
Great Music of the 20th Century
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Narrated by:
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Professor Robert Greenberg PhD
About this listen
The 20th century was a hotbed of musical exploration, innovation, and transformation unlike any other epoch in history. Ranging across the century in its entirety, these 24 lectures present a musical cornucopia of astounding dimensions - a major presentation and exploration of the incredible brilliance and diversity of musical art across a turbulent century.
Using a chronological approach, you'll explore the fascinating gamut of 20th-century musical "isms", from impressionism and fauvism to serialism, stochasticism, ultraserialism, neoclassicism, neotonalism, and minimalism as well as the inclusivity and synthesis within concert music that embraced Western historical styles, folk and popular music, jazz, rock, Asian, Latin American, and other influences in the service of heightened musical expression. Through the panoramic view of the course, you'll discover the genius of composers such as Debussy, Stravinsky, Schoenberg, Webern, Bartok, Ligeti, Riley, and many others.
Far more than simply a series of lectures, the program comprises a huge and many-sided resource for discovering the endless riches of 20th-century concert music across the globe. The phenomenal range of genres and composers covered and the wealth of suggestions for specific works make this a reference that could easily inspire years of musical exploration and glorious listening.
This remarkable inquiry opens the doors to an extraordinary spectrum of contemporary masterpieces that await discovery and deep listening. Within these unique and riveting lectures, Professor Greenberg offers you the keys to understanding and deep enjoyment of a revolutionary, visionary, and magnificent era in music. In Great Music of the 20th Century, you'll experience the living, evolving, and superlative musical art that so vividly and unforgettably speaks to the life of our times.
PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying reference material will be available in your Library section along with the audio.
©2018 The Teaching Company, LLC; 2018 The Great Courses (P)2018 The Great CoursesI listened to this having already heard the Professor's excellent "How to Listen to and Understand Great Music" and was particularly intrigued by the final chapters on 20th century music. I have been interested in 20th century music for a while and had already heard early Stravinsky works such as Right of Spring and Firebird and had tried to listen to Edgard Varese, Anton Webern and Pierre Boulez which I enjoyed but found "difficult" shall we say.
There is no doubt that it is a tough gig presenting this book. Not only is some of the music completely un-describable (Collon Nancarrow anyone!) but the Professor is further hindered in that, unlike his other courses, this one has no music. What? I hear you cry? No music! Well, the story is that because many of the composers on here have not been dead for 75 years (some of them are still alive) the royalty fees for putting excepts of music on the course would be prohibitively expensive. However, Professor Greenberg has helpfully put a series of URL links on his website with the pieces he describes in the course. This means that you do have to put a bit more effort in to fully appreciate what is going on here but, believe me, it is worth it.
I had never really listened to the music of Arnold Schoenberg before hearing this course thinking that it would be "too difficult". I am now converted. It has also opened my ears to the later works of Stravinsky and the "new pluralism" of Rouse, Ades and Kernis and for that I am thankful.
The only negative I can think of for this course is that it has cost me a fortune buying some of the recordings so I can have them to listen too. I have spent many pounds so far on the Complete Works of Schoenberg, the Complete Works of Webern and some Pierre Boulez that I had not heard before. I like the piece at the end where the Professor talks about his own musical tastes and it seems he is, after all, a fairly regular guy. Fairly.
This is a truly exceptional course covering some of the most extraordinary sounds.
Amazing sounds, astounding music brought to life
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Vivid and fascinating
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Best heard on great courses directly
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Another great course.
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Content delivery and indeed performance is just wonderful.
Highly recommended
Fabulous
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First off - there is very little actual music in these lectures; he explains at the start that the cost of licensing the work of not-long-dead composers means he can't play you the recorded excerpts as he goes along, as you will be used to in his other courses. However, he provides a wonderful coursebook in the PDF file with URLs to some brilliant videos - so the music (and more) is only a click away. I note that one reviewer above has declared that you don't get these with the course on Audible - this is incorrect; they are in the PDF file in your audible library alongside the course download link and it all works fine. So aside from some piano examples he plays himself (and a few snippets of his own music) - it is all Bob. That is why 'story' is only getting 4 stars up above; if the music had been in there it would have been incredible and, as it is, I found myself coming down on the side of Charles Ives - screw copyright, music belongs to everyone. Gimme!!! Anyway the links are there and they are great.
Prof. Greenberg's overview itself is, for my money, much better than Alex Ross 'The Rest is Noise' from the point of view of actually making the music accessible. There are a couple of reasons for this I think. Firstly, I love Greenberg's willingness to stick his neck out and tell you his opinion. He loves and he hates, and the ongoing drama of who or what will be celebrated, or, alternatively, given both barrels makes this worth the price of admission alone. Secondly, I think the music truly gets centre-stage here in a way that it does not in Alex Ross' very interesting book. There is cultural, historical, and biographical overview here as well but this course is principally about the music - which I think is borne out in what the course consciously omits (Shostakovitch for example) as well as what it devotes entire lectures to. It is selective. The selections for listening/watching in the links are obviously chosen with care and I was delighted to discover much of this music (most of it to be honest) for the first time. Thirdly, Greenberg's being a prolific contemporary composer himself feels more important in this course, than in any of his previous. This course brings us 'up to speed' and so there is more of a sense than ever that this stuff (from Stravinsky's Rite of Spring onwards) is what contemporary composers are still wrestling with as they try to figure out what it is that they do or should do next. I thought Prof. Greenberg's frank account of his career (nay, his life!) as a composer in one of the final lectures was great - very honest, very amusing, and quite moving.
Don't miss this course - it is special.
A Wonderful Piece of Work
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Another stunningly good course!
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Very disappointing
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