The Call of the Crown tells the tale of three mismatched teenagers – a mysterious wise man – his ‘giant’ friend, and two old soldiers. Together, the six begin a journey across their homeland to attend a once a decade celebration in the country’s capital. Not long into their journey, a chance encounter with a group of northerners leads to a frightening discovery.
Portland, Oregon Chef’s Tablecelebrates the food and culture of what theNew York Timescalls the city’s ‘golden age’ of dining and drinking. The city’s food scene–largely a celebration of the farm-to-table movement–has grown and evolved tremendously in the last five years, with an abundance of local fisheries, farms, and small beef, lamb, and pork producers providing the city’s fascinating restaurants with a wide array of locally-grown deliciousness.
George Gershwin is one of the giants of American music, unique in that he was both a brilliant writer of popular songs (‘Swanee,’ ‘I Got Rhythm,’ ‘They Can’t Take That Away From Me’) and of more serious music, including ‘Rhapsody in Blue,’ ‘An American in Paris,’ and ‘Porgy and Bess.’ Now, in The George Gershwin Reader, music lovers are treated to a spectacular celebration of this great American composer. The Reader offers a kaleidoscopic collection of writings by and about Gershwin, including more than eighty pieces of superb variety, color, and depth. There is a who’s who of famous commentators: bandleader Paul Whiteman; critics Robert Benchley, Alexander Woollcott, and Brooks Atkinson; fellow musicians Irving Berlin, Jerome Kern, Alec Wilder (who analyzes the songs ‘That Certain Feeling’ and ‘A Foggy Day’), Leonard Bernstein, and the formidable modernist composer Arnold Schoenberg (who was Gershwin’s tennis partner in Hollywood). Some of the most fascinating and important writings here deal with the critical debate over Gershwin’s concert pieces, especially ‘Rhapsody in Blue’ and ‘An American in Paris,’ and there is a complete section devoted to the controversies over ‘Porgy and Bess,’ including correspondence between Gershwin and DuBose Hayward, the opera’s librettist (a series of excerpts which illuminate the creative process), plus unique interviews with the original Porgy and Bess–Todd Duncan and Anne Brown. Sprinkled throughout the book are excerpts from Gershwin’s own letters, which offer unique insight into this fascinating and charming man. Along with a detailed chronology of the composer’s life, the editors provide informative introductions to each entry. Here then is a book for anyone interested in American music. Scholars, performers, and Gershwin’s legions of fans will find it an irresistible feast.
Mendelssohn, Goethe, and the Walpurgis Night addresses tolerance and acceptance in the face of cultural, political, and religious strife. Its point of departure is the Walpurgis Night. The Night, also known as Beltane or May Eve, was supposedly an annual witches’ Sabbath that centered around the Brocken, the highest peak of the Harz Mountains. After exploring how a notoriously pagan celebration came to be named after the Christian missionary St. Walpurgis (ca. 710-79), John Michael Cooper discusses the Night’s treatments in several closely interwoven works by Goethe and Mendelssohn. His book situates those works in their immediate personal and professional contexts, as well as among treatments by a wide array of other artists, philosophers, and political thinkers, including Voltaire, Lessing, Shelley, Heine, Delacroix, and Berlioz. In an age of decisive political and religious conflict, Walpurgis Night became a heathen muse: a source of spiritual inspiration that was neither specifically Christian, nor Jewish, nor Muslim. And Mendelssohn’s and Goethe’s engagements with it offer new insights into its role in European cultural history, as well as into issues of political, religious, and social identity — and the relations between cultural groups — in today’s world. John Michael Cooper is Professor of Music at Southwestern University and author of Mendelssohn’s ‘Italian’ Symphony (Oxford University Press).
