Gottlieb Muffat (1690-1770) has been heralded as one of the first composers of keyboard music to display 'distinctly Austrian traits'. In light of both the extent and quality of his œuvre, he was undoubtedly the single most important composer of keyboard music in Vienna in the first half of the eighteenth century. A prodigious child, he performed for the Emperor when he was around ten years old and his formative years were shaped by two of the most renowned composers of the period: his father Georg and Johann Joseph Fux. Muffat served as organist at the Viennese imperial court for over half a century and was responsible for teaching several members of the imperial family. This book explores both his career and quotidian existence and presents much hitherto unknown information about other members of this musical family. A thematic catalogue, which includes descriptions of all known manuscript sources of his music, comprises the second part of this study and serves to highlight the significance of his output and the reception and transmission of his work.

Diplomats had multiple tasks: not only negotiating with the representatives of other states, but also mediating culture and knowledge, and not least elaborating reports on their observations of politics, society, and culture. Culture, according to the studies featured in this book, is defined as a complex sphere including aspects like systems of communication, literature, music, arts, education, and the creation of knowledge. This edition containing contributions from six conferences held in Vienna and Istanbul by the Don Juan Archiv Wien focuses on the complex diplomatic and cultural relations between the Ottoman Empire and Europe from the time of the early embassies to Istanbul up to "Tanzimat".

This provocative addition to the Bach Perspectives series offers a counternarrative to the isolated genius status that J. S. Bach and his music currently enjoy. Contributors contextualize Bach by examining the output, reputation, and compositional practices of his contemporaries in Germany whose work was widely played and enjoyed in his time, including Georg Philipp Telemann, Christoph Graupner, Gottlieb Muffat, and Johann Adolf Scheibe. Essays place Bach and his work in relation to his peers, examining avenues of composition they took while he did not and showing how differing treatments of the same subjects or texts resulted in markedly different compositional results and legacies. By looking closely at how Bach's contemporaries addressed the tasks and challenges of their time, this project provides a more nuanced view of the musical world of Bach's time while revealing in more specific terms than ever how and why Bach's own music remains fresh and compelling. In this volume, Wolfgang Hirschmann proposes an ethnographic approach that contextualizes Bach's works, addressing the aesthetic paths he took as well as those he did not pursue. Steven Zohn's essay considers Telemann's contribution to the orchestral Ouverture genre, observering how Telemann's approach to integrating the national styles of his time was quite different from, but no less rich than, Bach's. Andrew Talle compares settings and strategies of Vergnügte Ruh, beliebte Seelenlust by Bach and Graupner. Alison Dunlop presents valuable primary research on Muffat, the most commonly cited keyboard music composer in Vienna during Bach's lifetime. Finally, Michael Maul sheds new light on the Scheibe-Birnbaum controversy, contextualizing the most famous critique of J. S. Bach's compositional style by discussing the other composers that Scheibe critiqued.

Named a Library Journal Best Reference of 2023 - "Bravo! An invaluable source for scholars and concertgoers.” - Library Journal In the history of the Western musical tradition, the Baroque period traditionally dates from the turn of the 17th century to 1750. The beginning of the period is marked by Italian experiments in composition that attempted to create a new kind of secular musical art based upon principles of Greek drama, quickly leading to the invention of opera. The ending is marked by the death of Johann Sebastian Bach in 1750 and the completion of George Frideric Handel’s last English oratorio, Jephtha, the following year. The Historical Dictionary of Baroque Music, Second Edition contains a chronology, an introduction, and an extensive bibliography. The dictionary section has more than 500 cross-referenced entries on composers, instruments, cities, and technical terms. This book is an excellent resource for students, researchers, and anyone wanting to know more about baroque music.

Written by fourteen leading experts in the field, this Companion covers almost every aspect of the harpsichord - the history of the instrument, tuning systems, the role of the harpsichord in ensemble, its use in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, and includes separate chapters devoted to Domenico Scarlatti, J. S. Bach and Handel. Chapters featuring almost every national style are written by authors with close connections to the countries about which they are writing, including England, The Netherlands, Germany, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, France, Italy, Portugal and Spain, as well as the less extensive harpsichord traditions of Russia, the Nordic and Baltic countries, and colonial Spanish and Portuguese America. With musical examples, illustrations, a timeline of the harpsichord, and an appendix of composers, reliable editions and original sources, this book is for all who love the harpsichord, or want to learn more about it.

This definitive volume, the second, largest, and most central in Newman's History of the Sonata Idea, covers the period from the first sample Italian sonatas using the new techniques of the Alberti bass about 1735 to the succession of masterpieces by Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven which extended until about 1820. It is one of the few books to deal exclusively with the classical era in music. Originally published in 1963. A UNC Press Enduring Edition -- UNC Press Enduring Editions use the latest in digital technology to make available again books from our distinguished backlist that were previously out of print. These editions are published unaltered from the original, and are presented in affordable paperback formats, bringing readers both historical and cultural value.