RESEARCH VS. COMMUNICATION
But then so was everything in Janáček. His music, however novel its ways and means, always avidly sought popular appeal, and the composer measured his success in terms of his popularity. His role model, he was unabashed to admit, was Puccini. (Indeed, few commentators have failed to notice that the title character’s first entrance in act I of Kát’a Kabanová, not yet singing but accompanied by her soaring leitmotif, directly parallels the analogous moment in Madama Butterfly.) Despite Adorno’s wishful attempt at “co-opting” him, alienation simply was not this composer’s bag. He was as enthusiastic a communitarian as a modernist could be. As a result, his historical prestige has suffered. Many twentieth-century histories of twentieth-century music omit him altogether, or write him off in spite of everything as an insignificant regionalist. Janáček made his comeback into history during the 1950s, when he was rediscovered (first in England) not in the classroom but in the opera house, largely thanks to the efforts of Charles Mackerras (b. 1925), a conductor who had studied in Prague with Václav Talich (1883–1961), Czechoslovakia’s outstanding orchestra director.
- Citation (MLA):
- Richard Taruskin. "Chapter 7 Social Validation." The Oxford History of Western Music. Oxford University Press. New York, USA. n.d. Web. 12 Oct. 2024. <https://www.oxfordwesternmusic.com/view/Volume4/actrade-9780195384840-div1-007011.xml>.
- Citation (APA):
- Taruskin, R. (n.d.). Chapter 7 Social Validation. In Oxford University Press, Music in the Early Twentieth Century. New York, USA. Retrieved 12 Oct. 2024, from https://www.oxfordwesternmusic.com/view/Volume4/actrade-9780195384840-div1-007011.xml
- Citation (Chicago):
- Richard Taruskin. "Chapter 7 Social Validation." In Music in the Early Twentieth Century, Oxford University Press. (New York, USA, n.d.). Retrieved 12 Oct. 2024, from https://www.oxfordwesternmusic.com/view/Volume4/actrade-9780195384840-div1-007011.xml
