HIS 295‐06 ST Tyrants and Tunesmiths: Opera, Politics, and Society in Modern Europe Spring Semester 2011 Tuesday 10:00‐11:50 and Thursday 10:00‐10:50 Alumni Recitation Hall #131 COURSE INFORMATION Dr. Kelly J. Maynard, Grinnell College Department of History Office: Mears #212 Office Phone: (641) 269‐4465 Office Hours: W 4:15‐6:15 and by appointment Email: [email protected] QuickTime™ and aTIFF (Uncompressed) decompressorare needed to see this picture. QuickTime™ and aTIFF (Uncompressed) decompressorare needed to see this picture. QuickTime™ and aTIFF (Uncompressed) decompressorare needed to see this picture. COURSE DESCRIPTION This course examines the complex relationship between music production and political power in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries in three national contexts: France, Germany, and the Soviet Union. We consider specific relationships among composers, politicians, and institutions and seek to understand how such relationships helped to shape both the works themselves and the political and social realities around them in the processes of inception, performance, and reception. In class we analyze a range of sources from personal letters to staging sketches, newspaper articles, aesthetic treatises, political rants, musical scores, costumes, libretti, and poetry. The course also includes DVD viewings of several works and a field trip to the Chicago Lyric Opera’s production of Wagner's Lohengrin. Course requirements are comprised of regular, active, and thoughtful participation during discussions; three brief response papers; one performance review paper; and a final, peer‐reviewed presentation with accompanying annotated bibliography on a musico‐political topic of students’ own devising. Please note that no particular training or expertise in music is required for this class. Curiosity is a great place to start. HIS 295‐06 ST/Maynard/Tyrants/S11/p.2 REQUIRED TEXTS Jane Fulcher, The Nation’s Image: French Grand Opera as Politics and Politicized Art (Cambridge University Press, 1987/2002) ISBN: 0521529433 ‐ paperback Christopher McIntosh, The Swan King: Ludwig II of Bavaria (Tauris Parke, 1982/2003) ISBN: 1860648924 ‐ paperback Solomon Volkov, Shostakovich and Stalin: The Extraordinary Relationship Between the Great Composer and the Brutal Dictator (Alfred A. Knopf, 2004) ISBN: 0375410821 ‐ hardcover Additional readings will be available on PWeb or handed out in class. COURSE REQUIREMENTS AND GRADING Although introductory lectures provide the broad historical context for each of the units which we explore, this class otherwise is conducted like a seminar. Our meetings center around discussion of assigned readings and viewings, and it is through the free and open exchange of ideas that we all will benefit the most from the class. You are expected to attend class regularly, except in case of dire emergency. Please note that by definition every absence from class has a negative impact upon the overall quality of our conversation. Your grade will be impacted accordingly. After two uncommunicated absences you will receive an F for the participation portion of the course grade. After three uncommunicated absences you will fail the course entirely. You must come to class with the reading materials in hand and a one‐page, printed list of prepared points in response to what you have seen, heard, and read. These points need not be formally presented. They literally may be a list in any format of thoughtful topics – observations, questions, disagreements – you would like to address in the course of discussion. The list will serve as an aide for you to contribute to the conversation. At the end of each of the three units which comprise the class, you will be asked to write a carefully‐crafted response paper of roughly five pages analyzing the material which we have covered in readings, discussions, and viewing for that unit only. After our field trip to the Chicago Lyric Opera you will be assigned a short performance review paper as well. Finally, at the end of the semester, each student will be responsible for a peer‐reviewed presentation of roughly 20 minutes in duration on a substantive, carefully‐researched topic of your own devising, developed in consultation with the instructor. Each presentation is expected to take into account political and social context as well as musical style and to incorporate a discussion of one or more of the broader issues raised during the semester. A substantial annotated bibliography recording the research sources for your presentation is also required. There is no final exam for this course. HIS 295‐06 ST/Maynard/Tyrants/S11/p.3 Your overall grade will be calculated according to the following formula: course participation 30% response papers (10% each) 30% performance review essay 5% annotated bibliography 15% final presentation 20% Students with any form of documented disability are encouraged to contact me early in the semester so that we can arrange for your learning needs to be met and for you to participate fully in the class. You will also need to provide documentation of your condition(s) to the Dean for Student Academic Support and Advising, Joyce Stern, on the third floor of the Rosenfield Center (x3702). COURSE SCHEDULE January 25 Introduction PART I FRANCE Jan 27 LECTURE: French Revolutions, 1789‐1871 February 1 The Rise of French Grand Opera • Fulcher The Nation’s Image Introduction and Chapters 1 + 2 (pp. 1‐121) Feb 3 The Fall of French Grand Opera • Fulcher The Nation’s Image Chapters 3 + 4 and Conclusion (pp. 122‐204) VIEWING: Meyerbeer Les Huguenots (1836) • Synopsis of Les Huguenots (Fulcher pp. 247‐251) Feb 8 Discussion of Les Huguenots Staging Les Huguenots: Behind the Scenes • Description of the Opera House in Galignani New Paris Guide (1839) • Meyerbeer/Veron Contract (1834) with amendments • Mise‐en‐scène documents (1835‐6) all in First Nights at the Opera, pp. 201‐206 + 222‐226 • Meyerbeer letters to Minna (1834‐6) Feb 10 Responding to Les Huguenots • Press reviews of Les Huguenots (1836) Le Monde Dramatique, Le Ménestrel, Allgemeine Musikalische Zeitung • Other responses (1836) Hector Berlioz, George Sand, Charles De Boigne, Henry Chorley all in First Nights at the