Beyond The Art of Finger Dexterity

Within the history of European music, Carl Czerny (1791-1857) is simultaneously all too familiar and virtually invisible. During his lifetime, he was a highly successful composer of popular piano music, and his pedagogical works remain fundamental to the training of pianists. But Czerny's reputation in these areas has obscured the remarkable breadth of his activity, and especially his work as a composer of serious music, which recent performances and recordings have shown to hold real musical interest.
Beyond "The Art of Finger Dexterity" explores Czerny's multifaceted career and its legacy and provides the first broad assessment of his work as a composer. Prominent North American and European musicians and scholars explore topics including Czerny's life and its context; his autobiographical writings and efforts to promote his teacher, Beethoven; his activity as a pedagogue, both as teacher of Liszt and as the authority held up to innumerable amateur women pianists; his role in shaping performance traditions of classical music; the development of his image during and after his lifetime; and his work in genres including the Mass, the symphony, the string quartet, and the piano fantasy.
This is the first English-language book on Czerny, and the broadest survey of his activity in any language.

Contributors: George Barth, Otto Biba, Attilio Bottegal, Deanna C. Davis, James Deaville, Ingrid Fuchs, David Gramit, Alice M. Hanson, Anton Kuerti, Marie Sumner Lott, James Parakilas, Michael Saffle, Franz A. J. Szabo, Douglas Townsend, and John Wiebe.

DavidGramit [University of Alberta] is the author of Cultivating Music: The Aspirations, Interests, and Limits of German Musical Culture, 1770-1848.

Table of Contents

Carl Czerny and Post-Classicism - Otto Biba
Czerny's Vienna - Alice M. Hanson
Carl Czerny's Recollections: An Overview and an Edition of Two Unpublilshed Autograph Sources - Attilio Bottegal
A Star Is Born? Czerny, Liszt, and the Pedagogy of Virtuosity - James Deaville
The Veil of Fiction: Pedagogy and Rhetorical Strategies in Carl Czerny's Letters on the Art of Playing the Pianoforte - Deanna Davis
Carl Czerny: Beethoven's Ambassador Posthumous - Ingrid Fuchs
Playing Beethoven His Way: Czerny and the Canonization of Performance Practice - James Parakilas
Carl Czerny and Musical Authority: Locating the "Primary Vessel" of the Musical Traditioin - George Barth
Carl Czerny, Composer - Anton Kuerti
Czerny's Mass No. 2 in C Major: Church Music and the Biedermeier Spirit - John Wiebe
Carl Czerny's Orchestral Music: A Preliminary Study - Douglas Townsend
Not Just a Dry Academic: Czerny's String Quartets in E and D Minor - Marie Sumner Lott
Czerny and the Keyboard Fantasy: Traditions, Innovations, Legacy - Michael Saffle
The Fall and Rise of "Considerable Talent": Carl Czerny and the Dynamics of Musical Reputation - David Gramit