First Nights: Five Musical Premiers

Rating:
Summary: A Harvard Course in a Nutshell
Review: I took Professor Thomas Kelly's "First Nights: Five Performance Premieres" class at Harvard, and it was an amazing experience. His lectures were loosely based off of this book, and always garnered curious visitors in the lecture hall. While I didn't read the book during the course, because the material was repetitive with his lectures, I read all of it in anticipation for the final, and it was as if Professor Kelly was giving a personal lecture to me, all without leaving the comfort of my room. It is well written, well researched, anecdotal without being too convoluted, and entertaining, most importantly! I highly highly recommend this book! I am looking forward to reading his First Nights at the Opera book soon. If you ever have a chance to visit Harvard, do come by to listen to one of his lectures (Fall semester, Tu/Th at 10 AM in Sanders Theater)

Rating:
Summary: A Coffee Table Book You Should Actually Read
Review: It's easy as a listener to get caught up in the impact of great music on us today and to ignore the people who brought it about in the first place. Kelly has done a wonderful job of enlightening and enlivening my experience of these five works, four of which I've spent a lot of time with over the years. He brings together stories on the composition, the cultural setting, and the nuts and bolts of putting on the first performances in a way that both academics and popular readers will appreciate.

Rating:
Summary: A Coffee Table Book You Should Actually Read
Review: It's easy as a listener to get caught up in the impact of great music on us today and to ignore the people who brought it about in the first place. Kelly has done a wonderful job of enlightening and enlivening my experience of these five works, four of which I've spent a lot of time with over the years. He brings together stories on the composition, the cultural setting, and the nuts and bolts of putting on the first performances in a way that both academics and popular readers will appreciate.

Rating:
Summary: New Insights into Old Favorites
Review: This book brings together an extraordinary amount of interesting information about 5 of the greatest works of Western music, in the context of trying to recreate their first performances. Kelly writes with the interest of an enthusiast, but the scholarly background is immense, as befits a university press book. Plenty of interesting illustrations and diagrams, and interesting pull-quotes in boxes, break up the text, enhancing readability. I had not previously been aware that the version heard at the first concert of Berlioz's Symphonie Fantastique was subjected to significant rewriting before being published in the form performed today -- this is typical of the interesting insights the book adds to common knowledge. Also, that Berlioz changed the selection of wind instruments, but that one can hear many of the originals on some recent recordings. My only disappointment was that Kelly stopped at 5 works - I would love a similar work-up of first performances of the Wagner Ring Cycle, Mozart's Figaro, and a major work of Mahler - perhaps the first performance of the 8th Symphony. I guess that just means that Kelly might profitably prepare a sequel!

Rating:
Summary: New Insights into Old Favorites
Review: This book brings together an extraordinary amount of interesting information about 5 of the greatest works of Western music, in the context of trying to recreate their first performances. Kelly writes with the interest of an enthusiast, but the scholarly background is immense, as befits a university press book. Plenty of interesting illustrations and diagrams, and interesting pull-quotes in boxes, break up the text, enhancing readability. I had not previously been aware that the version heard at the first concert of Berlioz's Symphonie Fantastique was subjected to significant rewriting before being published in the form performed today -- this is typical of the interesting insights the book adds to common knowledge. Also, that Berlioz changed the selection of wind instruments, but that one can hear many of the originals on some recent recordings. My only disappointment was that Kelly stopped at 5 works - I would love a similar work-up of first performances of the Wagner Ring Cycle, Mozart's Figaro, and a major work of Mahler - perhaps the first performance of the 8th Symphony. I guess that just means that Kelly might profitably prepare a sequel!