Britten's Unquiet Pasts: Sound and Memory in Postwar Reconstruction (Music since 1900) - Hardcover

Wiebe, Heather

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0521194679 ISBN 13: 9780521194679

Publisher: Cambridge University Press, 2012

Synopsis

Examining the intersections between musical culture and a British project of reconstruction from the 1940s to the early 1960s, this study asks how gestures toward the past negotiated issues of recovery and renewal. In the wake of the Second World War, music became a privileged site for re-enchanting notions of history and community, but musical recourse to the past also raised issues of mourning and loss. How was sound figured as a historical object and as a locus of memory and magic? Wiebe addresses this question using a wide range of sources, from planning documents to journalism, public ceremonial and literature. Its central focus, however, is a set of works by Benjamin Britten that engaged both with the distant musical past and with key episodes of postwar reconstruction, including the Festival of Britain, the Coronation of Elizabeth II and the rebuilding of Coventry Cathedral.

About this title

Review:

'Fascinating ...' The Times Literary Supplement

'Unfailingly readable ...' Musical Times

Book Description:

Heather Wiebe's book examines educational, occasional and religious works of Benjamin Britten that engage both with the distant past and with key episodes of postwar reconstruction, elucidating the role of music in mid-century British culture while exploring issues of memory, enchantment and cultural citizenship.

About this edition

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Publication date: 2012
• ISBN 10: 0521194679
• ISBN 13: 9780521194679
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 250