Musical Madhouse
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19th century
A01=Hector Berlioz
Author_Hector Berlioz
Berlioz
Category=AV
composer
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eq_bestseller
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eq_music
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
Les Grotesques de la musique
music articles
Product details
- ISBN 9781580461825
- Weight: 404g
- Dimensions: 152 x 229mm
- Publication Date: 01 Feb 2005
- Publisher: Boydell & Brewer Ltd
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Paperback
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This is the first complete translation into English of Berlioz's second collection of musical articles, originally published in 1859. The work is a uniquely Berliozian combination of light-hearted journalism and serious musical comment and analysis.
Hector Berlioz's Les Grotesques de la musique is the only one of his books that has never been translated into English in its entirety. It is by far the funniest of all his works, and consists of a number of short anecdotes, witticisms, open letters, and comments on the absurdities of concert life. Alastair Bruce's fluid translation brings to life this important composer and bon vivant. He does a wonderful job of conveying all the puns, jokes, and invective of Berlioz's prose as well as the nuances of his stories. He even imitates a Tahitian accent in the translation, as Berlioz does in the original. The notes will give the reader insight into the innuendos and in-jokes that fill the pages. This translation will take its place among other translations of Berlioz's prose writings, bringing to the reader more lively examples of a still misunderstood composer caught up in the musical life of mid-nineteenth century Paris.
Alastair Bruce is a London-based management consultant and former treasurer of the Berlioz Society. Hugh Macdonald is General Editor of New Berlioz Edition.
HUGH MACDONALD was the Avis Blewett Professor of Music, Washington University, St Louis from 1987 to 2011. He is the author of many important books, including Beethoven's Century: Essays on Composers and Themes (URP, 2008), Music in 1853: the Biography of a Year (Boydell Press, 2012), and Saint-Saëns and the Stage (CUP, 2019).
