Overview

"Jean Cocteau, Erik Satie, Moulin Rouge - the names popularly associated with film composer Georges Auric's career conjure visions of a distant and glamorous early twentieth-century Parisian art world. Auric wrote well over 100 film scores, including the soundtrack for Roman Holiday, and was notably affiliated with Les Six, a group of French composers reacting to the musical establishment of the 1920s. But Auric's life and work spanned far beyond this limited sphere. A lifelong involvement in politics - from his leftism during the Popular Front years of the 1930s to his significant role in the French Communist Party's musical resistance of the 1940s - heavily influenced his sound and aesthetic. His advocacy on behalf of his fellow musicians led him into the fight for fair copyright laws, initially in France and then worldwide. And over the course of a seven-decade-long career, Auric took on roles as diverse as music critic, opera director, and arts administrator, revealing a deep involvement in his country's musical life that makes the label of ""composer"" seem inadequate. The first English-language biography of Auric, Georges Auric: A Life in Music and Politics rethinks the conventional ideas of what it means to be a composer. Drawing from an astonishing three dozen untapped archives, including the private archives of Auric's widow, author Colin Roust presents a picture of Auric that is as multifaceted as the man's career. Using Auric's life as a lens, Roust reveals the transforming role of music - and the composer - in twentieth-century society."

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9780190607807

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Reviews

Colin Roust has written an extraordinary biography of an extraordinary man. Beautifully organized and elegantly written, Roust's clear judgment, original and exhaustive research, and formidable understanding of musical life in twentieth-century France pervade this magisterial volume. This book will fascinate all those who love French music of the last century. It will especially appeal to those interested in film music. The author's research into the state of French art and society during the Second World War makes for gripping reading. Indeed, Roust has done a great service to all readers, musical or otherwise, who seek to understand in greater detail the turbulent history of France in the twentieth century. -- Byron Adams, Distinguished Professor of Musicology, University of California, Riverside

Author Information

Dr. Colin Roust is Assistant Professor of Musicology at the University of Kansas. His research interests include twentieth-century music, film music, music history pedagogy, music and politics, and the intersection of music and the other arts in multimedia genres. He is also a co-editor of The Routledge Film Music Sourcebook and co-translator of William Ritter: Studies of Foreign Art.

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