Romanian Music
Romanian music, whether explicitly or more discreetly, has been a permanent presence in the pages of Musicology Today. If we trace a three-year retrospective since the journal has existed, we notice that George Enescu, Paul Constantinescu, Mihail Jora, Constantin Brăiloiu, Nicolae Brânduș, George Draga, Aurel Stroe, Miriam Marbe etc. have been protagonists of analyses and essays signed by Romanian and foreign authors.
Within the latter category, the musicologist, composer and performer Thomas Beimel is now back to propose an attractive text on the history of a building – the Cantacuzino Palace – going hand in hand with the history of an institution – the Union of Composers and Musicologists in Romania and the George Enescu Museum. As he did in past issues of Musicology Today, Thomas Beimel based his article on his radio programmes broadcast on Deutschlandfunk, Cologne. Romanian musicians can continue to be grateful to him for the passion with which he brings Romanian topics back to the German audience.
Another German musician (this time coming from Transylvania), Peter Szaunig, “frames” his pages on Romanian music within the portrait of someone who remains rather unknown in this country, thus building bridges between Romanian culture and the German one: Rudolf Wagner-Régenyi.
In an ideal middle position, two musicologists – our coleagues at the National Music University in Bucharest – analyse, each of them, a Romanian composer. Alice Tacu is preparing a vast George Draga monography for publication, of which she has selected a few pages on the concept of heterophony and has offered them to Musicology Today. Olguța Lupu continues to enlarge upon a topic to which she has already dedicated a lot of time, publishing two generous documentary volumes on Tiberiu Olah’s creation. You will find them in the bibliographical notes of her study in the present issue, which analyses some of Olah’s lesser known musical works.
Twentieth-century Romanian music is worth many pages of investigation in widely-circulated languages, which should bring it to the attention of the contemporary artistic world, even if only, still, in a rather shy manner. We are setting off in 2013 with this thought in mind and we are trying to do our bit…
Valentina Sandu-Dediu
( English translation by Maria-Sabina Draga Alexandru)