The American Stravinsky : The Style and Aesthetics of Copland's New American Music, the Early Works, 1921-1938 / / Gayle Murchison.

• Author: Murchison, Gayle Minetta.
• Place / Publishing House: Ann Arbor : : University of Michigan Press,, 2012.; ©2012.
• Year of Publication: 2012
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (xviii, 285 pages) :; illustrations

One of the country's most enduringly successful composers, Aaron Copland created a distinctively American style and aesthetic in works for a diversity of genres and mediums, including ballet, opera, and film. Also active as a critic, mentor, advocate, and concert organizer, he played a decisive role in the growth of serious music in the Americas in the twentieth century. In The American Stravinsky, Gayle Murchison closely analyzes selected works to discern the specific compositional techniques Copland used, and to understand the degree to which they derived from European models, particularly the influence of Igor Stravinsky. Murchison examines how Copland both Americanized these models and made them his own, thereby finding his own compositional voice. Murchison also discusses Copland's aesthetics of music and his ideas about its purpose and social function.

Table of Contents

Scherzo humoristique (Cat and mouse) : Copland's American Petrushka and his debt to Stravinsky -- Boulanger and compositional maturity -- Popular music and jazz : authentic or Ersatz? -- Paris and jazz : French neoclassicism and the new modern American music -- Back in the United States : popular music, jazz, and the new American music -- European influence beyond Stravinsky and les Six : Hába and Schoenberg -- Toward a new national music during the 1930s : Copland's populism, accessible style, and folk and popular music -- Copland's journey left -- "Folk" music and the popular front : El salón Mexico -- Billy the Kid -- A vision for American music-- .