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‘Phrasing – the Very Life of Music’: Performing the Music and Nineteenth-Century Performance Theory

The journal in which this essay appears was a special issue also edited by the author.

The origins of this special issue go back to a conference organised with Bennett Zon, the General Editor of Nineteenth-Century Music Review and director of the Centre for Nineteenth-Century Music at the University of Durham.

The conference was called Performing Romantic Music: Theory and Practice.

Given that the large majority of the existing literature on nineteenth-century performance deals with practical issues, I saw the need for a special journal issue devoted specifically to theoretical and critical contexts surrounding nineteenth-century performance practices.

As guest Editor for this special issue, I particularly enjoyed working with authors who are also performers. While the concerns surrounding the integration of the performer’s voice and discourse into the discipline of musicology continues to present a major challenge, the contributions in this special issue highlight the importance of personal insights derived from practical experience in illuminating theoretical, critical and philosophical issues surrounding music performance.