Puccini: A Biography: Amazon.de: Mary Jane Phillips-Matz, William Weaver: Englische Bücher

From Booklist

Giacomo Puccini (1858-1924) stood at the end of fivegenerations of composers. A generous man who helped others when theyneeded a boost, he loved motorcars and boats for excitement butretreated to his beloved Tuscany's lakes to escape urban hubbub. Muchto his jealous wife Elvira's distress, he had many paramours andconfidantes. His sense of drama drove him to demand perfection fromhis librettists. With his third opera, Manon Lescaut, heestablished himself as a leading composer for the stage. GiulioRicordi, scion of the music-publishing house, was impresario forproductions of his operas, and Toscanini conducted most of theirpremiers. Phillips-Matz, a prolific contributor to Opera News,interviewed Puccini's family members and close friends over the courseof 45 years, and she uses his letters as a primary resource for aneminently readable biography that emphasizes the genesis of his operasand his loving dedication to their composition andproduction. Alan Hirsch
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

From Library Journal

The literature on Puccini continues to grow with these two books. Italian-born Budden (The Operas of Verdi) here synthesizes Puccini's musical endeavors with his life. Using a straightforward, chronological approach, giving exact dates when possible, he treats each opera in a separate chapter, devoting much space to character and plot and citing contemporary reviews and subsequent reception. He also mentions Puccini's other instrumental and vocal compositions. Informed lay readers will gain insight while theoreticians will appreciate Budden's deeper musical analysis. His elegant turns of phrase ("rhythmic scaffolding") and obvious expertise combine in an exceptional whole, though a few Britishisms may confuse American readers. A list of works, useful biographical information on personalities mentioned in the text, and a strong bibliography round out the volume. Michele Girardi's recently translated Puccini: His International Art is similar, with even more specific treatment of musical passages. Highly recommended for academic and music collections, as well as sophisticated clients at public libraries. Phillips-Matz (Verdi: A Biography) discusses Puccini as if she were telling the life story of a valued friend. She remarks on premieres, casts, and critical reception of the works but says little about the music itself. However, she does expand upon the personal issues touched on by Budden (e.g., the Doria Manfredi incident). She also sets a cultural context with historical descriptions of the Tuscan region and extensive information on Puccini's forebears. Her style is stimulating and, for the most part, more entertaining than merely informative. In a rather old-fashioned way, she talks about her own meetings with characters like Puccini's granddaughter, Biki, and singer Gilda Dalla Rizza. Her method of including "footnotes" within the text and abbreviations is helpful; however, one wishes that she had indicated in the introduction the groupings of relevant materials rather than repeating them each time they occurred. She also includes a works list, six major contemporary opera composers and their works, and an up-to-date bibliography. Conrad Wilson's Giacomo Puccini in Phaidon Press's "20th-Century Composers" series makes a good complement, although Phillips-Matz's approach is more genteel and positive. Recommended for all collections. (Indexes and illustrations not seen in either.) Barry Zaslow, Miami Univ. Libs., Oxford, OH
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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nonsense 12. April 2011

Von autor

Format:Gebundene Ausgabe

This book contains so much embarrassing nonsense and yesterdays' knowledge, that it should be immedeately thrown off the market. Modern Puccini-Research is done by Julian Budden and the both outstanding Germans Schickling and Krausser. What Phillips-Matz has to say is often rumour, anecdotes and legend, far away from truth. Sorry.

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Puccini: a restless visionist and revisionist 11. Februar 2003

Von Jon Hunt - Ver�ffentlicht auf Amazon.com

Format:Gebundene Ausgabe|Von Amazon best�tigter Kauf

Having sung in "Tosca" and "Madama Butterfly", my interest was piqued when I first heard about Mary Jane Phillips-Matz's wonderful new biography about Giacomo Puccini. Using his operas as chapter divisions, the author gives a firm basis on which to look at Puccini's life as he struggled with his music, his collaborators, his family, his publisher, his singers, Arturo Toscanini and himself.

Restless and constantly on the move was Italy's greatest twentieth-century composer. The composer was not content to stay long in one place, she tells us. He had a house here, a house there; he didn't like this one, he longed to be at yet another one....this was no laboratory musician! Through the sharing of Puccini's letters (and he wrote unceasingly, it seems), Phillips-Matz offers us glimpses into the continual torment the composer faced, either from his own high standards and inabilities to finish projects to the endless revisions of present and past operas on which he was working. Puccini seemed to be under perpetual pressure. The author is careful not to be judgmental about her subect; in fact she includes a surprising number of revealing interviews that she, herself, conducted with singers who had performed Puccini operas and had worked with him in his later life.

Phillips-Matz's book is not so much a book about Puccini's music as it is about process. How did the composer go about choosing texts? What was he feeling when he composed? How did he envision the final outcomes of his operas? The relationships with those who were closest to him are perhaps the best aspects of this book, especially those with his wife and Toscanini. The author almost seems to be encouraging the reader by saying this: "here is what Puccini was like; now go hear his music and see what connections you can make."

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Disappointing as a Biography 19. Oktober 2003

Von glorybe - Ver�ffentlicht auf Amazon.com

Puccini was reviewed as a wonderful account of Puccini's life and, while the author does tell us the events of his life, this account is less readable than most biographies I've read. She covers the facts of his life in a disjointed fashion. She will bring up a point and then say she will cover it in a later chapter, or she will say she covered it earlier. She arranges the chapters according to the operas he wrote, which is chronological, but the information she writes jumps around so much that it's distracting. The best biographies read as interestingly as the best fiction, and unfortunately this did not measure up. Puccini's life was certainly very interesting and this could have been a great book. Perhaps her editor should have done a better job.

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Solid biography 16. Dezember 2002

Von Stanley Hauer - Ver�ffentlicht auf Amazon.com

Not as good--or as long--as her Verdi, Phillips-Matz's new bio of Puccini is solid and competent. She is at her best with scenery, at her weakest with the music. Though this biography will not soon replace Mosco Carner, it's worth the purchase price and the reader's time.

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Puccini: A Biography [Englisch] [Gebundene Ausgabe]

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