Dialogues with Boulez

"In these fascinating dialogues, Pierre Boulez speaks a lot about developments and trajectories, and what he says helps us understand the course his creative life has taken.. " This series of conversations between Rocco Di Pietro, who in the preface describes himself as a "failed composer," and Boulez himself, the mature composer and renowned conductor, presents the reader with challenging questions about composition and imagination, classical and modernist traditions, and how the arts communicate with the individual. Boulez describes the dichotomy in himself between the composer and the performer - as a composer he is adventurous, always seeking new discoveries and finding the right trajectory for his art. As a performer he maintains a distance from the piece, even when it is his own, preferring to view objectively all the elements of the performance. From Bach and Mahler to Schoenberg and Maderna, Boulez relates the form and content of music to the world of poetry, art, and philosophy. Readers will find themselves drawn into these dialogues, fascinated as much by Boulez's organic concept of the creative world as by his outspoken opinions of its other denizens.