LECTURES

Musicology Department and Stearns Lecture Series

Musicology Distinguished Lecture

"From the Voice of the Maréchal to Musique Concrète: Pierre Schaeffer and the Case for Cultural History"

Dr. Jane Fulcher (Professor, Musicology, University of Michigan)

Friday September 25, 2009
5:00 p.m.
Burton Memorial Tower 506

Historians know Pierre Schaeffer as the engineer in Vichy radio who founded a conservative cultural venture called "Jeune France," the innovations and artistic quality of which were slight, after which he was embraced by French technocratic postwar culture. Musicologists know a different Schaeffer--the pioneer in electro-acoustic music, the inventor and theorist of musique concrète, whose background in the Vichy period was insignificant and whose innovations lie within the context of the postwar European musical avant-garde. Both narratives, this paper argues, occlude perception of Schaeffer's growth, not only subjective but artistic, thus veiling important insights into the new French culture planted during Vichy and into the conceptual and aesthetic seeds of musique concrète.

Ethel V. Curry Distinguished Lecture in Musicology

In addition to lectures offered by visiting scholars, the Musicology Department boasts an endowed lecture series, created by H. Robert Reynolds in honor of his mother, Ethel V. Curry.

Past Lectures