WEST MEETS EAST - PREPARATION 1

(F-10)

                                                                                        

For Monday Sept. 13 – We will do a quick survey of some high points of the representation of the Middle East in European music, mostly from the 19th century.

 

Please listen to these selections.  You'll find all the recordings on Naxos (see below).

W.A. Mozart: Turkish rondo from Piano Sonata in A minor, K. 331 (c. 1782)

Felicien David: Le Desert, #1 Entry into the Desert, #2 Glorification of Allah (1844)

C. Saint-Saens: Bacchanale, ballet from Samson and Dalila (1877)

Leo Délibes: Bell Song from Lakmé (1883)

N. Rimsky-Korsakov: Sheherazade, #1 The sea and Sinbad's ship (1888)

M. Ravel: Shéhérazade, #1 Asie (1903)

You can access Naxos recordings at http://www.naxosmusiclibrary.com .  You'll need the SF Conservatory password, which I'll give you in class.  Then you'll have to search for the selections by composer name and title.  You can find the lyrics to the vocal numbers on Naxos as well.  I don't think you'll need the musical scores, but those are available in the library and at IMSLP.

 

In addition please read:

Matthew Head: Orientalism, Masquerade and Mozart’s Turkish Music (2000), pp. 67-80.

Ralph Locke, Cutthroats, and Casbah Dancers, Muezzins and Timeless Sands: Musical Images of the Middle East," 19th-Century Music (1998), 20-53.

You'll find the readings in a binder in the library and also posted on the course website.  To read them online you'll need a password, which I'll give you in class.

 

Please prepare answers to the following questions:

1.  Ralph Locke says (p. 49) that the Middle East served writers, painters, and composers as "a locus for the mingling of the dangerous, the transcendent, and the unpredictable."  Pick a piece from the list above that represents each of these three possibilities and explain briefly why you classify it thus.

2.  Matthew Head says (p.82): “Authenticity in exoticism is always by definition an impossibility.”  How does he apply this statement to Mozart's Turkish rondo? (p.87) How would you apply this insight to one of the other pieces on the list above?

 

By “prepare” I don’t mean a “paper” or even very lengthy answers.  Just write down a short paragraph for each question outlining your ideas so that you can present them in class.  I’ll ask you to hand in your paragraphs at the end of class.