ENGLISH

Boccherini’s Body: An Essay in Carnal Musicology

Book information

Publisher
University of California Press
Year
2005
ISBN
9780520930629
DOI
10.1525/9780520930629
Language
english
Format
PDF
Filesize
4 MB (3830482 bytes)
Pages
376\374
Library
degruyter.com
Time added
2023-08-21 16:29:03

Description

In this elegant study of the works of the undeservedly neglected composer Luigi Boccherini, Elisabeth Le Guin uses knowledge gleaned from her own playing of the cello as the keystone of her original approach to the relationship between music and embodiment. In analyzing the striking qualities of Boccherini's music—its virtuosity, repetitiveness, obsessively nuanced dynamics, delicate sonorities, and rich palette of melancholy affects—Le Guin develops a historicized critical method based on the embodied experience of the performer. In the process, she redefines the temperament of the musical Enlightenment as one characterized by urgent, volatile inquiries into the nature of the self. A CD of sound examples, performed by the author and her string quartet, is included with the book.

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