The Quilting Points of Musical Modernism: Revolution, Reaction, and William Walton (Music in Context)

Modernism is both a contested aesthetic category and a powerful political statement. Modernist music was condemned as degenerate by the Nazis and forcibly replaced by socialist realism under the Soviets. Sympathetic philosophers and critics have interpreted it as a vital intellectual defence against totalitarianism, yet some American critics consider it elitist, undemocratic and even unnatural. Drawing extensively on the philosophy of Heidegger and Badiou, The Quilting Points of Musical Modernism proposes a new dialectical theory of faithful, reactive and obscure subjective responses to musical modernism, which embraces all the music of Western modernity. This systematic definition of musical modernism introduces readers to theory by Badiou, Žižek and Agamben. Basing his analyses on the music of William Walton, Harper-Scott explores connections between the revolutionary politics of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and responses to the event of modernism in order to challenge accepted narratives of music history in the twentieth century. Modernism is both a contested aesthetic category and a powerful political statement. Modernist music was condemned as degenerate by the Nazis and forcibly replaced by socialist realism under the Soviets. Sympathetic philosophers and critics have interpreted it as a vital intellectual defence against totalitarianism, yet some American critics consider it elitist, undemocratic and even unnatural. Drawing extensively on the philosophy of Heidegger and Badiou, Quilting Points proposes a new dialectical theory of faithful, reactive and obscure subjective responses to musical modernism, which embraces all the music of Western modernity. This systematic definition of musical modernism introduces readers to theory by Badiou, i ek and Agamben. Basing his analyses on the music of William Walton, Harper-Scott explores connections between the revolutionary politics of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and responses to the event of modernism in order to challenge accepted narratives of music history in the twentieth century. 01.0_pp_i_vi_Frontmatter 02.0_pp_vii_viii_Contents 03.0_pp_ix_x_List_of_illustrations 04.0_pp_xi_xxii_Preface 05.0_pp_1_2_A_RUTHLESS_CRITICISM_OF_EVERYTHING_EXISTING 05.1_pp_3_42_Modernism_as_we_know_it_ideology_and_the_quilting_point 06.0_pp_43_44_RELATIONSHIP_PROBLEMS 06.1_pp_45_80_Modernism_love_and_truth 06.2_pp_81_146_The_love_of_Troilus_and_Cressida 07.0_pp_147_148_THE_REVOLUTIONARY_KERNEL_OF_REACTIONARY_MUSIC 07.1_pp_149_196_Communist_modernism 07.2_pp_197_250_A_new_community 08.0_pp_251_254_Afterword_what_to_do 09.0_pp_255_266_Bibliography 10.0_pp_267_277_Index A new theory of musical modernism, which brings contemporary philosophy into contact with music theory and interpretation.