David Joseph Buch (born 1950) is an American
musicologist
Musicology (from Greek μουσική ''mousikē'' 'music' and -λογια ''-logia'', 'domain of study') is the scholarly analysis and research-based study of music. Musicology departments traditionally belong to the humanities, although some m ...
.
Life and career
Buch was born in
Detroit
Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at t ...
and studied at the
School of the Art Institute of Chicago
The School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC) is a private art school associated with the Art Institute of Chicago (AIC) in Chicago, Illinois. Tracing its history to an art students' cooperative founded in 1866, which grew into the museum and ...
and the
Accademia Musicale Chigiana
The Accademia Musicale Chigiana (''English'': Chigiana Musical Academy) is a music institute in Siena, Italy. It was founded by Count Guido Chigi-Saracini in 1932 as an international centre for advanced musical studies. It organises Master Class ...
in
Siena
Siena ( , ; lat, Sena Iulia) is a city in Tuscany, Italy. It is the capital of the province of Siena.
The city is historically linked to commercial and banking activities, having been a major banking center until the 13th and 14th centur ...
, Italy. He received his PhD in
Music History
Music history, sometimes called historical musicology, is a highly diverse subfield of the broader discipline of musicology that studies music from a historical point of view.
In theory, "music history" could refer to the study of the history o ...
from
Northwestern University
Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston, Illinois. Founded in 1851, Northwestern is the oldest chartered university in Illinois and is ranked among the most prestigious academic institutions in the world.
Charte ...
.
He had been Professor of Music at
Wayne State University
Wayne State University (WSU) is a public research university in Detroit, Michigan. It is Michigan's third-largest university. Founded in 1868, Wayne State consists of 13 schools and colleges offering approximately 350 programs to nearly 25,000 ...
and Professor of Music History at the
University of Northern Iowa
The University of Northern Iowa (UNI) is a public university in Cedar Falls, Iowa. UNI offers more than 90 majors across the colleges of Business Administration, Education, Humanities, Arts, and Sciences, Social and Behavioral Sciences and gr ...
(UNI), where he is Professor Emeritus. Buch was a visiting professor at the
University of Chicago
The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, U of C, or UChi) is a private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois. Its main campus is located in Chicago's Hyde Park, Chicago, Hyde Park neighborhood. The University of Chic ...
from 2008 until 2011. He has published numerous scholarly studies on a range of topics in music, having explored archives and libraries in many European cities.
His research has received international attention owing to the discovery of new attributions to
Mozart in
Emanuel Schikaneder's collaborative opera ''
Der Stein der Weisen oder Die Zauberinsel'' (Vienna, 1790). His study of the theatrical tradition in which Mozart's ''
The Magic Flute
''The Magic Flute'' (German: , ), K. 620, is an opera in two acts by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to a German libretto by Emanuel Schikaneder. The work is in the form of a '' Singspiel'', a popular form during the time it was written that in ...
'' originated has led him to new interpretations of the
libretto, notably skepticism to the widely held view that ''The Magic Flute'' is specifically a
Masonic
Freemasonry or Masonry refers to fraternal organisations that trace their origins to the local guilds of stonemasons that, from the end of the 13th century, regulated the qualifications of stonemasons and their interaction with authorities ...
opera (see
Libretto of The Magic Flute
''The Magic Flute'' is a celebrated opera composed in 1791 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Mozart employed a libretto written by his close colleague Emanuel Schikaneder, the director of the Theater auf der Wieden at which the opera premiered in th ...
).
In 1998 he was named UNI Distinguished Scholar and received the Donald N. McKay Research Award.
Buch plays the
lute,
viola da gamba
The viol (), viola da gamba (), or informally gamba, is any one of a family of bowed, fretted, and stringed instruments with hollow wooden bodies and pegboxes where the tension on the strings can be increased or decreased to adjust the pitch ...
and guitar. He has performed with the
Chicago Symphony Orchestra
The Chicago Symphony Orchestra (CSO) was founded by Theodore Thomas in 1891. The ensemble makes its home at Orchestra Hall in Chicago and plays a summer season at the Ravinia Festival. The music director is Riccardo Muti, who began his tenu ...
under
Claudio Abbado
Claudio Abbado (; 26 June 1933 – 20 January 2014) was an Italian conductor who was one of the leading conductors of his generation. He served as music director of the La Scala opera house in Milan, principal conductor of the London Symphony ...
, and as guest soloist with the Eckstein String Quartet (principals of the CSO).
Selected bibliography
* (1985) "Style brisé, style luthé, and the choses luthées", ''
The Musical Quarterly
''The Musical Quarterly'' is the oldest academic journal on music in America. Originally established in 1915 by Oscar Sonneck, the journal was edited by Sonneck until his death in 1928. Sonneck was succeeded by a number of editors, including Ca ...
'' 71: 52–67.
* (1985) "The Influence of the Ballet de cour in the Genesis of the French Baroque Suite", ''
Acta Musicologica'' 57: 94–109.
* (1989) "The Coordination of Text, Illustration, and Music in a Seventeenth-Century Lute Manuscript: La Rhétorique des Dieux", ''Imago Musicae: International Yearbook of Musical Iconography''.
* (1992) "Fairy-Tale Literature and Die Zauberflöte,” ''Acta Musicologica'' 64: 30–49.
* (1994) ''Dance Music from the Ballets de cour 1575–1651. Historical Commentary, Source Study, and Transcriptions from the Philidor Manuscripts''. Stuyvesant, New York; Pendragon Press.
* (1996) "The Sources of Dance Music for the Ballets de cour before Lully", ' 82: 314–31.
* (1997) "Mozart and the
Theater auf der Wieden
The Theater auf der Wieden, also called the Freihaus-Theater auf der Wieden or the Wiednertheater, was a theater located in the then-suburban Wieden district of Vienna in the late 18th century. It existed for only 14 years (1787–1801), but duri ...
: New attributions and perspectives", ''Cambridge Opera Journal'' 9: 195–232.
* (1999) "On the Context of Mozart's Variations on the Aria, 'Ein Weib ist das herrlichste Ding auf der Welt', K.613", ''Mozart-Jahrbuch 1999'': 71–80.
* (2000) "Eighteenth-century Performing Materials from the Archive of the Theater an der Wien and Mozart's Die Zauberflöte,” ''
The Musical Quarterly
''The Musical Quarterly'' is the oldest academic journal on music in America. Originally established in 1915 by Oscar Sonneck, the journal was edited by Sonneck until his death in 1928. Sonneck was succeeded by a number of editors, including Ca ...
'' 84: 287–322.
* (2001) "Der Stein der Weisen, Mozart, and collaborative Singspiels at
Emanuel Schikaneder's Theater auf der Wieden", ''Mozart-Jahrbuch 2000'': 91–126.
* (2001) "Die Hauskomponisten am Theater auf der Wieden zur Zeit Mozarts (1798–1791)", ''Acta Mozartiana'' 48 1/4: 75–81.
* (2002) "Newly-Identified Engravings of Scenes from Emanuel Schickaneder's Theater auf der Wieden, 1789–1790, in the ''Allmanach für Theaterfreunde''", ''Maske und Kothurn'' 48: 351–376.
* (2003) "Mozart's German Operas" (chapter 12), in ''
The Cambridge Companion to Mozart'', ed.
Simon Keefe. Cambridge: 156–167.
* (2003) "Così fan tutte, La scuola degli amanti and L'ecole des amans", ''Hudební veda'' 38/3–4 (
Festschrift
In academia, a ''Festschrift'' (; plural, ''Festschriften'' ) is a book honoring a respected person, especially an academic, and presented during their lifetime. It generally takes the form of an edited volume, containing contributions from the h ...
Tomislav Volek): 313–320.
* (2004) "A Newly-Discovered Manuscript of Mozart's ''
Die Zauberflöte
''The Magic Flute'' (German: , ), K. 620, is an opera in two acts by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to a German libretto by Emanuel Schikaneder. The work is in the form of a ''Singspiel'', a popular form during the time it was written that includ ...
'' from the Copy Shop of Emanuel Schikaneder's Theater auf der Wieden", ''Studia Musicologica'' 45: 269–279.
* (2004) "''Die Zauberflöte'', Masonic Opera, and Other Fairy Tales", ''
Acta Musicologica'' 76/2:193–219, debunking many alleged masonic allusions.
* (2004) "The Don Juan Tradition, Eighteenth-Century Supernatural Theatre and Vincenzo Righini's ''Il convitato di pietra''", ''Hudební veda'' 41/3–4: 295–302.
* (2005) "Three Posthumous Reports Concerning Mozart in his Late Viennese Years", ''Eighteenth-Century Music'' 2:125–129.
* (2007) with H. Worthen, "Ideology in Movement and a Movement in Ideology: The Deutsche Tanzfestspiele 1934 (9–16 December, Berlin)", ''
Theatre Journal
The ''Theatre Journal'' is a quarterly peer-reviewed academic journal covering the theatre arts, with articles from the October and December issues centering on a predetermined theme. It is an official publication of The Association for Theatre i ...
'' 59/2: 215–239.
* (2008) ''Magic Flutes and Enchanted Forests: The Supernatural in the Eighteenth-Century Musical Theater'' (University of Chicago Press)
* (2012) ''Representations of Jews in the Musical Theater of the Habsburg Empire 1788–1807'' (Yuval Music Series 9), Jerusalem: The Jewish Music Research Centre.
* (2012) "Placidus Partsch, die Liedersammlung für Kinder und Kinderfreunde und die letzten drei Lieder Mozarts", ''Acta Mozartiana'' 59/1: 5–24.
* (2015) "Richard Strauss, ''Idomeneo'' and the Musical Mischling in the Third Reich", ''Richard Strauss-Jahrbuch 2014.'' Tutzing: Hans Schneider 2015: 67–84.
* (2015) "Emanuel Schikaneder as Theater Composer, or Who Wrote Papageno's Melodies in ''Die Zauberflöte''?" ''Divadelní revue'' 26/2: 160–167.
* (2016) "Mozart's Bawdy Canons, Vulgarity, and Debauchery at the Wiednertheater", ''Eighteenth-Century Music'' 13/2:238–308.
* (2017) "Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart" (annotated bibliography), in ''Oxford Bibliographies in Music,'' ed. Bruce Gustafson. New York: Online only.
* (2020
"Concepción Gómez de Jacoby: Tárrega's Enigmatic Patron and ''Recuerdos de la Alhambra''" Michael Lorenz (29 November)
* (2021)"On the Need for a Scholarly Edition of Tárrega’s Complete Works." Soundboard Scholar 7, (1). https://digitalcommons.du.edu/sbs/vol7/iss1/2
Editions
* (1990) ''Denis Gaultier, "La Rhétorique des dieux"'' (Recent Researches in the Music of the Baroque Era 62). Madison: A-R Editions, Inc. .
* (2002) with Manuela Jahrmärker (ed.) ''Schikaneders heroisch-komische Oper ''Der Stein der Weisen'' – Modell für Mozarts ''Zauberflöte''. Kritische Ausgabe des Textbuches'', (Hainholz Musikwissenschaft 5), Göttingen. .
* (2007) ''Der Stein der Weisen'' (full score), (Recent Researches in the Music of the Classic Era 76) Middleton. Wisconsin: A-R Editions. .
* (2010) ''Der wohltätige Derwisch oder Die Schellenkappe (Vienna, 1791). (full score and piano-vocal score; RRMCE 81).'' Middleton, Wis.: A-R Ed. .
* (2014) Franz Xaver Süßmayr, ''Der Spiegel von Arkadien (Vienna, 1794). (full score and piano-vocal score; RRMCE 93–94).'' Middleton, Wis.: A-R Ed. .
* (2014) Mozart, Wanhal, Henneberg, Müller, et al., ''Liedersammlung für Kinder und Kinderfreunde (Vienna 1791).'' RRMCE 95. Middleton, Wis., A-R Ed. .
* (2015) Two operas from the Series ''Die zween Anton.'' Part 1: ''Der dumme Gärtner aus dem Gebürge oder Die zween Anton (Vienna 1789).'' RRMCE 96. Middleton, Wis., A-R Ed. .
* (2016) Two operas from the Series ''Die zween Anton.'' Part 2: ''Die verdeckten Sachen (Vienna 1789).'' RRMCE 98. Middleton, Wisconsin, A-R Ed. .
References
External links
*
*
Edward Rothstein
Edward Benjamin Rothstein (born October 16, 1952) is an American critic. Rothstein wrote music criticism early in his career, but is best known for his critical analysis of museums and museum exhibitions.
Rothstein holds a B.A. from Yale Universi ...
"Not Even Mostly Mozart, but Clearly Some" ''
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
'', June 12, 1997
{{DEFAULTSORT:Buch, David J.
American musicologists
University of Chicago faculty
Bienen School of Music alumni
Mozart scholars
Living people
1950 births