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‘Piano ou Clavecin?’ Joaquín Nin’s Feud with Wanda Landowska’s Harpsichord

Published version
Peer-reviewed

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Authors

GONZALO DELGADO, SONIA 

Abstract

jats:titleAbstract</jats:title>jats:pWanda Landowska and Joaquín Nin were, in the context of the Parisian Schola Cantorum during the first decade of the twentieth century, two of the leading artists performing the harpsichord repertoire. This established them as pioneers of its concert practice, but their irreconcilable attitudes to performance – Landowska’s supposedly historical/reconstructive (employing the harpsichord) and Nin’s updated (employing the modern piano) – embroiled them in a fierce controversy conducted in French and Spanish journals between November 1911 and October 1912. This article examines a large quantity of unedited correspondence together with the relevant press articles in the context of the two performers’ agendas. The results suggest that this controversy was an unprecedented marketing strategy orchestrated by Nin against, but reliant upon, Landowska’s success at the time when he was about to make his début in Spain. However, the unforeseen and long-lasting consequences of this controversy brought priceless publicity for Landowska’s cause: the revival of the harpsichord.</jats:p>

Description

Keywords

3603 Music, 36 Creative Arts and Writing

Journal Title

Journal of the Royal Musical Association

Conference Name

Journal ISSN

0269-0403
1471-6933

Volume Title

Publisher

Cambridge University Press (CUP)