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Book Reviews

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 January 2016

Extract

  • Volume I of Messiaen's ‘Traite’, ‘Music and Color’, and organ recordings Christopher Dingle

  • Robert Craft's Stravinsky memoirs and recordings Rodney Lister

Type
Book Reviews
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1995

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References

page 29 note 1 Leduc, 1944 (2 volumes); English translation (by Satterfield, John), Leduc 1956 Google Scholar.

page 29 note 2 Musique et Couleur - nouveaux entretiens avec Claude Samuel by Messiaen, Olivier. Pierre Belfond (Paris, 1986)Google Scholar.

page 30 note 3 Enretietis avec Olivier Messiaen by Samuel, Claude. Pierre Belfond (Paris, 1967 Google Scholar); English translation by Apprahamian, Felix, (London, 1976 Google Scholar).

page 30 note 4 Including fifty-odd pages on Saint Francois d'Assise.

page 30 note 5 Page 199.

page 30 note 6 Page 195.

page 30 note 7 The exceptions being Verset pour la fete de la Déedicace (1960) and Livre du Saint-Sacrement (1984).

page 32 note 1 Stravinsky, : Glimpses of a Life, p.48 Google Scholar.

page 34 note * The catalogue numbers are MM 67078, 67086, 67103, 67113 and 67xxx respectively. Music Masters recordings are distributed in the UK by Nimbus Records Ltd. (Ed.)

page 34 note 2 M31124.

page 34 note 3 Allen, Edwards: Flawed Words and Stubborn Sounds: A Conversation with Elliott Carter. (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1971). p.56 Google Scholar.

page 34 note 4 EMI CDS 7 54607 2.

page 35 note 5 Columbia MS6022.

page 35 note 6 Dial 10, 1949.

page 35 note 7 Columbia ML5772, 1962.

8 It is interesting to consider a quote from Stravinsky himself on the subject: …“meaning,” the translator's argument d'etre, is only one item. Translation changes the character of a work and destroys its cultural unity.

An example of translation destroying text and music occurs in the latter part of my Renard. The passage lam referring to -I called it a pribaoutki - exploits a speed and an accentuation that are natural to Russian (each language has characteristic tempi which partly determine musical tempo and character). No translation of this passage can translate what I have done musically with the language. But there are many such instances in all of my Russian vocal music; I am so disturbed by them I prefer to hear those pieces in Russian or not at all.’

( Toorn, Pieter C. Van Den quotes this in his The Music of Igor Stravinsky [New Haven: Yale University Press] (p.251)Google Scholar, citing the Stravinsky-Craft book. Themes and Episodes, p.57. It is not actually on that page in Themes and Episodes.)

page 35 note 9 The Boulez recording of Renard, in French, released in the United States on Everest 3184 in 1962, has by far the best performance trom the standpoint of delivering the words clearly, with understanding and humour. Both that performance and that of Les Noces by Boulez, released in the United States on Nonesuch H-7133, offer much more convincing falsetto from the male singers than any of the Craft or Stravinsky recordings of these works.

page 35 note 10 Columbia MS6991. This should not be confused with Columbia M33201, a recording of all the extant drafts for orchestrations of Les Noces which preceded the final version.

page 35 note 11 ML5772.