Haydn and His Contemporaries II. Selected Papers from the Fifth Biennial Conference of the Society for Eighteenth-Century Music at the College of Charleston in Charleston, SC, 13–15 April 2012 ed. by Kathryn L. Libin

Abstract

Reviewed by: Haydn and His Contemporaries II. Selected Papers from the Fifth Biennial Conference of the Society for Eighteenth-Century Music at the College of Charleston in Charleston, SC, 13–15 April 2012 ed. by Kathryn L. Libin Beatriz Magalhães Castro Haydn and His Contemporaries II. Selected Papers from the Fifth Biennial Conference of the Society for Eighteenth-Century Music at the College of Charleston in Charleston, SC, 13–15 April 2012. Edited by Kathryn L. Libin. Ann Arbor, MI: Steglein Publishing, 2015. [ xiii, 177 p. ISBN 9780981985084 (paperback), $30.] Music examples, tables, illustrations, bibliographical references. Dedicated to Joseph Haydn and his contemporaries, this volume comprises eight papers presented at the Fifth Biennial Conference of the Society for Eighteenth-Century Music (SECM), for a second time conjointly organized with the Haydn So -ciety of North America (HSNA) and held at the Towell Library of the College of Charles ton, South Carolina, from 13–15 April 2012. A full review of the conference by Michael E. Ruhling, a board member (now a director-at-large) of SECM and editorial director of HAYDN: Online Journal of the Haydn Society of North America, is available at http://www.secm.org/newsletter/volume20.pdf (accessed 28 December 2016). Kathryn Libin, a noted specialist in Wolf gang Amadeus Mozart and Jane Austen (and also currently a director-at-large of SECM), edited the volume and wrote its preface. The full conference program (p. xii) was organized in ten sessions covering a number of topics; in addition to two sessions devoted to Haydn, the conference included papers on stringed instruments and their music; musical communication; songs, a songbook, and singing (two sessions); dissertations in progress; sacred music (two sessions); and marches and minuets. Supplementing the fifteen paper [End Page 96] presentations by seasoned scholars as well as five younger researchers (some of whom were recipients of SECM travel grants), were a performance (by the Eisenstadt Trio) and two lecture-recitals (by Mark Nabholz and Mayron Tsong). Abstracts of the papers are available at http://www.secm.org/Conferences/secm5/secm5program.html (accessed 28 December 2016). Of the eight essays published in this volume, only two focus specifically on Haydn, while six are dedicated to various aspects of eighteenth-century music scholarship. The conference's emphasis on Haydn's contemporaries fit well into the scope of the project since the papers addressed topics related to the understanding of his musical vocabulary, time, and medium. However, half of the published papers are tangential to Haydn studies, as they pertain to archival research on church music or music circulation. Among the remaining essays, three refer to topic theory as a theoretical framework, while one focuses on iconographical studies of performance practices. Although overall the papers emerge primarily from historical musicological approaches to eighteenth-century music scholarship, the refreshing inclusion of archival research broadens the inquiries to the reception of Haydn's work in diverse countries such as China, Mexico, Venezuela, Uruguay, and Brazil. Dianne Lehmann Goldman's opening essay focuses on eighteenth-century Responsories for the Santíssima Trindad at Mexico City Cathedral. Aligning with the efforts, lately increased, to map Latin American and Caribbean sources, Goldman's research follows the trend of comparing historical music sources from local composers to their European counterparts, as the practices of transcription, adaptation, and copying assumed differentiated roles. This is especially relevant in topic theory analyses that can more keenly evaluate the reception and use of eighteenth-century compositional practices. Such cases also contribute to the understanding of how deeply European compositional practices were injected into local music practices. These types of inquiry yield better perceptions of the practice of antico and galant styles outside of their European contexts. In Goldman's case, her concluding notes appropriately draw attention to the concepts of musical "work" and ownership that are pertinent to, as one may add, not only the eighteenth century, but throughout periods of colonial domination in general, when there were limited means for circulating music scores or even music paper itself. The situation required a higher level of copying and resulted in adaptations of musical sources obtained and exchanged in various forms. Continuing the explorations of ecclesiastical music practices, the...