New Perspectives on the 19th-Century Cello

This book offers a rich variety of approaches to the nineteenth-century cello and cellists. Its range of topic and methodology reflects the new phase in historical performance research. Research in instrumental treatises and accounts of musical performances is broadened by researchers and performers who explore different cultural perspectives on the cello. This book contains the first sustained studies of cello sonatas by Emilie Meyer, Leokadia Kashperova, Mel Bonis, and Henriette Bosmans, and of Joachim Raff’s concertos. Alfredo Piatti’s Bach performances are shown to have predated Casals birth by several decades. Old and new approaches to teaching and research are explored in a study of the chamber music in the Paris Conservatoire’s cello method, the proposal of an imaginative process of ‘holistic emulation’ that can enrich historical performance, and a study of Victor Herbert that explores analytical methods in performance research. Performance techniques are analysed in Duport’s influence on Beethoven, Popper’s use of portamento, and an innovative historical examination of what might constitute romantic cello sound. Piatti reappears as a virtuoso in Bergamo, along with one of the greatest nineteenth-century virtuosi, François Servais, the Šťastný brothers, and Casals. This book combines archival research, source studies, early recordings, and art history. The contributors are a diverse community of scholars of the first rank, with international reputations for research and performance.