Mozart Speaks: Views on Music, Musicians, and the World. Dieser Artikel ist nicht verfügbar.Mozart Speaks: Views on Music, Musicians, and the World

A unique topical guide to Mozart's life and work drawn from the composer's own letters. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart has become the ultimate symbol of human creativity and artistic perfection. He was capable of sublime artistic philosophy and yet vulnerable to petty jealousies and crises of confidence. 18 photographs, 53 music examples, index, appendix, and glossary.

Marshall (music, Brandeis Univ.) here attempts to write the book on music that Mozart always wanted to write. Derived from letters and other sources, the scope includes both musical and nonmusical subjects. Whether the fragmentary material with its chatty style and prosaic concerns is a good source for the opinions of Mozart, or whether it is easily converted into a unitary literary product, is arguable. Marshall does a brilliant job of selecting and annotating, but topical classifications are often arbitrarily applied to "subject-less" excerpts and the letters themselves lend a numbing sameness to the text. Redeeming features include superb scholarly preparation, useful indexing/abstracting guidance, and occasional hidden treasures for general browsing. Those hoping to find new aspects of Mozart's personality will be disappointed though, since much of the material is familiar.
- Daniel Fermon, Museum of Modern Art Lib., New York
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.

In time for the bicentennial of Mozart's death in 1791, Marshall ( The Music of Johann Sebastian Bach ) presents a selection of the composer's letters from the classic 1938 translation by Emily Anderson. Arranged according to theme, the letters reveal the writer's views on his personal life, his career, his philosophy, contemporaneous events, the music profession in the 18th century and the other arts. We learn his thoughts on performance, practice, opera, church music, instrumental music, methods of teaching composition, other composers and musicians. The letters in which he discusses his aesthetic principles provide, according to Marshall, clues to what Mozart would have said had he written a book on music. Marshall includes correspondence by the composer's family and friends, and adds explanatory comments that make the book accessible to the general reader. Illustrations not seen by PW.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.