Music
Besides having been an accomplished public intellectual, the Renaissance Man Edward Saïd was an accomplished pianist who also worked as the music critic for The Nation magazine; as such, he wrote three books about music: Musical Elaborations (1991); Parallels and Paradoxes: Explorations in Music and Society (2002), co-authored with Daniel Barenboim; and On Late Style: Music and Literature Against the Grain (2006). In Music at the Limits (2007), Saïd said that he found reflections of his ideas about literature and history in music, especially in bold compositions and strong performances. The composer Mohammed Fairouz said that he has been deeply influenced by the writings of Edward Saïd; compositionally, he produced the First Symphony, which alludes to the essay “Homage to a Belly-Dancer'”, about Tahia Carioca; and a piano sonata titled Reflections on Exile, which refers to the eponymous collection of essays.
In 1999, Saïd and Daniel Barenboim co-founded the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, which is composed of young Israeli, Palestinian, and Arab musicians. They also established The Barenboim–Said Foundation in Seville, for which a government-funded foundation was constituted, in 2004, to develop education-through-music projects. Besides managing the West–Eastern Divan Orchestra, the Barenboim–Said Foundation assists with the administration of the Academy of Orchestral Studies, the Musical Education in Palestine project, and the Early Childhood Musical Education Project, in Seville.
Read more about this topic: Edward Said
Famous quotes containing the word music:
“I defied the machinery to make me its slave. Its incessant discords could not drown the music of my thoughts if I would let them fly high enough.”
—Lucy Larcom (1824–1893)
“It is from the blues that all that may be called American music derives its most distinctive character.”
—James Weldon Johnson (1871–1938)
“During the cattle drives, Texas cowboy music came into national significance. Its practical purpose is well known—it was used primarily to keep the herds quiet at night, for often a ballad sung loudly and continuously enough might prevent a stampede. However, the cowboy also sang because he liked to sing.... In this music of the range and trail is “the grayness of the prairies, the mournful minor note of a Texas norther, and a rhythm that fits the gait of the cowboy’s pony.””
—Administration in the State of Texa, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)