Moral Fire: Musical Portraits from America's Fin de Siècle - Hardcover

Horowitz, Joseph

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0520267443 ISBN 13: 9780520267442

Publisher: University of California Press, 2012

Synopsis

Joseph Horowitz writes in Moral Fire: “If the Met’s screaming Wagnerites standing on chairs (in the 1890s) are unthinkable today, it is partly because we mistrust high feeling. Our children avidly specialize in vicarious forms of electronic interpersonal diversion. Our laptops and televisions ensnare us in a surrogate world that shuns all but facile passions; only Jon Stewart and Bill Maher share moments of moral outrage disguised as comedy.”

Arguing that the past can prove instructive and inspirational, Horowitz revisits four astonishing personalities―Henry Higginson, Laura Langford, Henry Krehbiel and Charles Ives―whose missionary work in the realm of culture signaled a belief in the fundamental decency of civilized human nature, in the universality of moral values, and in progress toward a kingdom of peace and love.

About this title

From the Inside Flap

"Joseph Horowitz's absorbing study of four key figures in the history of classical orchestral music in late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century America is consistently fascinating, thought-provoking, and rewarding. This book should be of great interest to anyone who loves music and cares about its place in, and meaning to, society."

―Mark Volpe, Managing Director, Boston Symphony Orchestra
“Moral Fire is not only a wonderfully readable book, but also a welcome work of scholarship by one of our most astute and discriminating students, critics, and champions of the classical music tradition in America. This book will be welcomed not only by those interested in the history of music in America, but also by cultural historians and American Studies specialists for its perceptive insights into U.S. culture―and cultural aspiration―at the dawn of the twentieth century.”

―Paul S. Boyer, General Editor, The Oxford Encyclopedia of American History
“In this vivid, empathetic book, renowned scholar Joseph Horowitz further develops his case that to understand American intellectual and cultural history, one must understand Americans’ deep engagement with music in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Despite their different backgrounds and mindsets, the four figures profiled in Moral Fire all reveal the impulses and contradictions of Gilded Age culture through their involvement with music. Higginson, Langford, Krehbiel, and Ives were all intensely romantic yet devoted to moralism and uplift, democratic in spirit and agenda yet refined and sophisticated, Victorian yet modern. Moral Fire helps readers understand why the much-misunderstood Gilded Age in reality ranks as an especially creative and formative period in American thought and culture.”

―Alan Lessoff, editor, Journal of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era

About the Author

Joseph Horowitz is the author of Classical Music in America, Artists in Exile, (UC Press), Understanding Toscanini, and Wagner Nights. Previously a New York Times music critic, then Executive Director of the Brooklyn Philharmonic, he is currently Artistic Director of DC's Post-Classical Ensemble.

Edition details

• Publisher: University of California Press
• Publication date: 2012
• ISBN 10: 0520267443
• ISBN 13: 9780520267442
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 284