Orchestrating the Nation

The Nineteenth-Century American Symphonic Enterprise

Douglas Shadle

First history of a major American repertory
Provides a new explanation of orchestral music canon formation in the U.S.A.
Examines the history of the symphony from a transatlantic perspective
Includes over 100 music examples, mostly from unpublished manuscripts, supported by a companion website that features over 50 recordings

Orchestrating the Nation

The Nineteenth-Century American Symphonic Enterprise

Douglas Shadle

Description

During the nineteenth century, nearly one hundred symphonies were written by over fifty composers living in the United States. With few exceptions, this repertoire is virtually forgotten today. In Orchestrating the Nation: The Nineteenth-Century American Symphonic Enterprise, author Douglas W. Shadle explores the stunning stylistic diversity of this substantial repertoire and uncovers why it failed to enter the musical mainstream.

Throughout the century, Americans longed for a distinct national musical identity. As the most prestigious of all instrumental genres, the symphony proved to be a potent vehicle in this project as composers found inspiration for their works in a dazzling array of subjects, including Niagara Falls, Hiawatha, and Western pioneers. With a wealth of musical sources at his disposal, including never-before-examined manuscripts, Shadle reveals how each component of the symphonic enterprise-from its composition, to its performance, to its immediate and continued reception by listeners and critics-contributed to competing visions of American identity.

Employing an innovative transnational historical framework, Shadle's narrative covers three continents and shows how the music of major European figures such as Beethoven, Schumann, Wagner, Liszt, Brahms, and Dvorák exerted significant influence over dialogues about the future of American musical culture. Shadle demonstrates that the perceived authority of these figures allowed snobby conductors, capricious critics, and even orchestral musicians themselves to thwart the efforts of American symphonists despite widespread public support of their music. Consequently, these works never entered the performing canons of American orchestras.

An engagingly written account of a largely unknown repertoire, Orchestrating the Nation shows how artistic and ideological debates from the nineteenth century continue to shape the culture of American orchestral music today.

Orchestrating the Nation

The Nineteenth-Century American Symphonic Enterprise

Douglas Shadle

Acknowledgments
About the Companion Website
Introduction
1: The Launch of the Enterprise
2: Anthony Philip Heinrich, Hapless Wanderer
3: William Henry Fry, Operatic Translator
4: George Frederick Bristow, American Stalwart
5: The Rivalry of Nations
6: The End of an Era
Interlude: The Country Divided
7: Louis Moreau Gottschalk, Pan-American Republican
8: John Knowles Paine, Universal Classicist
9: The Rivalry of Generations
10: Ellsworth Phelps, Brooklyn Patriot
11: The Winds of Change
12: Antonín Dvorák, Bohemian Prophet
Epilogue
Works Cited

Orchestrating the Nation

The Nineteenth-Century American Symphonic Enterprise

Douglas Shadle

Author Information

Douglas Shadle, Assistant Professor of Musicology, Vanderbilt University

Douglas W. Shadle is an expert on the culture of classical music in the United States. He holds a Ph.D. in musicology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and is currently Assistant Professor of Musicology at Vanderbilt University's Blair School of Music.

Orchestrating the Nation

The Nineteenth-Century American Symphonic Enterprise

Douglas Shadle

Reviews and Awards

"Orchestrating the Nation is exhaustively researched and deftly incorporates quotations from a staggering array of critical sources. The interleaving of a critical and thoughtful review of secondary literature with these rare and important primary sources consulted in an array of American archives gives the study an extraordinary breadth. The task Shadle set for himself was a complex one, requiring a careful and deliberate manner. His success in the completion of this tome is unequivocal." - Laura Moore Pruett, Journal of American History

"Shadle provides readers with an engaging introduction to a vast repertoire that is glossed over in music history texts, if mentioned at all, and entices the reader to enter into an aural representation of a developing national identity." - Reeves Shulstad, Notes

"a major contribution to the scholarship of this time period ... Well written with a dry wit that enlivens the prose, Orchestrating the Nation is an important contribution to the study of the symphony in the nineteenth century." - Kristen M. Turner, Transposition. Musique et sciences sociales

"Douglas Shadles roster of forgotten nineteenth-century American symphonists is proof that the United States had no shortage of composers." - Allen C. Guelzo, First Things

"Douglas W Shadle's pioneering Orchestrating the Nation charts the turbulent course of 'The Nineteenth-Century American Symphonic Enterprise' (as its subtitle has it) with scholarly detail and illuminating commentary ... With a companion website offering musical excerpts of works discussed, this is an invaluable introduction to a woefully neglected aspect of American music making." - Michael Quinn, Classical Music

"Orchestrating the Nation contains much valuable new research. A broad spectrum of critical commentary, well beyond the reactionary Dwight, is presented, bringing into focus the competing agendas that emerged in the search for a national voice in music." - Gramophone

Orchestrating the Nation

The Nineteenth-Century American Symphonic Enterprise

Douglas Shadle

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