Cultural Narratives of Old Age in the Lives, Work, and Reception of Old Musicians

Synopsis

Operating largely within the world of European-American classical music, this book discusses the creative work of old musicians—composers, performers, listeners, and scholars—and how those forms of music- making are received and understood. Like everything else about old age, music-making is usually understood as a decline from a former height, a deficiency with respect to a youthful standard. Against this ageist mythology, this book argues that composing oldly, performing oldly, and listening oldly are distinctive and valuable ways of making music—a difference, not a deficit; to be celebrated, not ignored or condemned.Instead of the usual biomedical or gerontological understanding of old age, with its focus on bodily, cognitive, and sensory decline, this book follows Age Studies in seeing old age through a cultural lens, as something created and understood in culture. This book seeks to identify the ways that old musicians (composers, performers, listeners, and scholars) accept, resist, adapt, and transform the cultural scripts for the performance of old age. Musicking oldly (making music in old age) often represents an attempt to rewrite ageist cultural scripts and to find ways of flourishing musically in a largely hostile landscape.

Copyright:

2025

Book Details

Book Quality:

Publisher Quality

ISBN-13:

9781040114575

Related ISBNs:

9781040114544, 9781003489399, 9781032788142

Publisher:

Taylor & Francis

Date of Addition:

08/23/24

Copyrighted By:

Joseph Straus

Adult content:

No

Language:

English

Has Image Descriptions:

No

Categories:

Nonfiction, Disability-Related, Social Studies, Music, Philosophy

Submitted By:

Bookshare Staff

Usage Restrictions:

This is a copyrighted book.