Representing Russia's orient [electronic resource] : from ethnography to art song / by Adalyat Issiyeva

Author: Issiyeva, Adalyat
Published: New York : Oxford University Press, 2020.
Physical Description: xxi, 406 pages : illustrations, maps ; 25 cm.

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AMS studies in music series

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Contents

Unveiling tradition : Oriental "Others" in Nineteenth-Century Russian (Folk)Song Collections -- Building Images of the "Other:" Russian Musical Ethnographies on Inorodtsy -- Aryanism and Asianism in the Quest for the Russian Identity -- Alexander Aliab'ev, Decembrism, and Russian Orient -- Balakirev, his Orient, and the Five -- Ethnographic Concerts at the Service of Empire.

Summary

"This book examines the musical ramifications of Russian nineteenth-century expansion to the east and south and explores the formation and development of Russian musical discourse on Russia's own Orient. It traces the transition from music ethnography to art songs and discusses how various aspects of (music) ethnographies, folksong collections, music theories, and visual representations of Russia's ethnic minorities, or inorodtsy, shaped Russian composers' perception and musical representation of Russia's oriental "others." Situated on the periphery, minority peoples not only defined the geographical boundaries of the empire, its culture, and its music, but also defined the boundaries of Russianness itself. Extensively illustrated with music examples, archival material, and images from long-forgotten Russian sources, this book investigates historical, cultural, and musical elements which contributed to the formation and creation of Russia's imperial identity. It delineates musical elements that have been adopted to characterize Russians' own national hybridity. Three case studies-well-known leader of the Mighty Five Milii Balakirev, lesser known Alexander Aliab'ev, and the late-nineteenth-century composers affiliated with the Music-Ethnography Committee-demonstrate how and why, despite the overwhelming number of pejorative images and descriptions of inorodtsy, these composers decided to "forget" their social and political differences and sometimes "confused" and combined diverse minorities' identities with that of the "self." The analysis of the arrangements of folksongs of Russia's eastern and southern minorities reveals the trajectory of musical treatment from denigration and "othering" to embracing peoples from all provinces of the empire"--

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