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Locating East Asia in Western Art Music
Music / Culture
Edited Yayoi Uno Everett, Frederick Lau
Sales Date: 2004-02-12
388 Pages, 6.00 x 9.00 in
How does a piece of music embody the sound of a different culture?
The traditional musics of China, Japan and Korea have been an important source of inspiration for many Western composers. Some, like Chou Wen-chung and John Cage, have moved beyond superficial borrowing of "Eastern" musical elements in earnest attempts to understand non-Western principles of composition. At the same time, many Asian composers, often trained in the West or in Western music traditions, have been using Asian elements to create works of unique musical synthesis. As a result of such cultural interpenetrations, the landscape of Western art music has been irreversably altered.
Locating East Asia in Western Art Music is a comparative study of Asian-influenced Western composers and Western-influenced Asian composers, and the first sustained exploration of this cross cultural exchange. Bringing together work by music theorists, musicologists and ethnomusicologists, this book explores how musical notions of East and West are constructed and utilized by composers, and reevaluates the many ways East Asian composers have contributed to developments in twentieth century music. Composers discussed include John Cage, Toru Takemitsu, Chou Wen-chung, Toshiro Mayuzumi, Isang Yun, Tan Dun, John Zorn, and Henry Cowell.
CONTRIBUTORS: Hugh De Ferranti, Yayoi U. Everett, Judith Herd, Ellie Hisama, Eric Lai, Frederic Lau, Fredric Lieberman, Steven Nuss, Nancy Rao, and Yu Siuwah.
Interultural Synthesis in Postwar Western Art Music: Historical Contexts, Perspectives, and Taxonomy – Yayoi Uno Everett
Fusion or Fission: The Paradox and Politics of Contemporary Chinese Avant-Garde Music – Frederick Lau
The Cultural Politics of Japan's Modern Music: Nostalgia, Nationalism, and Identity in the Interwar Years – Judith Ann Herd
Two Practices Confused in One Composition: Tan Dun's Symphony 1997: Heaven, Earth, Man – Yu Siu Wah
John Zorn and the Postmodern Condition – Ellie M. Hisama
Music from the Right: The Politics of Toshiro Mayuzumi's Essay for String Orchestra – Steven Nuss
Henry Cowell and His Chinese Music Heritage: Theory of Sliding Tone and His Orchestral Work of 1953-1965 – Nancy Yunhwa Rao
The Evolution of Chou Wen-chung's Variable Modes – Eric Lai
Musical Syncretism in Isang Yun's Gasa – Jeongmee Kim
Contemporary Japanese Music: A Lecture by John Cage – Edited by Fredric Lieberman
Toru Takemitsu, on Sawari – Translated and Annotated by Hugh De Ferranti and Yayoi Uno Everett
Wenren and Culture – Chou Wen-Chung
YAYOI UNO EVERETT is Assistant Professor of Music at Emory University. FREDERICK LAU is Associate Professor of Music at the University of Hawai'i at Manoa.
"This excellent and very useful book will have a considerable impact on our understanding of the history of Western and world music in the twentieth century."
~Bruno Nettl, Professor of Music and Anthropology, University of Illinois
"This estimable collection focuses necessary attention on the teeming exchanges among the fluid worlds of East Asian and Western art musics and aesthetics, giving them a richly textured life and providing honest, not always adulatory assessments. The book is also smartly ahead of the curve in bringing together ethnographic, critical, theoretical and composerly perspectives."
~Michael Tenzer, author of Gamelan Gong Kebyar
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