Matthew Head – författare

In the German states in the late eighteenth century, women flourished as musical performers and composers, their achievements measuring the progress of culture and society from barbarism to civilization. Female excellence, and related feminocentric values, were celebrated by forward-looking critics who argued for music as a fine art, a component of modern, polite, and commercial culture, rather than a symbol of institutional power. In the eyes of such critics, femininity - a newly emerging and primarily bourgeois ideal - linked women and music under the valorized signs of refinement, sensibility, virtue, patriotism, luxury, and, above all, beauty. This moment in musical history was eclipsed in the first decades of the nineteenth century, and ultimately erased from the music-historical record, by now familiar developments: the formation of musical canons, a musical history based on technical progress, the idea of masterworks, authorial autonomy, the musical sublime, and aggressively essentializing ideas about the relationship between sex, gender and art.In Sovereign Feminine, Matthew Head restores this earlier musical history and explores the role that women played in the development of classical music.

In the German states in the late eighteenth century, women flourished as musical performers and composers, their achievements measuring the progress of culture and society from barbarism to civilization. Female excellence, and related feminocentric values, were celebrated by forward-looking critics who argued for music as a fine art, a component of modern, polite, and commercial culture, rather than a symbol of institutional power. In the eyes of such critics, femininity—a newly emerging and primarily bourgeois ideal—linked women and music under the valorized signs of refinement, sensibility, virtue, patriotism, luxury, and, above all, beauty. This moment in musical history was eclipsed in the first decades of the nineteenth century, and ultimately erased from the music-historical record, by now familiar developments: the formation of musical canons, a musical history based on technical progress, the idea of masterworks, authorial autonomy, the musical sublime, and aggressively essentializing ideas about the relationship between sex, gender and art. In Sovereign Feminine, Matthew Head restores this earlier musical history and explores the role that women played in the development of classical music.

Moving beyond narratives of female suppression, and exploring the critical potential of a diverse, distinguished repertoire, this Companion transforms received understanding of women composers. Organised thematically, and ranging beyond elite, Western genres, it explores the work of diverse female composers from medieval to modern times, besides the familiar headline names. The book's prologue traces the development of scholarship on women composers over the past five decades and the category of 'woman composer' itself. The chapters that follow reveal scenes of flourishing creativity, technical innovation, and (often fleeting) recognition, challenging long-held notions around invisibility and neglect and dismissing clichés about women composers and their work. Leading scholars trace shifting ideas about composers and compositional processes, contributing to a wider understanding of how composers have functioned in history and making this volume essential reading for all students of musical history. In an epilogue, three contemporary composers reflect on their careers and identities.

Moving beyond narratives of female suppression, and exploring the critical potential of a diverse, distinguished repertoire, this Companion transforms received understanding of women composers. Organised thematically, and ranging beyond elite, Western genres, it explores the work of diverse female composers from medieval to modern times, besides the familiar headline names. The book's prologue traces the development of scholarship on women composers over the past five decades and the category of 'woman composer' itself. The chapters that follow reveal scenes of flourishing creativity, technical innovation, and (often fleeting) recognition, challenging long-held notions around invisibility and neglect and dismissing clichés about women composers and their work. Leading scholars trace shifting ideas about composers and compositional processes, contributing to a wider understanding of how composers have functioned in history and making this volume essential reading for all students of musical history. In an epilogue, three contemporary composers reflect on their careers and identities.

Matthew Head explores the cultural meanings of Mozart''s Turkish music in the composer''s 18th-century context, in subsequent discourses of Mozart''s significance for ''Western'' culture, and in today''s (not entirely) post-colonial world. Unpacking the ideological content of Mozart''s numerous representations of Turkey and Turkish music, Head locates the composer''s exoticisms in shifting power relations between the Austrian and Ottoman Empires, and in an emerging orientalist project. At the same time, Head complicates a presentist post-colonial critique by exploring commercial stimuli to Mozart''s turquerie, and by embedding the composer''s orientalism in practices of self-disguise epitomised by masquerade and carnival. In this context, Mozart''s Turkish music offered fleeting liberation from official and proscribed identities of the bourgeois Enlightenment.

Matthew Head explores the cultural meanings of Mozart''s Turkish music in the composer''s 18th-century context, in subsequent discourses of Mozart''s significance for ''Western'' culture, and in today''s (not entirely) post-colonial world. Unpacking the ideological content of Mozart''s numerous representations of Turkey and Turkish music, Head locates the composer''s exoticisms in shifting power relations between the Austrian and Ottoman Empires, and in an emerging orientalist project. At the same time, Head complicates a presentist post-colonial critique by exploring commercial stimuli to Mozart''s turquerie, and by embedding the composer''s orientalism in practices of self-disguise epitomised by masquerade and carnival. In this context, Mozart''s Turkish music offered fleeting liberation from official and proscribed identities of the bourgeois Enlightenment.

When a Belgian beauty dies in the Congo, “sharp-eyed, sharp-tongued Dr. Mary Finney” is on the case in this “witty, well-written” mystery from 1950 (The New York Times).It doesn’t take a lot to be the belle of the expat community in Leopoldville, a tiny outpost in the Belgian Congo. A pulse and a pair of pumps will do the trick. Liliane Morelli brought more than that to the party, but it apparently wasn’t enough: She’s still dead of what the doctor calls blackwater fever—though any idiot could tell you that mosquitoes were not to blame. One way or another, Liliane was just a little too fatale for her own good.Enter Dr. Mary Finney, the Miss Marple of the missionary brigade. She doesn’t do a lot of praying, but her sleuthing skills are top-notch. Now she’s looking into the young Mrs. Morelli’s death, the so-called blackwater fever, and her much old husband who is somehow nowhere to be found. The more she looks, the more she sees the truth: Lots of people wanted Liliane. And a few others wanted her dead.

A medical missionary in post-WWII Paris is out to solve the murder of a nightclub singer in this 1955 mystery by the author of The Devil in the Bush. Paris at the height of its post-War chic is a far cry from the African backwaters that Hoop Taliaferro has been calling home. But with his American charm and American dollars, he fits in anywhere. He especially fits in at the Flea Club, a naughty nightclub for people who have pretty tame ideas of naughty. The real draw is Nicole, a third-rate chanteuse singing sad songs for the bored expats holding up the bar. When someone silences the music, it falls to Hoop to put things right. Sleuthing''s not really Hoop''s line. He runs more to clever quips and nicely ironed khakis. But he is saved, once again, by the timely arrival of the redoubtable Dr. Mary Finney. Stomping through the City of Light in her sensible shoes, Mary is everything Nicole wasn''t—including one step ahead of her killer.

Offers an intimate view of a contemporary composer's creative world and how others may interpret it.Howard Skempton has contributed to British musical life for more than half a century, as composer, performer and commentator. His music is characterised by simplicity yet sophistication and is appreciated by lay and specialist listeners in equal measure. Skempton studied in London with Cornelius Cardew in the late 1960s, co-founding the Scratch Orchestra, and has written over 600 pieces since then, informed by and informing compositional trends. His outputincludes pieces for solo piano, accordion, cello, and guitar, chamber ensemble, orchestra, and voice. His music is performed by leading artists and recorded by, amongst others, Sony and NMC.This book offers an intimateview of a composer's creative world and how others may interpret it. It is not a conventional "life and works" though it contains a timeline, authorised work list and discography for orientation. It is written for anyone interested in contemporary music and (auto)biography, whether performer, listener, specialist, or student. The first four chapters comprise transcripts of conversations between Skempton and Esther Cavett followed by reflections from different commentators (respectively Matthew Head, Heather Wiebe, Arnold Whittall and Pwyll Ap Siôn). Skempton and Cavett discuss his musical origins, the wide array of musical and extra-musical influences on his music, his early adult life in London, his compositional development and processes, and how he teaches composition. The reflections are rich and wide-ranging, providing biographical, cultural and aesthetic insights and including close readings of keyscores. The penultimate chapter draws upon voices of Skempton's performers (Peter Hill, Thalia Myers, John Tilbury and James Weeks). To close, Cavett reflects on how Skempton told his story and the process of describing a creative life in music. The book includes manuscripts of six previously unpublished compositions and images of Skempton and his collaborators.ESTHER CAVETT is Senior Research Fellow at King's College, London.MATTHEWHEAD is Professor of Music at King's College, London.CONTRIBUTORS: Esther Cavett, Rosie Clements, Luke Deane, Matthew Head, Peter Hill, Thalia Myers, Howard Skempton, Pwyll Ap Siôn, John Tilbury, James Weeks, HeatherWiebe, Arnold Whittall.