Book Review
Jan. 15th, 2020 11:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kenjariToward A New Music
by Carlos Chávez
Mexican composer and conductor Carlos Chavez wrote this long essay in 1937. In it he explores the uses and possibilities of the newly emerging sound and recording technologies, namely the phonograph, radio, and sound film. Chavez is overall very optimistic about the benefits of these technologies and the creative uses of them, especially when it comes to the role of music and sound in film. He clearly looks forward to the musical future that he imagines these technologies will bring.
Reading this almost a hundred years after it was written is an interesting experience, almost like looking at a time capsule or exploring an archive. It's fascinating to see how electricity-based technology and inventions were initially viewed by forward-thinking composers, and to compare this vision to how things actually played out. Chavez lived until 1978, so I am curious if he wrote anything later on that followed on the ideas and observations in Toward a New Music.
by Carlos Chávez
Mexican composer and conductor Carlos Chavez wrote this long essay in 1937. In it he explores the uses and possibilities of the newly emerging sound and recording technologies, namely the phonograph, radio, and sound film. Chavez is overall very optimistic about the benefits of these technologies and the creative uses of them, especially when it comes to the role of music and sound in film. He clearly looks forward to the musical future that he imagines these technologies will bring.
Reading this almost a hundred years after it was written is an interesting experience, almost like looking at a time capsule or exploring an archive. It's fascinating to see how electricity-based technology and inventions were initially viewed by forward-thinking composers, and to compare this vision to how things actually played out. Chavez lived until 1978, so I am curious if he wrote anything later on that followed on the ideas and observations in Toward a New Music.
