Sibelius: A Composer's Life and the Awakening of Finland

Sibelius: A Composer's Life and the Awakening of Finland
by Glenda Dawn Goss

Sibelius: A Composer's Life and the Awakening of Finland
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Book Summary Information

Author: Glenda Dawn Goss
Edition: Hardcover
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2009-12-15
ISBN: 0226304779
Number of pages: 549
Publisher: University Of Chicago Press

Book Reviews of Sibelius: A Composer's Life and the Awakening of Finland

Book Review: A masterpiece of musicology and cultural history
Summary: 5 Stars

This is a miraculous book. Goss's portrait of one of the 20th century's greatest and most enigmatic composers is set against the backdrop of Finland's rise to nationhood. The author's meticulous research and vivid portrayal of the key players in the drama - Jean Sibelius, Robert Kajanus, Axel Gallén and others - makes the book almost read like a novel. Goss is dead-on in many of her musical assessments and peppers her narrative with flashes of wit. If you are interested in the music of Sibelius, this is essential reading. I only wish a writer of similar talents would take on the legacy of Dmitri Shostakovich in similar fashion.

Summary of Sibelius: A Composer's Life and the Awakening of Finland

One of the twentieth century?s greatest composers, Jean Sibelius (1865?1957) virtually stopped writing music during the last thirty years of his life. Recasting his mysterious musical silence and his undeniably influential life against the backdrop of Finland?s national awakening, Sibelius will be the definitive biography of this creative legend for many years to come.

 

Glenda Dawn Goss begins her sweeping narrative in the Finland of Sibelius?s youth, which remained under Russian control for the first five decades of his life. Focusing on previously unexamined events, Goss explores the composer?s formative experiences as a Russian subject and a member of the Swedish-speaking Finnish minority. She goes on to trace Sibelius?s relationships with his creative contemporaries, with whom he worked to usher in a golden age of music and art that would endow Finns with a sense of pride in their heritage and encourage their hopes for the possibilities of nationhood. Skillfully evoking this artistic climate?in which Sibelius emerged as a leader?Goss creates a dazzling portrait of the painting, sculpture, literature, and music it inspired. To solve the deepest riddles of Sibelius?s life, work, and enigmatic silence, Goss contends, we must understand the awakening in which he played so great a role.

 

Situating this national creative tide in the context of Nordic and European cultural currents, Sibelius dramatically deepens our knowledge of a misunderstood musical giant and an important chapter in the intellectual history of Europe.

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