Nationalism, imperialism and cosmopolitanism in Russian nineteenth-century provincial amateur music-making

Journal article

This article analyses domestic amateur music-making in nineteenth-century Russian provincial towns. By moving away from the artistic centre — geographically, in relation to the repertoire and in terms of musicianship — it shifts attention from intellectual debate about the nature of Russian nineteenth-century music, to the more complex realm of musical practice. Instead of describing a musical culture that revolved around the oppositions of Western versus Russian musical expression, the sounds of the domestic space analysed here show how contemporaries reconciled international dances and operatic arias with Russian, Ukrainian and Gypsy folksong. Their musical practices thus gave rise to a soundscape that was at once international, imperial, national and local, and which focused on sentimentality and domesticity.

Authors: Mannherz, J

• Publication status: Published
• Peer review status: Peer reviewed
• Publisher: Modern Humanities Research Association
• Journal: Slavonic and East European Review
• Volume: 95
• Issue: 2
• Pages: 271-297
• Publication date: 2017-04-01
• DOI: 10.5699/slaveasteurorev2.95.2.0293
• EISSN: 2222-4327
• ISSN: 0037-6795
• ISBN: 9781781882979