Donald Mitchell – författare

The Mahler Companion consists of a collection of original essays on Mahler written especially for the occasion by Mahler specialists from around the world. It addresses all parts of his life and work - symphonies, songs and song-cycles (each of which is discussed individually), his conducting activities, compositional habits, and aesthetic development - and sets these within the cultural and political context of his time. In addition, it responds to the global spread of this remarkable composer's music, and an almost universal fascination with it, by attempting to give an account of the reception of Mahler's music in many of the countries in which it eventually came to flourish, eg. Holland, France, Japan, Russia, England, and the United States. This particular series of chapters reveals that the 'Mahler Phenomenon' earned its description principally in the years after the Second World War, but also that the Mahler revival was already well under way pre-war, perhaps especially in England and the States, and most surprisingly of all, Japan. The selection of contributors, who between them cover all Mahler's musical output, shows that here too this volume significantly crosses national boundaries. The very diverse approaches, analyses and commentaries, amply illustrated with music examples, are evidence of the uniquely rich and complex character of a music that spans more than one culture and more than one century. The volume includes the most significant and up-to-date Mahler research and debate, and illumines some hitherto unexplored areas of Mahler's life eg. his visit to London in 1892, his sculptor daughter, Anna, and the hall in which the Seventh Symphony was first performed in Prague in 1908. It has often been claimed that Mahler, born in 1860, was in fact a prophet of much that was to come in the 20th century. His later works undeniably anticipate, often with dazzling virtuosity, many of the principal techniques and aesthetics of the new century, only the first decade of which he lived to see. Small wonder that among his earliest admirers was a collective of some of the most important and innovative composers of our time, Schoenberg, Berg, and Webern. Their successors (Copland, Shostakovich, and Britten, to name a few) were to range across contrasting cultures and national frontiers. Drawing on the best resources and the most up-to-date information about the composer, this volume fulfils the need in Mahler literature for a genuinely comprehensive guide to the composer and will be the authoritative guide for Mahler enthusiasts for years to come.

The Mahler Companion consists of a collection of original essays on Mahler written especially for the occasion by Mahler specialists from around the world. It addresses all parts of his life and work - symphonies, songs and song-cycles (each of which is discussed individually), his conducting activities, compositional habits, and aesthetic development - and sets these within the cultural and political context of his time. In addition, it responds to the global spread of this remarkable composer's music, and an almost universal fascination with it, by attempting to give an account of the reception of Mahler's music in many of the countries in which it eventually came to flourish, eg. Holland, France, Japan, Russia, England, and the United States. This particular series of chapters reveals that the 'Mahler Phenomenon' earned its description principally in the years after the Second World War, but also that the Mahler revival was already well under way pre-war, perhaps especially in England and the States, and most surprisingly of all, Japan.The selection of contributors, who between them cover all Mahler's musical output, shows that here too this volume significantly crosses national boundaries. The very diverse approaches, analyses and commentaries, amply illustrated with music examples, are evidence of the uniquely rich and complex character of a music that spans more than one culture and more than one century. The volumes includes the most significant and up-to-date Mahler research and debate, and illumines some hitherto unexplored areas of Mahler's life eg. his visit to London in 1892, his sculptor daughter, Anna, and the hall in which the Seventh Symphony was first performed in Prague in 1908.It has often been claimed that Mahler, born in 1860, was in fact a prophet of much that was to come in the 20th century. His later works undeniably anticipate, often with dazzling virtuosity, many of the principal techniques and aesthetics of the new century, only the first decade of which he lived to see. Small wonder that among his earliest admirers was a collective of some of the most important and innovative composers of our time, Schoenberg, Berg, and Webern. Their successors (Copland, Shostakovich, and Britten, to name a few) were to range across contrasting cultures and national frontiers.Drawing on the best resources and the most up-to-date information about the composer, this volume fulfils the need in Mahler literature for a genuinely comprehensive guide to the composer and will be the authoritative guide for Mahler enthusiasts for years to come.

Highly Commended, BMA Medical Book Awards 2013Sarcoidosis represents a major challenge for physicians—not just in respiratory medicine, but across a range of specialties. This book, with a multidisciplinary authorship of the highest standard, presents the most up-to-date thinking on all aspects of the condition, from epidemiology to clinical manifestations and treatment options. Full coverage is given to both respiratory and non-respiratory aspects. The basic science that underlies the disease and its progression is evaluated in detail, and placed into its correct clinical context. Possible future advances are covered in a concluding section.The editors—all leading figures in the field with international reputations—have compiled the definitive work on the subject in a single volume. The book is fully comprehensive and evidence based and will be an essential addition to the bookshelves of all whose practice involves the care and treatment of patients with sarcoidosis.

Highly Commended, BMA Medical Book Awards 2013Sarcoidosis represents a major challenge for physicians—not just in respiratory medicine, but across a range of specialties. This book, with a multidisciplinary authorship of the highest standard, presents the most up-to-date thinking on all aspects of the condition, from epidemiology to clinical manifestations and treatment options. Full coverage is given to both respiratory and non-respiratory aspects. The basic science that underlies the disease and its progression is evaluated in detail, and placed into its correct clinical context. Possible future advances are covered in a concluding section.The editors—all leading figures in the field with international reputations—have compiled the definitive work on the subject in a single volume. The book is fully comprehensive and evidence based and will be an essential addition to the bookshelves of all whose practice involves the care and treatment of patients with sarcoidosis.

Landscape is now on the agenda in a new way. The increasing interest in justice, power and the political landscape expresses a sea change occurring in the meaning of landscape itself, from landscape as scenery to landscape as polity and place. As Lionella Scazzosi argues "The meaning of the term ‘landscape’ has become broader than that of a view or panorama, which characterized many national protection laws and policies until the middle of the 20th century, and that of environment or nature, to which it has often been limited during the recent years of environmentalist battles." This is reflected in the new European Landscape Convention, for which: "’Landscape’ means an area, as perceived by people." The tide thus has turned towards J. B. Jackson’s view of landscape as not "a scenic or ecological entity but as a political or cultural entity, changing in the course of history." It is in this socio-political context that it becomes necessary to consider the role of power, and the importance of justice, in the shaping of the landscape as an area of practice and performance with both cultural and environmental implications.This book was previously published as two special issues of Landscape Research.

Landscape is now on the agenda in a new way. The increasing interest in justice, power and the political landscape expresses a sea change occurring in the meaning of landscape itself, from landscape as scenery to landscape as polity and place. As Lionella Scazzosi argues "The meaning of the term ‘landscape’ has become broader than that of a view or panorama, which characterized many national protection laws and policies until the middle of the 20th century, and that of environment or nature, to which it has often been limited during the recent years of environmentalist battles." This is reflected in the new European Landscape Convention, for which: "’Landscape’ means an area, as perceived by people." The tide thus has turned towards J. B. Jackson’s view of landscape as not "a scenic or ecological entity but as a political or cultural entity, changing in the course of history." It is in this socio-political context that it becomes necessary to consider the role of power, and the importance of justice, in the shaping of the landscape as an area of practice and performance with both cultural and environmental implications.This book was previously published as two special issues of Landscape Research.

The People’s Property? is the first book-length scholarly examination of how negotiations over the ownership, control, and peopling of public space are central to the development of publicity, citizenship, and democracy in urban areas. The book asks the questions: Why does it matter who owns public property? Who controls it? Who is in it? Donald Mitchell and Lynn A. Staeheli answer the questions by focusing on the interplay between property (in its geographical sense, as a parcel of owned space) and people. Property rights are often defined as the "right to exclude." It is important, therefore, to understand who (what individual and corporate entities, governed by what kinds of regulations and restrictions) owns publicly accessible property. It is likewise important to understand the changing bases for excluding some people and classes of people from otherwise publicly accessible property. That is to say, it is important to understand how modes of access and possibilities for association in publicly accessible space vary for different individuals and different classes of people, if we are to understand the role public spaces play in shaping democratic possibilities. In what ways are urban public spaces "the people’s property" – and in what ways are they not? What does this mean for citizenship and the constitution of an inclusive, democratic polity? The book develops its argument through five case studies: protest in Washington DC; struggles over the Plaza of Santa Fe, NM; homelessness and property redevelopment in San Diego, CA; the enclosure of public space in a mall in Syracuse, NY; and community gardens in New York City. Though empirically focused on the US, the book is of broader interests as publics in all liberal democracies are under-going rapid reconsideration and transformation.

The People’s Property? is the first book-length scholarly examination of how negotiations over the ownership, control, and peopling of public space are central to the development of publicity, citizenship, and democracy in urban areas. The book asks the questions: Why does it matter who owns public property? Who controls it? Who is in it? Donald Mitchell and Lynn A. Staeheli answer the questions by focusing on the interplay between property (in its geographical sense, as a parcel of owned space) and people. Property rights are often defined as the "right to exclude." It is important, therefore, to understand who (what individual and corporate entities, governed by what kinds of regulations and restrictions) owns publicly accessible property. It is likewise important to understand the changing bases for excluding some people and classes of people from otherwise publicly accessible property. That is to say, it is important to understand how modes of access and possibilities for association in publicly accessible space vary for different individuals and different classes of people, if we are to understand the role public spaces play in shaping democratic possibilities. In what ways are urban public spaces "the people’s property" – and in what ways are they not? What does this mean for citizenship and the constitution of an inclusive, democratic polity? The book develops its argument through five case studies: protest in Washington DC; struggles over the Plaza of Santa Fe, NM; homelessness and property redevelopment in San Diego, CA; the enclosure of public space in a mall in Syracuse, NY; and community gardens in New York City. Though empirically focused on the US, the book is of broader interests as publics in all liberal democracies are under-going rapid reconsideration and transformation.

This book is exceptional amongst those that have appeared so far in this well-established series, in that it is largely written by those who worked with the composer and assisted him during the period in which the opera was composed and first put on the stage. It will thus remain a source of first-hand information on Britten's final operatic achievement. Donald Mitchell was Britten's publisher at the time of Death in Venice and his Introduction includes many personal observations on the genesis of the work. The latter part of the book contains essays by T. J. Reed and Patrick Carnegy on the libretto's source in Thomas Mann's novella and Philip Reed compares briefly Visconti's cinematic interpretation of the novella. The volume is richly illustrated with music examples, sketches and extracts from the autograph score, and pictures from the first production. It will make an essential reference work and indispensable companion for opera-goers, students and scholars alike.

Volume One of these remarkable letters and diaries opens with a letter from Britten aged nine to his formidable mother, Edith. Music is already at the centre of his life, and it accompanies him through prep and public school and then to London to the Royal College of Music, where the phenomenally gifted but inexperienced young composer is plunged into metropolitan life and makes influential new friends, among them W. H. Auden and Christopher Isherwood. This was a time of prodigious musical creativity, a growing awareness of his sexuality, and the dawning of his political convictions. Most importantly, during this period Britten met Peter Pears and established the musical and personal relationship that was to last a lifetime. Volume One comes to a close in May 1939, when Britten, accompanied by Pears, departs for North America.The letters and diaries in this illuminating first volume and its successor are supplemented by the editors' detailed commentary and by exhaustive contemporary documentation. Together they constitute a comprehensive portrait not only of the composer but of an age.

In May 1939 Britten and Pears disembarked at Montreal at the start of their American visit, which was to be a period of intense musical activity and new personal relationships. At the same time, the relationship between Britten and Pears deepened into a partnership that was to endure for almost forty years.Their absence from England during the first years of the war led to sharp public comment and controversy, much of it documented here. On their return from America in 1942, hostility to their pacifist convictions and to their homosexuality resurfaced. Prejudice and subterfuge even affected the première of Peter Grimes in 1945, although it could not prevent the opera from being an unprecedented success.The letters in this second volume from the years 1939 to 1945 are among the most fascinating of the correspondence, and - supplemented by the editors' detailed commentary and by exhaustive contemporary documentation - offer a unique insight into American history, politics and culture during the Second World War.

The third volume of the annotated selected letters of composer Benjamin Britten covers the years 1946-51, during which he wrote many of his best-known works, founded and developed the English Opera Group and the Aldeburgh Festival, and toured widely in Europe and the United States as a pianist and conductor.Correspondents include librettists Ronald Duncan (The Rape of Lucretia), Eric Crozier (Albert Herring, Saint Nicolas, The Little Sweep) and E. M. Forster (Billy Budd); conductor Ernest Ansermet and composer Lennox Berkeley; publishers Ralph Hawkes and Erwin Stein of Boosey & Hawkes; and the celebrated tenor Peter Pears, Britten's partner. Among friends in the United States are Christopher Isherwood, Elizabeth Mayer and Aaron Copland, and there is a significant meeting with Igor Stravinsky.This often startling and innovative period is vividly evoked by the comprehensive and scholarly annotations, which offer a wide range of detailed information fascinating for both the Britten specialist and the general reader.Donald Mitchell contributes a challenging introduction exploring the interaction of life and work in Britten's creativity, and an essay examining for the first time, through their correspondence, the complex relationship between the composer and the writer Edward Sackville-West.

25 presentations on the spiritual life, with four major talks by H.H. the Dalai Lama.

A crucial year in the Britten/Auden relationship, which reshaped and redefined artistic direction in the immediate pre-war period.Benjamin Britten and W.H. Auden were key figures of the 1930s, and here Donald Mitchell traces their lives during one crucial year, 1936. They worked hard to establish themselves, first through the GPO film unit, in a collaboration which flowered and spilled over into the theatre, and then radio - a new medium that the liveliest creative minds of the time were exploring and exploiting.Britten and Auden also joined forces in works destined for the recital room and concert hall, among them Our Hunting Fathers, the political symbolism of which Donald Mitchell examines in depth, and On the Island, settings of early Auden that comprised Britten's first important set of songs to English texts. Much use is made of Britten's private diaries, which he kept on a daily basis, and a revealing portrait emerges of the two men's relationship, of their work together in many different fields, and of the reflection within that work of political ideas current at the time.DONALD MITCHELL was Britten's close friend and publisher from 1964 until the end of the composer's life, and his authorised biographer. The T S Eliot Memorial Lectures delivered in 1979

This volume concentrates on the composer's vocal music, including the late Rueckert Lieder, the 8th Symphony and Das Lied von der Erde.A monument in Mahler studies, this volume concentrates on the composer's vocal music and, in particular, on some of his most famous, most original and best loved compositions: the late Rueckert orchestral songs and Kindertotenlieder; Das Lied von der Erde, one of the composer's supreme masterpieces, and the vast Eighth Symphony. Much new ground is broken but the author bases his conclusions on a meticulous examination of the principal manuscript sources, especially those for Das Lied. He offers an unprecedented exploration of the original Chinese texts for that work and indeed of the whole Oriental dimension of Mahler's last and greatest song-cycle. Time and time again, the composer's sketches back up the author's reading of these massive scores and there will be few among this book's readers who will not find a familiar passage or movement sharply illuminated by fresh insights and information. The scope of the book, despite its concentration, is immensely wide; and so is the readership it addresses: Mahler scholars, performers, and general readers.DONALD MITCHELL was Founder Professor of Music at the University of Sussex. He is currently Visiting Professor at Sussex and York, and formerly at King's College, London.