株式会社極東書店トップ ＞ 商品一覧 ＞ From Biblical Book to Musical Megahit: William B. Bradbury's Esther, the Beautiful Queen.
商品詳細
From Biblical Book to Musical Megahit: William B. Bradbury's Esther, the Beautiful Queen.
・ISBN 978-1-4968-4574-0 hard US$ 110.00
￥25,773.- (税込) ※（※）価格はご注文時の参考価格となります。
納品価格につきましては書籍の入荷時点で確定となります。
版元の原価改定、外国為替の変動等により異なる場合がございますので、予めご了承下さい。
お気に入り
★★★
| 著者・編者 | Karpf, Juanita, |
|---|---|
| 出版社 | (University Press of Mississippi, US) |
| 出版年月 | 2023 |
| ページ数 | 277 pp. |
| 言語 | ENG |
| ニュース番号 | ＜A01-52494＞ |
解説
Many church-goers will recognize the name William Bradbury, a nineteenth-century American composer of popular hymns still sung at Sunday services. Bradbury's name may also bring to mind Esther, the Beautiful Queen, his choral setting of a text based on the biblical Book of Esther. Written for amateur singers, the uncomplicated score became enormously popular almost immediately after its initial publication in 1856. In From Biblical Book to Musical Megahit: William B. Bradbury's "Esther, the Beautiful Queen," Juanita Karpf traces the work's rich performance and reception history.
Bradbury emphatically stated that he intended Esther to be sung as an unadorned religious and educational piece. Yet many music directors exploited the potential for his score, producing elaborately staged events with costumes, scenery, and acting. Although directors retained Bradbury's original music, they nonetheless facilitated Esther's rapid entree into the realm of music theater. This stylistic transformation ignited a firestorm of controversy. Some clergy and religiously pious citizens condemned theatrical representations of biblical texts as the epitome of debauchery, sacrilege, and sin. In contrast, more tolerant and open-minded theater enthusiasts welcomed the dramatic staging of Esther as wholesome entertainment and as evidence of a refreshingly enlightened approach to biblical interpretation.
However heated this debate seemed at times, it did little to quell the continued rise in popularity of Esther. In fact, by the late 1860s, Bradbury's score had worked its way across the continent, north to Canada and, eventually, to Great Britain, Australia, Asia, and Africa. With performances recorded over a century after Bradbury published his score, Esther became, by any measure, an international megahit.
Bradbury emphatically stated that he intended Esther to be sung as an unadorned religious and educational piece. Yet many music directors exploited the potential for his score, producing elaborately staged events with costumes, scenery, and acting. Although directors retained Bradbury's original music, they nonetheless facilitated Esther's rapid entree into the realm of music theater. This stylistic transformation ignited a firestorm of controversy. Some clergy and religiously pious citizens condemned theatrical representations of biblical texts as the epitome of debauchery, sacrilege, and sin. In contrast, more tolerant and open-minded theater enthusiasts welcomed the dramatic staging of Esther as wholesome entertainment and as evidence of a refreshingly enlightened approach to biblical interpretation.
However heated this debate seemed at times, it did little to quell the continued rise in popularity of Esther. In fact, by the late 1860s, Bradbury's score had worked its way across the continent, north to Canada and, eventually, to Great Britain, Australia, Asia, and Africa. With performances recorded over a century after Bradbury published his score, Esther became, by any measure, an international megahit.