During the years 1500-1800, European performing arts reveled in a kaleidoscope of Otherness: Middle-Eastern harem women, fortune-telling Spanish 'Gypsies', Incan priests, Barbary pirates, moresca dancers, and more. In this prequel to his 2009 book Musical Exoticism, Ralph P. Locke explores how exotic locales and their inhabitants were characterized in musical genres ranging from instrumental pieces and popular songs to oratorios, ballets, and operas. Locke's study offers new insights into much-loved masterworks by composers such as Cavalli, Lully, Purcell, Rameau, Handel, Vivaldi, Gluck, and Mozart. In these works, evocations of ethnic and cultural Otherness often mingle attraction with envy or fear, and some pieces were understood at the time as commenting on conditions in Europe itself. Locke's accessible study, which includes numerous musical examples and rare illustrations, will be of interest to anyone who is intrigued by the relationship between music and cultural history and by the challenges of cross-cultural (mis)understanding.
- An engaging and accessible exploration of how Westerners across the centuries have viewed distant places and peoples
- Focuses on a crucial 300-year period (1500-1800), when Europe was founding colonial empires overseas and combating the Ottoman Empire
- Illustrates how music, far from being an isolated aesthetic activity, participated in conveying stereotypical images of peoples living 'elsewhere' and minority peoples at home
- Includes rare illustrations, music examples that can be played or sung, and a list of recommended recordings and DVDs
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