Review of Kultur und Musik nach 1945: Ästhetik im Zeichen des Kalten Krieges, edited by Ulrich J. Blomann
Author(s)
Pollock, Emily R
Date Issued
March 2018
Journal
Notes
Publisher
Project Muse
Citation
Pollock, Emily Richmond. "Review of Kultur und Musik nach 1945: Ästhetik im Zeichen des Kalten Krieges, edited by Ulrich J. Blomann." Notes 74, 3 (Mar. 2018): 415-17 doi 10.1353/not.2018.0006 ©2018 Author(s)
Version
Final published version
Abstract
In March 2013, Ulrich Blomann invited a group of academics, musicians, and critics to Hambach Castle for two days of presentations and discussions on the influence of the Cold War on music and culture. This volume, consisting of an introduction by Blomann and fifteen essays, commemorates that event. Blomann’s opening address establishes the premise that German scholars and critics have been insufficiently sensitive to the ways in which the political realities of the Cold War shaped musical ideas and products after 1945. He characterizes this gap in scholarship as a consequence of the West’s “propagandistic” insistence on the link between autonomous art and political freedom and sees the failure to investigate connections between music and politics in this era as a dogmatic avoidance, even a blindness, born out of Germans’ unwillingness to confront the realities of denazification and reconstruction (13). The volume’s essays focus mainly on divided Germany, with brief forays into North and South Korea and the Soviet Union, and address Blomann’s call to arms through heterogeneous methodologies, with some authors giving specific historical case studies and others attempting a more theoretical or reflective project. [1st paragaph]
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Music and Theater Arts Section
Terms of Use
Article is made available in accordance with the publisher's policy and may be subject to US copyright law. Please refer to the publisher's site for terms of use.
Persistent DSpace Link
DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.1353/not.2018.0006
