The World of Twentieth-Century Music [antikvár]

PREFACEThe World of Twentieth-Century Music is a replacement for The Complete 'Rook of 20th Century Music originally published in 1952a replacement, not just a new edition. Less than ten percent of the material has been retained from the earlier volume. Hand in hand with such rewriting came expansion. In words alone, the present volume is almost double the size of the earlier one. Twenty-nine composers have been added, bringing the total up to almost one hundred and fifty. Some four hundred additional major works have been discussed, so that the present volume embraces about one thousand major works. In addition, the programmatic descriptions have been greatly extended, and the biographical matter and critical evaluations of composers that precede the analyses have been considerably amplified.When The Complete Book of 20th Century Music was first pubUshed, its author felt it might fill a gap in musical literature by becoming the first book in any language to analyze today's musical compositions in all the major forms. Its continued success through the years has proved that there is a need for such a book. The Complete Book of 20th Century Music has gone through a dozen printings, and in 1959 was subjected to an updated edition. In 1965, when the idea for a replacement was first hatched. The Complete Book of 20th Century Music was still maintaining a healthy sales figure.At first, both publisher and author discussed the possibility of bringing out just a new edition of the old book. Such a plan was soon discarded. So much has happened to the world of twentieth-century music since 1952so sophisticated have music audiences everywhere become to twentieth-century musicthat a much more ambitious volume now had to be planned. The decision was then reached to begin from scratch and to plan a book fully capable of meeting the needs of 1968. The aim now was to make the book as comprehensive and as informative as humanly possible. It is no longer desirable to discuss just the representative works of the major composers; now there is a need for an analysis of their lesser works as well, particularly early works, the better to point up the creative evolution of these masters. The new currents and crosscurrents in the music of our times had to be discussed and explained, such as serialism, chance music, directional music, neo-dadaism and so forth, just as these are now so liberally represented on concert programs and in recordings.