Elliott Carter

About the Author, Further Reading, Production Notes, Back Cover

james wierzbicki teaches musicology at the University of Sydney, Australia, and is the author of Film Music: A History and Louis and Bebe Barron’s Forbidden Planet: A Film Score Guide. a m e r i c a n Composers Lou Harrison Leta E. Miller and Fredric Lieberman John Cage David Nicholls Dudley Buck N. Lee Orr William Grant Smith Catherine Parsons Smith Rudolf Friml William Everett Elliott Carter James Wierzbicki The University of Illinois Press is a founding member of the Association of American University Presses. _____________________________________ Composed in 9.5/13 Janson Text with Meta display by Jim Proefrock at the University of Illinois Press Manufactured by Thomson-Shore, Inc. University of Illinois Press 1325 South Oak Street Champaign, IL 61820-6903 www.press.uillinois.edu “A gratifying success. The story of Elliott Carter’s life and work is succinctly told and is one that specialists and non-experts alike can read with great profit.” —arnold whittall, author of Exploring Twentieth-Century Music: Tradition and Innovation “The most complete picture of Carter’s early life and career to date. Wierzbicki shows more clearly than anyone else how Carter’s temporal techniques evolved over the course of his career.” —anne c. shreffler, coeditor of Elliott Carter: A Centennial Portrait in Letters and Documents This compact introduction to the life and works of composer elliott carter provides a fresh perspective on one of the most significant American composers of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. A leading voice of the American classical music tradition and a two-time winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Music, Carter was initially encouraged to become a composer by Charles Ives, and he went on to learn from Walter Piston at Harvard University and Nadia Boulanger in Paris. Drawing on Carter’s voluminous writings and compositions, James Wierzbicki provides a clear discussion of Carter’s evolving understanding of musical time and the influence of film on his work. Celebrating his 100th birthday in 2008 by premiering a number of new compositions, Carter has been a powerful presence on the American new music scene, an important connection to American music’s foundational figures, and a dynamic force in its continuing evolution. james wierzbicki teaches musicology at the University of Sydney, Australia, and is the author of Film Music: A History and Louis and Bebe Barron’s Forbidden Planet: A Film Score Guide. a volume in the A M E R I C A N C O M P O S E R S series university of illinois press Urbana, Chicago, and Springfield www.press.uillinois.edu ISBN 978-0-252-07800-2 ISBN 978-0-252-07800-2 MUSIC ...