Music, Professional Identity, and Border Crossing in Eastern Europe during the Early Twentieth Century

Session Submission Type: Panel

Brief Description

For musicians in twentieth century Europe, movement across borders was an inescapable reality—whether through tours and tourism, emigration, or forced migration. In keeping with this year’s theme “Memory,” this panel explores how movement to or from Eastern Europe shaped the legacies of three composers in both the scholarly and popular imaginations. Our three case studies consider the claims to musical and political identity made by and about these individuals as they moved about Europe, as well as how these claims could circumscribe career horizons in often unexpected ways. Mariia Romanets examines how the ideological aims of the Ukrainian displaced community in post-War Germany dictated the professional identity of composer Andriy Olkhovsky and, in the process, shaped how and for what he is remembered today. Ana Diaconu analyzes the case of Stan Golestan, a Romanian composer whose movement along the well-traveled Bucharest-Paris axis brought both his music and legacy into a force field of nationalist and exoticist critical discourse. Finally, Kevin Bartig examines the interwar Soviet tours of Italian modernist composer Alfredo Casella, whose foreignness in the USSR made him an exceptionally malleable symbol in debates around Soviet culture. Together, these papers provide a nuanced picture of how differing types of cross-border movement were intimately tied to chosen or imposed identities and the conflicts between such identities and lived reality.

Sub Unit

• Arts II: Music, Theater, Performance Studies

Chair

• Valentina Sandu-Dediu, National U of Music Bucharest (Romania)

Papers

• The Challenges of Russianism in Ukrainian Historiography: The Case of Andriy Olkhovsky - Mariia Romanets, U of Bristol (UK)

• Mirrored Images: Stan Golestan as a ‘Propaganda’ Tool in Franco-Romanian Musical Relations - Ana Diaconu, National U of Music Bucharest (Romania)

• Modernism, Soviet Musical Criticism, and the Interwar Soviet Tours of Alfredo Casella - Kevin Bartig, Michigan State U

Discussant

• Valentina Sandu-Dediu, National U of Music Bucharest (Romania)