Overview

Scholarly writing on the music of Arvo Part is situated primarily in the fields of musicology, cultural and media studies, and, more recently, in terms of theology/spirituality. Arvo Part: Sounding the Sacred focuses on the representational dimensions of Part's music (including the trope of silence), writing and listening past the fact that its storied effects and affects are carried first and foremost as vibrations through air, impressing themselves on the human body. In response, this ambitiously interdisciplinary volume asks: What of sound and materiality as embodiments of the sacred, as historically specific artifacts, and as elements of creation deeply linked to the human sensorium in Part studies? In taking up these questions, the book ""de-Platonizes"" Part studies by demystifying the notion of a single ""Part sound."" It offers innovative, critical analyses of the historical contexts of Part's experimentation, medievalism, and diverse creative work; it re-sounds the acoustic, theological, and representational grounds of silence in Part's music; it listens with critical openness to the intersections of theology, sacred texts, and spirituality in Part's music; and it positions sensing, performing bodies at the center of musical experience. Building on the conventional score-, biography-, and media-based approaches, this volume reframes Part studies around the materiality of sound, its sacredness, and its embodied resonances within secular spaces.

Full Product Details

Author:   Peter C. Bouteneff ,  Jeffers Engelhardt ,  Robert Saler ,  Andrew Albin
Publisher:   Fordham University Press
Imprint:   Fordham University Press
ISBN:  

9780823289752

ISBN 10:   0823289753
Pages:   256
Publication Date:   01 December 2020
Audience:   Professional and scholarly ,  Professional & Vocational
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   In Print  
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Table of Contents

I. Introduction 1. Arvo Pärt and the Art of Embodiment | 3 Peter C. Bouteneff, Jeffers Engelhardt, and Robert Saler 2. The Sound—and Hearing—of Arvo Pärt | 8 Peter C. Bouteneff II. History and Context 3. Sounding Structure, Structured Sound | 25 Toomas Siitan 4. Colorful Dreams: Exploring Pärt’s Soviet Film Music | 36 Christopher J. May 5. Arvo Pärt’s Tintinnabuli and the 1970s Soviet Underground | 68 Kevin C. Karnes III. Performance 6. The Pärt Sound | 89 Paul Hillier, in conversation with Peter Bouteneff 7. The Rest Is Silence | 107 Andrew Shenton IV. Materiality and Phenomenology 8. Vibrating, and Silent: Listening to the Material Acoustics of Tintinnabulation | 129 Jeffers Engelhardt 9. Medieval Pärt | 154 Andrew Albin 10. The Piano and the Performing Body in the Music of Arvo Pärt: Phenomenological Perspectives | 177 Maria Cizmic and Adriana Helbig V. Theology 11. Presence, Absence, and the Ambiguities of Ambiance: Theological Discourse and the Move to Sound in Pärt Studies | 197 Robert Saler 12. The Materiality of Sound and the Theology of the Incarnation in the Music of Arvo Pärt | 208 Ivan Moody 13. Christian Liturgical Chant and the Musical Reorientation of Arvo Pärt | 220 Alexander Lingas 14. In the Beginning There Was Sound: Hearing, Tintinnabuli, and Musical Meaning in Sufism | 232 Sevin Huriye Yaraman List of Contributors | 243 Index of Terms | 247 Index of Persons | 252 Works by Other Composers | 256 Works by Arvo Pärt | 257

Reviews

This is a thorough and impressive attempt to challenge de-materialised readings of Part's music, concentrating especially on the sheer physicality of sound and hearing. It is likely to set new directions in studies of this beguiling composer, and open up fresh avenues in the wider field of music and theology. -- Jeremy Begbie, Duke University

This is a thorough and impressive attempt to challenge de-materialised readings of Part's music, concentrating especially on the sheer physicality of sound and hearing. It is likely to set new directions in studies of this beguiling composer, and open up fresh avenues in the wider field of music and theology.---Jeremy Begbie, Duke University,

". . .[T]his is a rich collection of studies expanding our understanding of P�rt's music and the late Soviet conditions in which it arose.-- ""Journal of Orthodox Christian Studies"" That P�rt's music appears to have an aspect that transcends description seems self-evident to many listeners. But the question of how--or if--music can embody or represent the spiritual has always been fraught with difficulty. This collection of interdisciplinary essays makes bold strides toward a further understanding of how P�rt might sculpt sound into such ethereal experience.-- ""Choice"" This is a thorough and impressive attempt to challenge de-materialised readings of P�rt's music, concentrating especially on the sheer physicality of sound and hearing. It is likely to set new directions in studies of this beguiling composer, and open up fresh avenues in the wider field of music and theology.---Jeremy Begbie, Duke University"

Author Information

Peter C. Bouteneff (Edited By) Peter C. Bouteneff is Professor of Systematic Theology at St. Vladimir’s Orthodox Theological Seminary, where he also directs the Institute of Sacred Arts and the Arvo Pärt Project. He is the author of Arvo Pärt: Out of Silence (SVS Press, 2015). Jeffers Engelhardt (Edited By) Jeffers Engelhardt is Associate Professor of Music at Amherst College. His research deals broadly with music, religion, European identity, and media. His books include Singing the Right Way: Orthodox Christians and Secular Enchantment in Estonia (Oxford, 2015) and the co-edited volume Resounding Transcendence: Transitions in Music, Religion, and Ritual (Oxford, 2016). Robert Saler (Edited By) Robert Saler is Research Professor of Religion and Culture and Associate Dean at Christian Theological Seminary in Indianapolis, where he also serves as Executive Director of the Center for Pastoral Excellence. He is the author of Between Magisterium and Marketplace (Fortress, 2014), Theologia Crucis (Cascade, 2016), and All These Things into Position: What Theology Can Learn from Radiohead (Cascade, 2019).

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