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Conductor's Guide to Debussy's Prelude, Nocturnes, & La Mer audiobook cover art

  • Conductor's Guide to Debussy's Prelude, Nocturnes, & La Mer

  • By: Gerard Schwarz
  • Narrated by: Gerard Schwarz
  • Length: 1 hr and 12 mins
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    4.5 out of 5 stars 20
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Debussy was the first great composer of the twentieth century. He departed from previous musical practice to a greater extent than any previous composer. Though he completed his masterpieces Prelude to Afternoon of a Faun and the triptych Nocturnes before the turn of the century, it was not until 1902 that Debussy received widespread recognition.

  • 4 out of 5 stars

  • Engaging but uneven volume levels

  • By William on 02-09-06
Conductor's Guide to Stravinsky's Petrouchka & The Rite of Spring audiobook cover art

  • Conductor's Guide to Stravinsky's Petrouchka & The Rite of Spring

  • By: Gerard Schwarz
  • Narrated by: Gerard Schwarz
  • Length: 1 hr and 14 mins
  • Original Recording
  • Overall
    4.5 out of 5 stars 17
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    4.5 out of 5 stars 13
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    4 out of 5 stars 13

As the 20th century winds to its close, Igor Stravinsky stands securely as its most important and influential composer. For more than six decades his works defined modernism in music, just as Picasso's canvases showed the essence of modernism in painting. Like that great Spanish artist, who was almost his exact contemporary, Stravinsky attained a dominating stature in his field. Only a handful of composers rivaled him in significance during his lifetime. None surpassed him.

  • 3 out of 5 stars

  • Misleading title . . . not FOR conductors

  • By G. White on 08-05-13
Great Music of the 20th Century audiobook cover art

  • Great Music of the 20th Century

  • By: The Great Courses
  • Narrated by: Professor Robert Greenberg PhD
  • Length: 17 hrs and 50 mins
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  • Overall
    4.5 out of 5 stars 36
  • Performance
    4.5 out of 5 stars 29
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    4.5 out of 5 stars 31

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. 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.

  • 2 out of 5 stars

  • Disappointment

  • By MAdison on 03-11-18
Conductor's Guide to Mendelssohn's Symphony No. 3 & No. 4 audiobook cover art

  • Conductor's Guide to Mendelssohn's Symphony No. 3 & No. 4

  • By: Gerard Schwarz
  • Narrated by: Gerard Schwarz
  • Length: 1 hr and 9 mins
  • Original Recording
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    4 out of 5 stars 9
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Felix Mendelssohn grew up in an extraordinary family, one distinguished by both worldly success and intellectual achievement. Mendelssohn was, in fact, the greatest child prodigy that music has known, undoubtedly helped by the early nurturing his talent received. Not even Mozart created such mature compositions at so early an age.

Conductor's Guide to Copland's Appalachian Spring, Billy the Kid, & Fanfare for the Common Man audiobook cover art

  • Conductor's Guide to Copland's Appalachian Spring, Billy the Kid, & Fanfare for the Common Man

  • By: Gerard Schwarz
  • Narrated by: Gerard Schwarz
  • Length: 1 hr and 13 mins
  • Original Recording
  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars 11
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Gerard Schwarz shares his enthusiasm for the music of Aaron Copland, the quintessential American composer. Born in 1900 into a family of immigrants in Brooklyn, Copland didn't come from a musical family and had to find his own way, even trying to learn harmony from a mail order course. Today, Copland has become a permanent part of our cultural landscape, as important to our national consciousness as Whitman, Whistler, or Melville.

Conductor's Guide to Dvorak's Symphony No. 9, In Nature's Realm, & Carnival audiobook cover art

  • Conductor's Guide to Dvorak's Symphony No. 9, In Nature's Realm, & Carnival

  • By: Gerard Schwarz
  • Narrated by: Gerard Schwarz
  • Length: 1 hr and 13 mins
  • Original Recording
  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars 11
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    4.5 out of 5 stars 8
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Gerard Schwarz takes you through the life of Anton Dvorak, a devoted Czech nationalist who, like other composers of the nineteenth century, brought national or ethnic pride into the concert hall by using their nation's folk music to evoke patriotic sentiments.

  • 4 out of 5 stars

  • good style, but

  • By Michael on 09-26-11

Publisher's Summary

Gerard Schwarz examines the life of this impolitic composer who lived in the political world of revolutionary Russia. Prokofiev's failure to interest himself in political realities, together with his tremendous confidence in his own genius, led him to ignore the darkening climate for artists in the Soviet Union. When the Soviets arrested his first wife on charges of spying, Prokofiev issued a public apology for his failure to write in an appropriate socialist style.

According to Aaron Copland, who met Prokofiev several times in the 1920s, "He was boyish, easily bored, and even impolite at times... He was very bright and outspoken, and I can't imagine that he would ever hide how he felt about anything." Once, when accompanying a singer in a performance of his songs, he reduced her to tears by berating her effort in front of the audience.

Schwarz uses musical excerpts from Prokofiev's "Classical" Symphony, Piano Concerto No. 3, and Romeo and Juliet to demonstrate how Prokofiev avoided the large scale and sweeping gestures of late-Romantic orchestral music in favor of lean sonorities, textural clarity, and concise architecture.

If you love the symphony, this hour of delightful entertainment and fascinating information will enrich your symphony experience like nothing else. See the entire Musically Speaking Collection here.
(P)2005 Musically Speaking, Inc.

Critic Reviews

"Basic enough to be intelligible to musical beginners, and intelligent enough to interest even the connoisseur. Seattle Symphony fans of Gerard Schwarz's Sunday 'Musically Speaking' series know that Schwarz is one of the most articulate speakers on musical subjects." (Seattle Times)

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