The Piece as a Whole: Studies in Holistic Musical Analysis - Paperback

by Hugh Aitken (Author)

Designed to serve music students at the college level, this informal approach to music theory relates the technical aspects of music with the expressive character of the art. The approach is holistic in the sense that it focuses on the interrelationships between the piece as heard by a socially conditioned listener and the notated, performed score: it aims to bridge the gap between the technical and expressive aspects of music. The composers addressed are: Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin, Schumann, Brahms, Wagner, Debussy, and Schoenberg. There are separate chapters on the problems of meaning in music and on the interdependence of aesthetic and ethical value-judgments. This novel and exciting approach to music theory will be a welcome addition to the musical analysis literature.

Author Biography

HUGH AITKEN recently retired as Professor of Music at The William Paterson College of New Jersey. He studied composition at The Juilliard School and taught there from 1950 to 1970. He is the composer of over eighty works. His publishers include Oxford University Press, Theodore Presser Co., and ECS Music.