Our critics cast their eyes over this month’s selection of books on classical music
Bizet’s Carmen Uncovered Richard Langham Smith
Boydell 340pp (hb) £39.95
This is a deeply researched, illuminating volume that no Carmenophile or budding producer can be without. Sadly, it is marred by careless copy editing and an inadequate index: for instance, the Carlist Wars are mentioned, but with no explanation of who the militant forces were or why, and the wars don’t appear in the index. Also, unpaged references to distant plate numbers take time to find.
The book inevitably starts slowly since the scene has to be set and, for those of us not well up with early 19th-century Spain and its music and musicians it’s quite a steep learning curve. But with the opera itself featuring ever more largely, the interest quickens through a wealth of fascinating surprises. So you thought the flower Carmen throws to Don José was simply a love token? Nope.
The final pages explain the vital importance of the staging instructions. The opera usually ends with toreador Escamillo triumphant, having killed the bull. The directions tell us he sees Carmen’s body and rushes to kneel with Don José beside it; her two lovers united in grief. Roger Nichols ★★★★
Finding the Raga – An Improvisation on Indian Music Amit Chaudhuri
Faber & Faber 272pp (pb) £12.99
The subtitle, ‘An improvisation on Indian music’, is exact. The book has the feel of a raga, with its delicate calibration of pace and structure and its extraordinary climax towards the end: 14 pages left blank apart from little scatters of digits indicating what readers should hear in their heads.
A novelist and professor of creative writing, Chaudhuri’s bicultural background means he is equally at home in Mumbai and London, and his slow-burning passion for Indian classical music was complemented by his initial ambition to be a rock singer. He draws parallels between raga and European classical music, and brings in cinema, abstract painting, English poetry and Western pop; he offers at once a personal memoir and a brilliantly illuminating crosscultural commentary.
And he penetrates the mysteries of raga, including its history and development. In a book studded with apercus, let one stand for many: Indian classical music’s revolutionary engagement with antiquity may be why Western classical music never achieved centrality in India. Michael Church ★★★★★
Prima Donna – The Psychology of Maria Callas Paul Wink
Oxford University Press
304pp (hb) £22.99
How well can one ever hope to know a famous person? Intimately, suggests Paul Wink, psychology professor, opera fan and author of this ‘psychobiography’ of Maria Callas. Wink’s business is life rather than art, and the musically informed reader will wince at a smattering of misspelled singer names and opera titles. But the observations about how people tick are fascinating indeed. Wink uses narcissism as a framework through which to understand his patient’s at times demanding behaviour, difficult relationships with family members, highly dependent love affairs, perennial quest for security and even her eating and spending habits.
One might be a little sceptical about the extent to which one can psychoanalyse a person from beyond the grave
– let alone one so skilled in the art of performance. Speculative at times? Perhaps. But Wink’s reading is broadly sympathetic and provides a compelling explanation for the paradoxical mixture of confidence and insecurity that was such a puzzling feature of Callas’s personality. This is a gripping read – an engagingly written and very human story to be wolfed down in a couple of sittings. Alexandra Wilson ★★★★
Sailor Song – The Shanties and Ballads of the High Seas
Gerry Smyth
British Library 160pp (hb) £14.99
After the viral success of sea shanties on the video-sharing app Tiktok earlier this year, the release of this anthology was brought forward – a savvy business decision and a stroke of luck for any budding shanty singers, as this is a well-researched and thoroughly entertaining resource. Smyth pairs transcriptions of 40 shanties and ten forebitters (off-duty work songs or ballads) with bespoke illustrations and historical artworks.
Despite the aesthetic appeal of Sailor Song, it doesn’t shy away from a critical analysis of the thornier issues surrounding the transatlantic shipping trade and the bawdy lyrics of shanties, as well as the problematic nature of their more politically sensitive ‘reconstructions’. Smyth also accepts the shortcomings of folksong transcriptions: ‘the shanty was the product of a residually oral culture, rendering it highly resistant to a literate critical discourse (such as the one deployed here).’ He leaves questions for future researchers to explore further, while also appealing to the layman.
This all makes for a nuanced and in-depth analysis of the songs themselves, with insights you’d expect to glean from a dense academic tome – but here they’re wrapped up in a colourful and playful anthology. Freya Parr ★★★★