The Beloved Vision: A History of Nineteenth Century Music

by Stephen Walsh Narrated by Michael Page

Overview

When one thinks of "great" classical music, we harken back to the nineteenth century and the Romantic tradition.



The emotional resonance of nineteenth century has moved generations musicians and resonated with countless listeners. It has inspired artists and writers. But no writer until how has adopted such an insightful narrative approach as Stephen Walsh and he shows how there is more to Romantic music that meets the eye-and the ear.



The Beloved Vision links the music history of this singular epoch to the ideas that lay behind Romanticism in all its manifestations. In this account, we come to understand the phase in music history that has become the mainstay of the twentieth and twenty-first century concert and operatic repertoire.



The narrative begins in the eighteenth century, with C.P.E. Bach, Haydn and the literary movement known as Sturm und Drang. The windows are flung open, and everything to do with style, form, even technique, is exposed to the emotional and intellectual weather, the impulses and preferences of the individual composer. It's a colorful story, told with passion but also with the precision and clarity of detail for which Stephen Walsh is so widely admired.

Editorial Reviews

Harvey Sachs

Stephen Walsh has followed his magnificent, two-volume Stravinsky biography with this smaller but no less brilliant gem of a book on Debussy. Combining psychological perspicacity about his subject’s life with deep insight into his music, Walsh has made me not only better understand the composer—he has also made me want to re-listen to and re-reflect upon every piece that Debussy ever wrote.

Stuart Isacoff

Stephen Walsh’s Debussy: A Painter in Sound articulates with skill, taste and flashes of humor the evolution of an artistic giant who preferred to leave things ‘half said.’ It is impeccably researched and intellectually engrossing—a thorough and important study of the composer who forever changed the direction of music in our time.

The Economist

An enjoyable and impressive achievement. . . . Lively yet learned. . . . Walsh depicts Debussy’s Paris with the same verve and scholarship that he applies to the man.

The Spectator - Philip Hensher

Walsh is one of our most insightful writers on music, and his judgment always illuminates what it touches. . . . Published to mark the centenary of the composer’s death, Debussy: A Painter in Sound concentrates on what truly matters.

The Guardian - Kathryn Hughes

Compelling. . . . Finely tuned. . . . [Walsh] employs a delightfully fluent prose to carry the general reader along.”—

Booklist (starred)

Praise for Stephen Walsh:

“Outstanding.”

Literary Review - Rupert Christiansen

[A] wonderfully warm, wise and witty book about the greatest French composer of the modern era. As a comprehensive and integrated survey of Debussy’s life and work, it could hardly be bettered.”

The Wall Street Journal - Barton Swaim

"An excellent work of history. Walsh writes with clarity and insight. First-rate."

John Powell

In Debussy Stephen Walsh has produced a wonderfully detailed biography of a truly ground-breaking composer. This book should be of interest to any Debussy enthusiast.

he Economist

An enjoyable and impressive achievement. . . . Lively yet learned. . . . Walsh depicts Debussy’s Paris with the same verve and scholarship that he applies to the man.

Product Details

BN ID:	2940159383631
Publisher:	Tantor Audio
Publication date:	04/16/2024
Edition description:	Unabridged

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