FHS List A: Topics in Music History After 1750
Pastoral Idylls, National Anxieties: the Nineteenth-Century Symphony
Daniel Grimley
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Course Booklet
Welcome to the course! This booklet provides a summary of the course, a list of lecture
topics, and some suggestions for reading.
The nineteenth-century symphony is such a familiar part of the Western musical canon
that it is easy to overlook how complex and contested the genre became. Indeed,
despite its associations of monumentality, grandeur, and musical unity, it was a
discourse concerned as much with conflict and (problematically) hybridity as with
synthesis and resolution. This course will scrutinise key works from historical and
analytical perspectives. Attention will be directed towards issues of narrative (structural
as well as historical), representation, and meaning, across a broad range of works,
critically engaging with notions of centre and periphery, inheritance, and musical
tradition. The symphony emerges as an anxious site of musical-cultural practice, and
simultaneously offers a sharp lens for refracting broader issues in nineteenth-century
musical history. You are strongly encouraged to listen widely—particularly to explore
areas of the repertoire beyond works discussed during the lecture course (for instance,
symphonies by composers such as Niels W Gade, Franz Berwald, Johan Svendsen,
Camille Saint-Saëns, and C V Stanford)—and to consider issues of performance,
interpretation, ideology, and musical space. Listening to symphony concerts regularly on
Radio 3 (via the I-player) is an excellent way to broaden your knowledge of the
repertoire, and there is much material to explore on the Naxos Music Library.
Resources
This is a vast topic, with a vast critical literature. You should aim to be selective in your
research: don’t try and cover everything! Essential introductory discussions can be
found in MGG and New Grove Online (individual composer entries, as well as Mark Evan
Bond’s extensive subject chapter on the nineteenth-century symphony). You should also
consult A. Peter Brown’s substantial 2-volume set The Symphonic Repertoire vol. III a
and b (Bloomington: Indiana UP, 2007), which provides a wide range of repertoire
beyond the mainstream canon and succinct analytical summaries of individual
movements, as well as D Kern Holoman’s useful anthology The Nineteenth Century
Symphony (New York: Schirmer, 1997). More detailed suggestions for reading follow:
Sample Essay Questions
1. To what extent was the nineteenth-century symphony an Austro-German
phenomenon?
2. How successful were nineteenth-century composers in addressing the ‘finale problem’
in their symphonic works?
3. Assess the importance of one of the following in relation to the development of the
nineteenth-century symphony: a) counterpoint; b) programmaticism; c) landscape
4. To what extent can the nineteenth-century symphony be considered a popular genre?
1. Antiphonies. Schubert—Berlioz
Reading:
Carl Dahlhaus, ‘The Symphony after Beethoven’, in Nineteenth-Century Music trans. J
Bradford Robinson (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989), 152-60
Brian Newbould, ‘Schubert’, The Nineteenth-Century Symphony, ed. D Kern Holoman, 116
Schubert: Symphony in B Minor, ed. Martin Chusid (New York: Norton, 1968/71)
Berlioz: Fantastic Symphony, ed. Edward T. Cone (New York: Norton, 1971)
John M. Gingerich, ‘Unfinished Considerations: Schubert’s “Unfinished” Symphony in the
Context of his Beethoven Project’, 19th Century Music 31/2 (Fall, 2007), 99-112
James Hepokoski, ‘Beethoven reception: the symphonic tradition’ in The Cambridge
History of Nineteenth-Century Music, ed. Jim Samson (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2002), 424-59
F. E. Kirby, ‘The Germanic Symphony of the Nineteenth Century: Genre, Form,
Instrumentation, Expression’, Journal of Musicological Research 14/2 (1995), 193-221
Sanna Pederson, ‘On the Task of the Music Historian: The Myth of the German
Symphony after Beethoven’, Repercussions 2/2 (1993), 5-30
Stephen Rodgers, Form, Programme and Metaphor in the Music of Berlioz (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2009)
Maynard Solomon, ‘Schubert’s “Unfinished” Symphony’, 19th Century Music 21/2 (Fall,
1997), 111-133
Richard Taruskin, ‘B minor Moods’, The Oxford History of Western Music (OHWM), vol. 3,
ch. 2, 107-118
2. Inventing the German Traditions. Mendelssohn—Schumann
Reading:
John Daverio, Robert Schumann: Herald of a ‘New Poetic Age’ (Oxford: Oxford UP, 1997),
222-41
Thomas S. Grey, ‘Tableaux Vivants: Landscape, History Painting, and the Visual
Imagination in Mendelssohn’s Orchestral Music’, 19th Century Music 21/1 (Summer
1997),
Seth Haney, ‘Navigating Sonata Space in Mendelssohn’s Meeresstille und glückliche
Fahrt’, 19th Century Music 28/2 (Autumn 2004), 108-32
Peter Mercer-Taylor, ‘Mendelssohn’s “Scottish” Symphony and the Music of German
Memory’, 19th Century Music 19 (1995), 68-82
Anthony Newcomb, ‘Once more “Between Absolute and Programme Music”: Schumann’s
Second Symphony’, 19th Century Music 7 (1983-4), 233-50
Sanna Pederson, ‘A. B. Marx, Berlin Concert Life and German National Identity’, 19th
Century Music 18 (1994-5), 87-107
Linda Correll Roesner, ‘Schumann’, and R Larry Todd, ‘Mendelssohn’ in Holoman (ed.),
The Nineteenth-Century Symphony, 43-107
3. Late Idylls, Symphonic Anxieties. Brahms, Dvořák
Reading:
Reinhold Brinkmann, Late Idyll: The Second Symphony of Johannes Brahms trans. Peter
Palmer (Harvard: Harvard University Press, 1997)
Brahms: Symphony no. 4, ed. Kenneth Hull (New York: Norton, 2000)
David Brodbeck, ‘Brahms’, and Michael Beckerman, ‘Dvořák’, Holoman (ed.), The
Nineteenth-Century Symphony, 224-298
David Brodbeck, Brahms: Symphony no. 1 (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1997)
David Brodbeck, ‘Dvořák’s Reception in Liberal Vienna: Language Ordinances, National
Property, and the Rhetoric of Deutschtum’, Journal of the American Musicological Society
60/1 (Spring 2007), 71-131
A Peter Brown, ‘Brahms’ Third Symphony and the New German School’, The Journal of
Musicology 2/4 (Autumn 1983), 434-52
Carl Dahlhaus, ‘The Second Age of the Symphony’, Nineteenth-Century Music, 265-76
Walther Frisch, Brahms: the Four Symphonies (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2004)
Raymond Knapp, Brahms and the Challenge of the Symphony (New York: Stuyvesant,
1997)
Richard Taruskin, ‘The Return of the Symphony’, OHWM, vol. 3, ch. 13, 675-744
4. Defining Russia Symphonically. Tchaikovsky—Borodin
Reading:
Marina Frolova Walker, ‘Constructing the Russian National Character: literature and
music’; and ‘The beginning and the End of the Russsian Style’, in Russian Music and
Nationalism (New Haven: Yale UP, 2007), 1-51 and 140-225
Timothy L Jackson, Tchaikovsky: ‘Pathétique’ Symphony (Cambridge: Cambridge UP,
1999)
Raymond Knapp, ‘Passing—and Failing—in Late Nineteenth-Century Russia; or Why We
Should Care About the Cuts in Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto, 19th Century Music 26/3
(Spring 2003), 195-234
Joseph C Kraus, ‘Tchaikovsky’, Holoman (ed.), The Nineteenth-Century Symphony, 299326
Joseph C Kraus, ‘Tonal Plan and Narrative Plot in Tchaikovsky’s Fifth Symphony’, Music
Theory Spectrum 13/1 (Spring 1991), 21-47
Richard Taruskin, ‘P. I. Chaikovsky and the Ghetto’; ‘How the Acorn took Root’; and
‘Chaikovsky and the Human’, in Defining Russia Musically (Princeton: Princeton UP,
1997), 48-60, 113-151, 239-307
Richard Taruskin, ‘Slavs as Subjects and Citizens’, OHWM, vol. 3, ch. 9, 443-478
Roland John Wiley, Tchaikovsky (New York: Oxford UP, 2009), chs. 10-12
5. Wagner and the Symphonic Sublime. Bruckner—Franck
Reading:
Brian Hart, Vincent D’Indy and the Development of the French Symphony’, Music &
Letters 97/2 (May 2006), 237-61
Julian Horton, Bruckner’s Symphonies: Analysis, Reception, and Cultural Politics
(Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2004)
Benjamin Korstvedt, Bruckner: Symphony no. 8 (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2000)
Benjamin Korstvedt, ‘The First Published Edition of Anton Bruckner’s Fourth Symphony:
Collaboration and Authenticity’, 19th Century Music 20/1 (Summer 1996), 3-26
Vera Micznik, ‘The Absolute Limitations of Programme Music: The case of Liszt’s “Die
Ideale”, Music & Letters 80 (1999), 207-40
Margaret Notley, ‘Bruckner Problems, in Perpetuity’, 19th Century Music 30/1 (Summer
2006), 81-93
Margaret Notley, ‘ “Volksconzerte” in Vienna and the Late Nineteenth-Century Ideology
of the Symphony’, Journal of the American Musicological Society, 50/2-3
(Summer/Autumn 1997), 421-53
Stephen Parkany, ‘Kurth’s Bruckner and the Adagio of the Seventh Symphony’, 19th
Century Music 11/3 (Spring 1998), 262-81
Richard Taruskin, ‘The symphony Goes (Inter)national’, OHWM, vol. 3, ch. 14, 745-824.
6. Romantic Sunset, Modernist Dawns. Mahler—Sibelius—Nielsen
Reading:
Thomas Bauman, ‘Mahler in a New Key: Genre and the “Resurrection” Finale’, Journal of
Musicology 23/3 (Summer 2006), 468-85
Jeremy Barham ed., The Cambridge Companion to Mahler (Cambridge: Cambridge UP,
2007)
Stephen Downes, ‘Pastoral idylls, erotic anxieties and heroic subjectivities in Sibelius’s
Lemminkäinen and the Maidens of the Island and first two symphonies’ in Daniel M
Grimley ed., The Cambridge Companion to Sibelius (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2004)
Peter Franklin, Mahler: Symphony no. 3 (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1991)
Daniel M. Grimley, Carl Nielsen and the Idea of Modernism (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2010)
James Hepokoski, Sibelius: Symphony no. 5 (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1993)
Julian Johnson, Mahler’s Voices: Expression and Irony in the Songs and Symphonies
(Oxford: Oxford UP, 2009)
Kay M. Knittel, ‘“Polemik in Konzertsaal”: Mahler, Beethoven and the Viennese Critics’,
19th Century Music 29/3 (Spring 2006), 289-321
Robert Simpson, Carl Nielsen: Symphonist (London: Dent, 1979)