Music Makes the Nation: Nationalist Composers and Nation Building in Nineteenth-Century Europe

This book is an intellectual and cultural history about one of the most striking phenomena in all of nineteenth-century culture: namely, the interaction of nationalism and music. Nearly all the nation-building movements that swept across Europe in that century found some of their most influential and lasting expressions through the art of nationalist composers who took an active part in those movements. The political, intellectual, and artistic story behind some of the greatest musical works of the time and the artists who created them is the book's focus. Beginning with a theoretical explanation of the relationship between nationalism and music, three composers then come forward to stand at the center of the analysis: Richard Wagner in Gemany, Bedrich Smetana in the Czech lands, and Edvard Grieg in Norway. The rest of the book deals with their political and artistic projects to create a national music for their countries, as well as the essential role that folk music played in nationalism, the conflicts within nationalist movements over foreign artistic influence on the national culture, and the international dimensions of nationalist music.