Stocktakings from an Apprenticeship

by Pierre Boulez

In these essays, the leading French composer and conductor Pierre Boulez explains many of his most significant ideas about music. The essays are divided into four parts, the first three concerned with common preoccupations (aesthetic, technical, and polemical) and the last a collection of entries intended for a music encyclopedia. Boulez offers penetrating and provocative analyses of the music of the major figures of twentieth-century music including Stravinsky, Schoenberg, Berg, Webern, Debussy, Messiaen, and Ravel. His illuminating comments arise from intimate knowledge of the music, and the resulting collection is an essential document of post-war modern music.

Genres: Music

348 pages, Hardcover

First published March 1, 1966

About the author

Pierre Louis Joseph Boulez CBE (26 March 1925 – 5 January 2016) was a French composer, conductor, writer and founder of several musical institutions. He was one of the dominant figures of the post-war classical music world.