Baroque and anti-baroque: Octavio Paz
In: Return of the Baroque in Modern Culture
In: Return of the Baroque in Modern Culture
A review of Tara Forrest. The Politics of Imagination: Benjamin, Kracauer, Kluge (Transcript Verlag, Bielefeld, 2007).
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In: Foreign affairs: an American quarterly review, Band 60, Heft 1, S. 199
ISSN: 2327-7793
In: http://hdl.handle.net/10400.22/9604
Baroque music has been part of the saxophone repertoire in one form or another since the instruments creation, as it so happened to coincide with the Baroque revival. 'It was Mendelssohn's promotion of the St Matthew Passion in 1829 which marked the first public "revival" of Bach and his music', either through studies or repertoire the music of the baroque period has had an important role in the development of the majority of all saxophonists today. However the question remains. What function does this music have for a modern instrumentalist and how should this music be used or performed by a saxophonist? Many accolades have been given of saxophone performances of Baroque music. From the Aurelia saxophone quartets extensive reviews of the Art of Fugue 'Fugue in C of Dog', to Henk Van Twillerts widely accepted and successful Bach Cello suites on Baritone Saxophone, carrying through to more jazz style interpretations by Quintessence saxophone quintet and The modern jazz quartet. It is not unusual that the 'transcription' is an important part of the repertoire of a saxophonist. The saxophone did not have the introduction that was originally intended by Adolphe Sax who intended the instrument as an orchestral instrument that would help to blend the woodwind and brass sections yet have a soloistic nature as well. Berlioz, a close friend and advocate of the saxophone stated: "an instrument whose tone colour is between that of the brass and the woodwinds. But it even reminds one, though more remotely, of the sound of the strings. I think its main advantage is the greatly varied beauty in its different possibilities of expression. At one time deeply quiet, at another full of emotion; dreamy, melancholic, sometimes with the hush of an echo. I do not know of any instrument having this specific tone-quality, bordering on the limits of the audible." However the saxophone found its way into the French military and marching bands, taking over a large majority of the tuba lines, due to the fact that the saxophone (bass) was a much easier instrument to march with; the bass sax being the first sax in which Adolphe Sax invented. With this the saxophone lost its opportunity to become its creators dream and hence Adolph Sax decided to start the first saxophone class at the Paris Conservatoire. Along with having many works written for the saxophone, Sax began to transcribe for the saxophone in order to help promote the instrument in the classical genre. As so happens, the release of the saxophone in 1844 at the Paris Industrial Exhibition, was a fantastic success due to the first performance of Berlioz's own arrangement of his Chant Sacre. 'This first public performance of the saxophone occurred two years before Sax's patent for the instrument. For the purpose of demonstrating these new instruments, Berlioz arranged a simple choral piece of his own that he had composed approximately fifteen years previously. The Chant sacré, in this rendering, was a sextet scored for three brasses and three woodwinds and included the inventor himself playing the B-flat bass saxophone.' "The process of transcription is not new to saxophonists, since the instrument was invented in the 1840s and it took some time for the solo repertoire to grow." The first solo repertoire for the saxophone appeared early on in the saxophones life by composers such as Singelee, Demersseman, Chic and Savari, however there was still a shortage of performance pieces and works to expose the instrument to new more prolific composers, therefore performers did arrangements of popular classical music. The repertoire did not begin to grow until people such as Elisa Hall, Marcel Mule and Sigurd Racher, started having works written for them and commissioning composers for new pieces. It is interesting to note that transcribed music is not just a ready source of repertoire for the saxophonist but also an indespensible source for pedagogy. However it is a highly flamed debate, performing transcriptions especially baroque music on the saxophone, for baroque music largely consists of music for the church and the saxophone an instrument that was once described as an instrument of satan, with its connection to jazz the saxophone has been given a less then pure stigma and this can lead to much tension amongst public, performer and critic.
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In this provocative revisionist work, Evonne Levy brings fresh theoretical perspectives to the study of the "propagandistic" art and architecture of the Jesuit order as exemplified by its late Baroque Roman church interiors. The first extensive analysis of the aims, mechanisms, and effects of Jesuit art and architecture, this original and sophisticated study also evaluates how the term "propaganda" functions in art history, distinguishes it from rhetoric, and proposes a precise use of the term for the visual arts for the first time. Levy begins by looking at Nazi architecture as a gateway to the emotional and ethical issues raised by the term "propaganda." Jesuit art once stirred similar passions, as she shows in a discussion of the controversial nineteenth-century rubric the "Jesuit Style." She then considers three central aspects of Jesuit art as essential components of propaganda: authorship, message, and diffusion. Levy tests her theoretical formulations against a broad range of documents and works of art, including the Chapel of St. Ignatius and other major works in Rome by Andrea Pozzo as well as chapels in Central Europe and Poland. Innovative in bringing a broad range of social and critical theory to bear on Baroque art and architecture in Europe and beyond, Levy's work highlights the subject-forming capacity of early modern Catholic art and architecture while establishing "propaganda" as a productive term for art history
Vilnius presents itself today as the easternmost and northernmost European city of the Baroque, and the Baroque heritage played an important role in 1994 when the historic centre of Vilnius was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List. Throughout the twentieth century, the Vilnius Baroque attracted the attention of artists and scholars. However, the approaches to research into this field differed both in terms of methodology and in relation to their political aims. The lively intellectual debate on Vilnius' Baroque art and architecture that went on in the inter-war period was followed by a time of rather vague and unproductive research during the Soviet period, and it flourished again after the restoration of Lithuanian independence in 1990. The first part of this article gives an overview of the main debates on and interpretive models of Baroque architecture in Vilnius before the Soviet occupation. The second part explores the Soviet reinterpretation of Baroque art and architecture and the various techniques that were used to create new values of this heritage for the then new Socialist society of Lithuania.
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Vilnius presents itself today as the easternmost and northernmost European city of the Baroque, and the Baroque heritage played an important role in 1994 when the historic centre of Vilnius was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List. Throughout the twentieth century, the Vilnius Baroque attracted the attention of artists and scholars. However, the approaches to research into this field differed both in terms of methodology and in relation to their political aims. The lively intellectual debate on Vilnius' Baroque art and architecture that went on in the inter-war period was followed by a time of rather vague and unproductive research during the Soviet period, and it flourished again after the restoration of Lithuanian independence in 1990. The first part of this article gives an overview of the main debates on and interpretive models of Baroque architecture in Vilnius before the Soviet occupation. The second part explores the Soviet reinterpretation of Baroque art and architecture and the various techniques that were used to create new values of this heritage for the then new Socialist society of Lithuania.
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Vilnius presents itself today as the easternmost and northernmost European city of the Baroque, and the Baroque heritage played an important role in 1994 when the historic centre of Vilnius was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List. Throughout the twentieth century, the Vilnius Baroque attracted the attention of artists and scholars. However, the approaches to research into this field differed both in terms of methodology and in relation to their political aims. The lively intellectual debate on Vilnius' Baroque art and architecture that went on in the inter-war period was followed by a time of rather vague and unproductive research during the Soviet period, and it flourished again after the restoration of Lithuanian independence in 1990. The first part of this article gives an overview of the main debates on and interpretive models of Baroque architecture in Vilnius before the Soviet occupation. The second part explores the Soviet reinterpretation of Baroque art and architecture and the various techniques that were used to create new values of this heritage for the then new Socialist society of Lithuania.
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Vilnius presents itself today as the easternmost and northernmost European city of the Baroque, and the Baroque heritage played an important role in 1994 when the historic centre of Vilnius was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List. Throughout the twentieth century, the Vilnius Baroque attracted the attention of artists and scholars. However, the approaches to research into this field differed both in terms of methodology and in relation to their political aims. The lively intellectual debate on Vilnius' Baroque art and architecture that went on in the inter-war period was followed by a time of rather vague and unproductive research during the Soviet period, and it flourished again after the restoration of Lithuanian independence in 1990. The first part of this article gives an overview of the main debates on and interpretive models of Baroque architecture in Vilnius before the Soviet occupation. The second part explores the Soviet reinterpretation of Baroque art and architecture and the various techniques that were used to create new values of this heritage for the then new Socialist society of Lithuania.
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In: Return of the Baroque in Modern Culture
In: Continuum impacts
In: Norsk statsvitenskapelig tidsskrift, Band 22, Heft 4, S. 436-442
ISSN: 1504-2936