a conductor and performers with immense staying power, who must also be blissfully unaware of the solemn idiocy in which they are involved."
Said disappointed me, though, with the "unplayable" cliché: "I am now convinced that aside from the concerti, most of Mozart's piano works are fundamentally unplayable; Gould succeeded in demonstrating that point by the way he interpreted the sonatas throughout his career." I really have no idea what that means. Having played many of the sonatas myself, and heard many others do so (Glenn Gould aside), I know that they are playable. So Said is trying to be clever here, I'm just not sure why. He later calls the final fugue of Beethoven's "Hammerklavier" sonata unplayable, in a review of Pollini. Of course, Pollini had just played the fugue in recital, so obviously it was playable. What's the point of using a word that is so obviously an exaggeration, not to mention false? A pianist performs Liszt's Réminiscences de Don Juan, "an impossible waterfall of nervous octaves, thirds and chromatic runs," except that it's not actually impossible. Many pianists have done it. It makes Said sound like a rube, frankly.
The book has an almost comically appalling, distracting level of typos (I counted 37). I think the worst one I saw was essential spelled essennal. There are inconsistencies in italicizations and diacritical marks. You need to pick either Schoenberg or Schönberg; you can't toggle back and forth between them, and have all the Schoenberg references in your index but none of the Schönberg ones.
December 23, 2022
萨义德，霍洛维兹第一黑粉。最推崇古尔德，对波里尼盛赞不已，也有夸夸我心爱的布伦德尔（一般满意，毕竟也有批评，可我爱的人的缺点都很优雅，不需要被指正）
音乐的回望那一章他说 音乐是一种表达艺术 但又没有能力解释清楚、具体说出它表达的是什么 某个意义而言 一切音乐只关乎音乐 这是音乐话语或者观点表达中固有的悲剧 它受限于它自己。想来确实如此 音乐的震撼是创作者、音乐本身以及听众共同实现的 一切的艺术都是如此 包括文学绘画和翻译。我觉得一味追求“懂”和“正确”简直是一种当代疾病了。
关于我最爱的作曲家巴赫 他说他的对位音乐是若干同时行进的平行线 每个声部错综复杂地交织着 依循严格的规则自在地进行自我表达。这么说我更加认识到自己为什么这么喜欢巴赫 足够精巧繁复 但在规则内也能恣意妄为 巴赫真是丰富到一曲内想要的都能有。
器乐演奏家除了精湛的技巧外 音乐性的表达上还应该有艺术家独到的思考和审美。伟大的音乐家不只是演奏而已 他们更是对重要的曲目贡献了全新的思考和解读。从这个意义上 很多乐评都跑偏 听众把高超的技巧水平视作理所当然 把无瑕演出当成评判的唯一标准。这简直是本末倒置了。我要谨慎先入为主的成见的奴役！
读乐评和书评一样 给人一些品评新角度 审美不一样的话也不一定非要赞同大家之言。对我来说收获之一是以后在夸我心爱之人时可以夸得更多元更立体更全面！嗷呜！！
音乐的回望那一章他说 音乐是一种表达艺术 但又没有能力解释清楚、具体说出它表达的是什么 某个意义而言 一切音乐只关乎音乐 这是音乐话语或者观点表达中固有的悲剧 它受限于它自己。想来确实如此 音乐的震撼是创作者、音乐本身以及听众共同实现的 一切的艺术都是如此 包括文学绘画和翻译。我觉得一味追求“懂”和“正确”简直是一种当代疾病了。
关于我最爱的作曲家巴赫 他说他的对位音乐是若干同时行进的平行线 每个声部错综复杂地交织着 依循严格的规则自在地进行自我表达。这么说我更加认识到自己为什么这么喜欢巴赫 足够精巧繁复 但在规则内也能恣意妄为 巴赫真是丰富到一曲内想要的都能有。
器乐演奏家除了精湛的技巧外 音乐性的表达上还应该有艺术家独到的思考和审美。伟大的音乐家不只是演奏而已 他们更是对重要的曲目贡献了全新的思考和解读。从这个意义上 很多乐评都跑偏 听众把高超的技巧水平视作理所当然 把无瑕演出当成评判的唯一标准。这简直是本末倒置了。我要谨慎先入为主的成见的奴役！
读乐评和书评一样 给人一些品评新角度 审美不一样的话也不一定非要赞同大家之言。对我来说收获之一是以后在夸我心爱之人时可以夸得更多元更立体更全面！嗷呜！！
March 15, 2021
His tastes are sometimes idiosyncratic, but the depth of his musical knowledge is astounding, especially when it comes to piano and opera.
March 22, 2023
A collection of deeply researched, detailed, and rich essays, almost incomprehensible in range and breadth. You may disagree with Said’s opinion, but you cannot disagree with the turn of his phrase or the flow of his sentence. Musical criticism the way I wish mathematical criticism might one day be written.
July 2, 2018
Considering that Said was Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University, I was stunned by the depth of his musical knowledge as I entered into this collection of reviews and essays written over the course of a little over two decades up to the very end of his life. While the focus of the work is highly attuned to piano and operatic works, his erudition and genuine passion for the repertoire was refreshing and insightful. It was, nevertheless, as insightful as a self-professed amateur pianist could be. As one delves deeper there emerges a clear lack of thematic knowledge or facility with the music itself, and often he is reduced to a distant, somewhat amorphous, intellectual fetishization of the music. Said is very clear about musicians he likes (Gould being par excellence) and those he doesn’t, and this often revolves around his rather subjective notion of the kind of argument he believes music can present in spite of it being “fundamentally dumb”. Insofar as that is true, I think it has to be held in balance with the very real aesthete and sensate qualities that music can evince. I am sure Said knew this but, in an effort to correct the unthinking sentimentality that crowds out the recital halls of our times, he does go too far in his derision at times to the detriment of his overall point.
The derision he reserves for the Met, though, as a redundant, spent force with dubious curatorial value was entirely apt. For all one may disagree with his very, very strong and explicit opinions, you cannot say that he doesn’t say anything. Said offers a different entry into music, one about as literary as it can be; he finds perhaps in Gould a kindred spirit who, beyond his playing, produced a massive output of radio talks and essays. It is this metaphysical wrestling with the music, this connection to an argument advanced through neumes, that affords fertile ground beyond, say, Schenkerian analysis or the musicological studies of Maynard Solomon. Said is constantly asking “so what?”, and in doing so forces performers and writers to go beyond the routine and accepted into understanding why every inflection, every note, every study of zeitgeist, is necessary to a, if not complete, then surely diverting and fruitful study. While some, especially those of more limited financial means, may find tendentious his griping over the lacklustre state of concerts and festivals in toto (given that we can usually only afford to attend one or two a year), Said’s writing, wit, and energy leave this work completely accessible.
As a matter of note, there are A LOT of grammatical, typesetting, and even spelling errors! Highlights include “essenal” for “essential” and “Ageriach” for Martha Argerich. This can be quite distracting at times, and certainly unbefitting a man of such elegant writing.
The derision he reserves for the Met, though, as a redundant, spent force with dubious curatorial value was entirely apt. For all one may disagree with his very, very strong and explicit opinions, you cannot say that he doesn’t say anything. Said offers a different entry into music, one about as literary as it can be; he finds perhaps in Gould a kindred spirit who, beyond his playing, produced a massive output of radio talks and essays. It is this metaphysical wrestling with the music, this connection to an argument advanced through neumes, that affords fertile ground beyond, say, Schenkerian analysis or the musicological studies of Maynard Solomon. Said is constantly asking “so what?”, and in doing so forces performers and writers to go beyond the routine and accepted into understanding why every inflection, every note, every study of zeitgeist, is necessary to a, if not complete, then surely diverting and fruitful study. While some, especially those of more limited financial means, may find tendentious his griping over the lacklustre state of concerts and festivals in toto (given that we can usually only afford to attend one or two a year), Said’s writing, wit, and energy leave this work completely accessible.
As a matter of note, there are A LOT of grammatical, typesetting, and even spelling errors! Highlights include “essenal” for “essential” and “Ageriach” for Martha Argerich. This can be quite distracting at times, and certainly unbefitting a man of such elegant writing.
August 31, 2020
It felt almost like a delightful as well as intellectually enriching dialogue with an intelligent, knowledgeable, passionate (but not at all arrogant) friend that put a lot of music into context and show connections among a lot of dimensions.
The focus is on opera and piano, particularly the performances mostly in 1980s and 1990s in New York and a few other cities in USA. But make no mistake, departing from this limited scope, Said manages to take the reader on a very nice journey. I don't know if it's only me, and I don't know if it's because I already Said's passion for opera and piano to a great extent, but his enthusiasm and open mindedness for music is almost contagious, jumping at you from many pages.
Even though some parts of this collection of essays are tied to a very particular place and period, (e.g. why would you ever care for the conservatism of The Metropolitan Opera in New York City during 1980s and 1990s at all?), the motivations and principles employed by Said forces the reader to have a more critical eye towards the modern landscape of opera and concert hall programs and performances.
If the book contained nothing else but the points above, I'd still like it very much. But Said being Said, of course went above and beyond, with a few essays concerning the relationship between very problematic periods of history, politics and music. Those essays are necessarily timeless, in the sense that arguments voiced there continue to be meaningful in 2020s and beyond.
I recommend this book to all classical and modern music lovers: prepare your favorite drink, put on your favorite recording, and sit back, and enjoy the ride. But also don't forget to have some pen and paper around, because you'll find an almost irresistible need to take some notes for further reading based on the pointers Said provides.
The focus is on opera and piano, particularly the performances mostly in 1980s and 1990s in New York and a few other cities in USA. But make no mistake, departing from this limited scope, Said manages to take the reader on a very nice journey. I don't know if it's only me, and I don't know if it's because I already Said's passion for opera and piano to a great extent, but his enthusiasm and open mindedness for music is almost contagious, jumping at you from many pages.
Even though some parts of this collection of essays are tied to a very particular place and period, (e.g. why would you ever care for the conservatism of The Metropolitan Opera in New York City during 1980s and 1990s at all?), the motivations and principles employed by Said forces the reader to have a more critical eye towards the modern landscape of opera and concert hall programs and performances.
If the book contained nothing else but the points above, I'd still like it very much. But Said being Said, of course went above and beyond, with a few essays concerning the relationship between very problematic periods of history, politics and music. Those essays are necessarily timeless, in the sense that arguments voiced there continue to be meaningful in 2020s and beyond.
I recommend this book to all classical and modern music lovers: prepare your favorite drink, put on your favorite recording, and sit back, and enjoy the ride. But also don't forget to have some pen and paper around, because you'll find an almost irresistible need to take some notes for further reading based on the pointers Said provides.
January 17, 2020
10 『경계의 음악』 - 에드워드 사이드, 이석호 옮김
⭐⭐⭐⭐⚡
미치너의 <소설>에서 앞길을 예정해버리는 영악한 키잡이처럼 묘사된 편집자와 평론가를 떠올리게 만드는 에드워드 사이드가 20년간 기고한 음악 평론집이다
ㆍ
굴드, 바흐, 모짜르트, 베토벤, 폴리니, 바그너, 굴드, 브렌델, 바그너, 굴드... 새침하게 바렌보임, 다시 굴드, 바그너, 오오오 바흐에 이르는 일련의 사이클은 독일 음악과 오페라에 대한 강박을 보여주는 동시에 러시아 음악은 피해야만 하는 어떤 배제의 강박도 보여준다.
ㆍ
그럼에도 불구하고 음악 예술의 언어적 침묵을 해독하고 연주를 통한 재창조의 작업에 기대하는 지성적 통찰을 명징하게 선언하는데, 어중간한 평론이나 방황하는 음악가 전기의 도태를 본업 비교문학 연구가의 음악 산문인 '에드워드 사이드' 저작의 제읽기를 통해서 반동적으로 제시하는 탁월한 필력과 반골적 시선도 풍부하다.
ㆍ
p353 - 결과적으로 오늘날의 음악 청중은 자신들이 속한 시대의 음악에 우선 노출되지 못하는 역사상 최초의 사람들이 되고 말았다.
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물론 이 몰입으로 빚어낸 덕에 저자 스스로 말하고 있는 좋은 글, 음악이 새롭게 들리게 하는 역할을 하는 한 권의 책이 되었다는 점은 분명하다. 그럼에도 공연계가 유명 레파토리를 반복하는 탓에 현재의 음악을 최전선에서 접하지 못하는 최초의 세대가 됐다는 아쉬움은 사이드 스스로 반복하는 주제(굴드, 바흐, 바그너와 오페라)에 대한 내 아쉬움과 같은데... 사이드도 자신의 제약된 사이클에만 자신을 노출 시킨다는 인상이 역력하기 때문이다. ㅡ (사실 특정 소수 계층이 당대의 음악에 노출되고 있다는 점에서 이 말은 왜곡이다. 현대 음악의 청자는 존재하며, 고전 음악의 당대 청자도 전체 인구에 비하면 한줌이나 됐을까.)
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물론 나도 첼리비다케의 브루크너, 브람스, 드뷔시, 슈베르트에 대한 절대적인 신뢰에 더불어 바렌보임은 베토벤 소나타 아니고선 메롱함이며, 바그너는 서곡을 굳이 넘어가지 않고, 브렌델보다는 켐프니까.
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어떤 면에선 미치너의 <소설>이 재밌으면서도 결말의 평론가, 편집자의 공모에서 우롱당한 듯한 불쾌감을 느꼈던 기억과도 같으나, 전업 음악평론가라 하더라도 동서를 무론하고 다루는 데는 한계가 분명하겠으며 ㅡ 하물며 오페라를 총보로 다루는 열혈 시청자인 저자의 취향이 나와는 다른 것은 당연하겠으며, 이 공고한 취향과 주장은 우물 파기에는 미덕에 가깝다.
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어쨌든 그 미덕의 세례를 근 며칠 간 내가 경험했기 때문이기도 하다.
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p45 - 카라얀의 전체주의적 사고방식
p141 - 메트의 머저리 같은 옹고집
p155 - 대체 저자는 왜 피아노를 치는 거지?
p308 - 에이비느 렌터카 같은 계약서처럼 지루하게
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그리고 우아하게 분쇄하는 잔혹성은 덤이다.
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p.s. 살짝 오락가락한 것은 저자의 책... 모든 꼭지가 그렇다. 좋은데 싫고, 싫은데 좋다는 걸 철학과 스타일로 마감한다는 게 명백하고도 영원한 차이지만.
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⭐⭐⭐⭐⚡
미치너의 <소설>에서 앞길을 예정해버리는 영악한 키잡이처럼 묘사된 편집자와 평론가를 떠올리게 만드는 에드워드 사이드가 20년간 기고한 음악 평론집이다
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굴드, 바흐, 모짜르트, 베토벤, 폴리니, 바그너, 굴드, 브렌델, 바그너, 굴드... 새침하게 바렌보임, 다시 굴드, 바그너, 오오오 바흐에 이르는 일련의 사이클은 독일 음악과 오페라에 대한 강박을 보여주는 동시에 러시아 음악은 피해야만 하는 어떤 배제의 강박도 보여준다.
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그럼에도 불구하고 음악 예술의 언어적 침묵을 해독하고 연주를 통한 재창조의 작업에 기대하는 지성적 통찰을 명징하게 선언하는데, 어중간한 평론이나 방황하는 음악가 전기의 도태를 본업 비교문학 연구가의 음악 산문인 '에드워드 사이드' 저작의 제읽기를 통해서 반동적으로 제시하는 탁월한 필력과 반골적 시선도 풍부하다.
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p353 - 결과적으로 오늘날의 음악 청중은 자신들이 속한 시대의 음악에 우선 노출되지 못하는 역사상 최초의 사람들이 되고 말았다.
ㆍ
물론 이 몰입으로 빚어낸 덕에 저자 스스로 말하고 있는 좋은 글, 음악이 새롭게 들리게 하는 역할을 하는 한 권의 책이 되었다는 점은 분명하다. 그럼에도 공연계가 유명 레파토리를 반복하는 탓에 현재의 음악을 최전선에서 접하지 못하는 최초의 세대가 됐다는 아쉬움은 사이드 스스로 반복하는 주제(굴드, 바흐, 바그너와 오페라)에 대한 내 아쉬움과 같은데... 사이드도 자신의 제약된 사이클에만 자신을 노출 시킨다는 인상이 역력하기 때문이다. ㅡ (사실 특정 소수 계층이 당대의 음악에 노출되고 있다는 점에서 이 말은 왜곡이다. 현대 음악의 청자는 존재하며, 고전 음악의 당대 청자도 전체 인구에 비하면 한줌이나 됐을까.)
ㆍ
물론 나도 첼리비다케의 브루크너, 브람스, 드뷔시, 슈베르트에 대한 절대적인 신뢰에 더불어 바렌보임은 베토벤 소나타 아니고선 메롱함이며, 바그너는 서곡을 굳이 넘어가지 않고, 브렌델보다는 켐프니까.
ㆍ
어떤 면에선 미치너의 <소설>이 재밌으면서도 결말의 평론가, 편집자의 공모에서 우롱당한 듯한 불쾌감을 느꼈던 기억과도 같으나, 전업 음악평론가라 하더라도 동서를 무론하고 다루는 데는 한계가 분명하겠으며 ㅡ 하물며 오페라를 총보로 다루는 열혈 시청자인 저자의 취향이 나와는 다른 것은 당연하겠으며, 이 공고한 취향과 주장은 우물 파기에는 미덕에 가깝다.
ㆍ
어쨌든 그 미덕의 세례를 근 며칠 간 내가 경험했기 때문이기도 하다.
ㆍ
p45 - 카라얀의 전체주의적 사고방식
p141 - 메트의 머저리 같은 옹고집
p155 - 대체 저자는 왜 피아노를 치는 거지?
p308 - 에이비느 렌터카 같은 계약서처럼 지루하게
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그리고 우아하게 분쇄하는 잔혹성은 덤이다.
ㆍ
p.s. 살짝 오락가락한 것은 저자의 책... 모든 꼭지가 그렇다. 좋은데 싫고, 싫은데 좋다는 걸 철학과 스타일로 마감한다는 게 명백하고도 영원한 차이지만.
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January 21, 2020
My favourite music critic; rarely, he talks about cultural and political issues as manifested in music, rather than "pure" analysis; his reviews have slightly repetitive themes: Gould, Wagner; but he always writes thoughtfully about the composer's psychology and spiritual development (esp. Beethoven). Not for anyone(including me!) in the mood for music as pure non-referential relaxation; but,as I say, almost unique in linking to wider debates.
I find his rather awkward attempt at talking emotionally about music quite endearing.
His friendship with Barenboim, across the Jewish/Arab and Israel/Palestine divide is moving; and emblematic of everything Said stood for: building bridges. Sadly, he died in 2003.
I find his rather awkward attempt at talking emotionally about music quite endearing.
His friendship with Barenboim, across the Jewish/Arab and Israel/Palestine divide is moving; and emblematic of everything Said stood for: building bridges. Sadly, he died in 2003.
May 17, 2019
A very challenging read. Probably best read by musicians or at least anyone who has studied music theory as it is a very academic text.
September 6, 2008
Continuing the theme of serendipity... This is the book I was shopping for when I happened on The Music Lesson. Edward Said, the late much lamented, analyst and critic ("Orientalism") was also a very good pianist. The review of the book in the Economist was favorable, so I trotted off to buy the book.
It is a compilation of his writings on music - mostly criticism - for the Nation, NY Rev of Bks, etc. Given my obsession with Glenn Gould, it was unnerving to discover that Said was even more obsessed. According to his wife's introduction, it was Glenn Gould's death (ca. 1980) that started him writing about music. Any collection like this is bound to be uneven, if only because ideas first presented in one article are often repeated in various ways in other articles (written, often for other magazines).
Said's Gould project is to get to the root of why Gould has such a grip on the musical imagination. What I called Gould's daemonic quality, Said attributes to a fierce and uncompromising intellectual approach to music which allows no indulgence in sentiment or prettiness. It is ultimately moving to see how intellectual integrity, for Said, becomes, in the work of Gould, the most intensely emotional aesthetic experience.
To give a little hint of the grip exercised by Gould's music making: Glenn Gould met Cornelia Foss, the love of his life, because, her husband Lucas was entranced by the accidental hearing Gould's recording of the Goldberg Variations on a car radio. (After a ten year relationship, Cornelia returned to Foss)
If you can stick with the repetitions and disorganizations inherent in this collection it is an intriguing sort of self-analysis.
It is a compilation of his writings on music - mostly criticism - for the Nation, NY Rev of Bks, etc. Given my obsession with Glenn Gould, it was unnerving to discover that Said was even more obsessed. According to his wife's introduction, it was Glenn Gould's death (ca. 1980) that started him writing about music. Any collection like this is bound to be uneven, if only because ideas first presented in one article are often repeated in various ways in other articles (written, often for other magazines).
Said's Gould project is to get to the root of why Gould has such a grip on the musical imagination. What I called Gould's daemonic quality, Said attributes to a fierce and uncompromising intellectual approach to music which allows no indulgence in sentiment or prettiness. It is ultimately moving to see how intellectual integrity, for Said, becomes, in the work of Gould, the most intensely emotional aesthetic experience.
To give a little hint of the grip exercised by Gould's music making: Glenn Gould met Cornelia Foss, the love of his life, because, her husband Lucas was entranced by the accidental hearing Gould's recording of the Goldberg Variations on a car radio. (After a ten year relationship, Cornelia returned to Foss)
If you can stick with the repetitions and disorganizations inherent in this collection it is an intriguing sort of self-analysis.
January 1, 2013
This is a collection of writings on music by the late Palestinian-American cultural critic, perhaps best known for his critique of 'orientalism', the consensus western view of the Middle East. Throughout his career, Said wrote essays on musical events and controversies, which have been brought together in this 325-page book by his widow Mariam. He has outspoken views, for example on the fetishism of music festivals and competitions. He repeatedly lauds his rather predictable list of favourite pianists and composers (Gould, Pollini; Bach, Beethoven, Wagner) and is pretty vicious about his bugbears (Rossini, a composer of 'metamusic', and Bartók -- 'half tacky, half schmaltzy'). The best bits are about his friendship with the brilliant Daniel Barenboim, which led to the miraculous Israeli-Palestinian orchestra (West-East Divan) and to their book Parallels and Paradoxes, which I warmly recommend. Music at the Limits has delightful moments, but is not consistently good enough for me to recommend.
October 20, 2008
Said's just so good. Here he takes his philological eye to the performance, production, and reception of orchestral music in the U.S. (mainly) during the 80s, 90s, and until his death. Critiques composers, instrumentalists, conductors, opera directors, and even other critics.
Read
October 19, 2013Translation Done for Chapter One "Performance as an Extreme Occasion"
November 6, 2022
浪费了我几小时，一边翻页一边内心在撕的一本书。既缺乏文句的感性美，又没有理性的逻辑美。可能因为我不是那个时代的观众……
April 16, 2017
A fun read
I am familiar with Said based on his essay discussing Middle East politics. I had no idea that we was a musician and music credit as well. I enjoyed reading the essays in this book despite knowing only about 1/2 of the music he references
I am familiar with Said based on his essay discussing Middle East politics. I had no idea that we was a musician and music credit as well. I enjoyed reading the essays in this book despite knowing only about 1/2 of the music he references
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