Music Subject Overview
Musical modernism is understood here in the broadest sense, including compositional practices from the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. Of course, modernist practice is…
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Paraskevaídis, Graciela (1940-)
Graciela Paraskevaídis is a composer, musicologist and educator who lies between referents of Latin American music production. Born and solidly formed in the city of…
Leitmotif
A leitmotif (from the German Leitmotiv: ‘guiding motif’) in its original sense is a musical theme that appears multiple times over the course of a…
Billone, Pierluigi (1960–)
Pierluigi Billone is an Italian composer. Following early studies in guitar and composition in Sienna and Milan, he studied with Salvatore Sciarrino before moving to…
Musique Concrète
Musique Concrète (concrete music) is a music genre that developed from the technology of radio broadcasting. The inventor of Musique Concrète, the Frenchman Pierre Schaeffer…
Martinů, Bohuslav (1890–1959)
Bohuslav Martinů (1890–1959). Czech composer of Austro-Hungarian, Czechoslovak and American citizenship. He left his native Polička in Eastern Bohemia in 1906 to study violin at…
Music and Dance
The histories of modernist music and dance are vast and inextricably related, so much so that it is as daunting to consider them in tandem…
Czernowin, Chaya (1957–)
Arguably the most important Israeli composer to emerge in the late twentieth century, Czernowin, born 7 December in Haifa, is much sought after as a composer…
Russolo, Luigi (1885–1947)
Luigi Russolo (b. Portogruaro, 1885–1947) was a painter, inventor, and musician. He was an Italian Futurist who responded to Filippo Marinetti’s call to revolutionize art…
Pärt, Arvo (1934–)
Arvo Pärt is an Estonian composer whose music has had phenomenal success worldwide since his radical stylistic change from an overtly modernistic aesthetic to a…
Free Jazz
Free Jazz emerged in the late 1950s out of the ongoing negotiation of the American jazz tradition. By the mid-twentieth century, this African-American musical tradition…
Boulez, Pierre (1925-2016)
French composer Pierre Boulez was one of the most influential composers of the second half of the twentieth century. His personal development mirrored the history…
Turina, Joaquín (1882–1949)
Joaquín Turina (b. Seville, 9 December 1882; d. Madrid, 14 January 1949) was a Spanish composer who rose to prominence during Spain’s Edad de Plata…
Foulds, John (1880–1939)
John Herbert Foulds (1880–1939) was an English composer of classical music who found popularity with his light music and theatrical scores, but also created more…
Scelsi, Giacinto (1905–1988)
Giacinto Scelsi was an Italian avant-garde composer best known for the single-note style he developed during the 1950s and 1960s, which minimizes harmonic and melodic…
Dallapiccola, Luigi (1904–1975)
Luigi Dallapiccola was the leading Italian composer of the middle half of the twentieth century, contributing much to the development of musical modernism in Italy…
Zorn, John (1953--)
John Zorn is an American avant-garde saxophonist and composer. Zorn performs on alto saxophone and is one of the leading figures in New York City’s…
Atkinson, Madge (1885–1970)
A dancer, choreographer, educator, and writer, Madge Atkinson worked during the second and third decades of the twentieth century on the development of the dance…
Branca, Glenn (1948--)
Glenn Branca (b. Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, 1948) is an American composer noted for his works for massed electric guitars. Branca began his compositional career in New…
Adaskin, Murray (1906–2002)
Born in Toronto, Ontario and passing in Victoria, British Columbia, Murray Adaskin was a violinist, composer, and academic whose music was widely performed in Canada.…
Eno, Brian (1948--)
Brian Eno was one of the foremost producers of electronic music in the latter half of the twentieth century. He is primarily known as the…
Malipiero, Gian-Francesco (1882–1973)
Gian-Francesco Malipiero was an Italian composer whose life spanned an expansive period of Italian history, from the post-Risorgimento years through two disastrous wars and into…
Plaza, Juan Bautista (1898–1965)
Juan Bautista Plaza (Caracas, 19 July 1898–1 January 1965) was a Venezuelan composer, educator, writer, and musicologist active in Caracas; he was one of the…
Tello, Aurelio (1951--)
Aurelio Tello is a Peruvian composer, conductor, and musicologist. Since 1982, he has lived in Mexico. Tello has been awarded several prizes and distinctions, not…
Live Electronic Music
Defining live electronic music is a problematic and increasingly difficult critical task (Emmerson, 2007, 89–90; see also Collins, 2007, 38–54; Radford, 2008, 158–166). Attempts at…