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In this interdisciplinary book filled with historical texts, illustrations, and musical analyses, Rice reveals the transformative power of music as he demonstrates how musicians, first in the Netherlands and Cologne, and then in France, Italy, and London, reinvented St. Cecilia, a nonmusical Roman virgin-martyr, as their favored patroness and as a singer, organist, or performer on the virginal, clavichord, violin, bass viol, or lute. Two words, 'Cantantibus organis,' from the fifth-century description of Cecilia's wedding, guide Rice and his readers to her appearances in the famous Hartker Codex, Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, confraternity chapels, an altar in the Roman Pantheon, extravagant feasting to music on 22 November, plays, an alliterative poem on 'C,' competitions of composers, a papal mass for three choirs and three organs, and to more than one-hundred forty choral works celebrating her by Isaac, Clemens non Papa, Gombert, Guerrero, Lassus, Palestrina, Anerio, Marenzio, Purcell, and others. This study many years in the making is cultural history at its best. Barbara Haggh-Huglo, University of Maryland, College Park
In this exquisite and comprehensive monograph, John A. Rice provides a feast for the eyes and ears as he traces the history of music's patron saint from the Middle Ages up through the Baroque era. Claire Fontijn, Church History
John Rice’s new book is a brilliant accounting of how the exchange between art, music, and liturgy shaped the saint’s identity. Through an extensive survey of visual representations and liturgical celebrations, Rice shows that St. Cecilia’s patronage of music has its roots both in the liturgy and an evolving iconographic tradition. . .
Upon opening Rice’s book, one is immediately drawn to the stunning collection of 73 color plates that illustrate the evolution of ideas surrounding St. Cecilia. A feast for the eyes, this book within a book catalogues the transformation of St. Cecilia from virgin martyr to musician. For the performer looking to sing music for St. Cecilia, Rice has compiled an extensive appendix of 170 pieces published before 1620.
The book is broadly accessible to historians and musicians. Rice, an independent scholar, takes particular care to write for the non-specialist when discussing liturgy. He includes numerous contemporary accounts and has a keen eye for the amusing human quirks manifested in these documents. Rice’s book stands as a consummate example of the interactions between art, music, liturgy, and confraternity culture and how these exchanges enliven and spur on the formation of a saint’s identity. Emily Thelen, Early Music America
The range of Rice's scholarship and his in-depth knowledge are astonishing. . . An admirable feature of the book is Rice's ability to range across periods from the Middle Ages to the Baroque, and across different disciplines including history, literature, visual arts and music with equal authority. Patrick Bade, Burlington Magazine
The work is accessible, well argued, and confidently transcends academic disciplinary boundaries, fusing textual, visual and musical sources with aplomb. . . . the book's seventy-three colour plates offer a welcome visual chronology of Cecilia's evolving iconographic role and rising musical star. . . . Rice's book is a readable and richly researched work that makes an invaluable contribution to the understanding of this saint's iconographical evolution. Julia Faiers, Journal of the British Archeological Association
How, then, did Cecilia’s popular persona make this drastic transformation from a silent figure depicted as chastely preferring her own inaudible prayers in the early fifteenth century into a musical icon imagined to be actively performing on a variety of instruments in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries? Although previous music historians, from Charles Burney in the eighteenth century to Thomas Connolly in the twentieth, have grappled with this conundrum, John A. Rice’s new book provides the most comprehensive and convincing narrative. In tracing the 250-year journey of Cecilia from an obscure and ascetic virgin martyr to the sensual patron saint of musicians and recipient of motets and multimovement odes, Rice reveals how the complex interactions between musicians, artists, church leaders, and secular patrons continually redefined and embellished the figure of Cecilia in the popular imagination. Jane Hatter, Journal of Religion
Saint Cecilia in the Renaissance: The Emergence of a Musical Icon succeeds in considerably enriching our understanding of this fascinating saint and the intricate visual and musical connections surrounding her, while bringing together for scholars of all fields an impressive array of primary and secondary materials. Laura Stefanescu, Yale Journal of Music & Religion
Wer sich mit dem 'Aufstieg' der Heiligen Cecilia zur Musik-Ikone beschäftigen möchte, kommt an diesem Buch nicht vorbei. Zwar sind flankierende Forschungen, wie etwa aus dem Bereich der Theaterwissenschaft, denkbar. Jedoch hat Rice, nach Connollys Monografie von 1994, ein weiteres Standardwerk zum Thema vorgelegt, das seinerseits für Jahrzehnte prägend sein dürfte. Stephanie Klauk, Sehepunkte
Cet ouvrage de John A. Rice est un excellent exemple de recherche transversale et hautement interdisciplinaire. L’hypothèse du rôle du plaisir est démontrée seulement de façon indirecte, par l’accumulation d’oeuvres d’art, qui permet de comprendre la validité de l’hypothèse. L’itinéraire du lien entre Cécile et la musique du nord-ouest de l’Europe jusqu’à Rome convainc le lecteur. Le troisième chapitre montrant le lien entre le culte de sainte Cécile et l’émergence de l’identité professionnelle des musiciens et des compositeurs mérite une mention particulière pour sa très grande pertinence en rapport avec l’essor des études sur ce thème en musicologie. L’ouvrage peut aussi être très utile pour les musiciens. Le propos, les tableaux, et en particulier le répertoire musical de l’annexe, peuvent servir à construire plusieurs programmes de concert originaux. Pascale Duhamel, Renaissance and Reformation
Overall, this is a concise and well-researched study of the transformation of the cult of a female saint during the Renaissance and its immediate impact on the art, music, economies, and societal organizations that depended on its success and popularity. Bradford Lee Eden, Notes
Supplementary website with digital resources and study sheets
Music in the Eighteenth Century is an excellent textbook that provides a solid backbone for a class on the Classical period. The textbook will keep students engaged and entertained by moving from one exciting location to another and by exploring how musical works were produced not by geniuses working in a creative vacuum, but rather by people in specific places interacting with specific social, political, and cultural conditions. Martin Nedbal, College Music Symposium
Students lucky enough to learn from Rice's book will gain a broad, rich, and nuanced view of the eighteenth-century musical world. Margaret Butler, Journal of Music History Pedagogy
"Music in the Eighteenth Century" has been published in Spanish translation by Juan González-Castelao ( Madrid: Akal, 2019); for more information please click on the link above. For a Spanish-language talk-show about the book, with excerpts of music discussed in it, go to https://mediavod-lvlt.rtve.es/resources/TE_SHORAZU/mp3/1/8/1575645796081.mp3
Essays on Opera, 1750–1800, edited by John A. Rice (Farnham: Ashgate, 2010), vol. 3 in the series The Ashgate Library of Essays in Opera Studies, Roberta Montemorra Marvin, series editor
There is much here to stimulate and enhance the enjoyment of the thoughtful opera-goer, while at the same time there is much food for thought for performers, and above all producers. Opera
Highly recommended. J. Michele Edwards, Choice
Das Buch bietet einen hervorragenden Zugang zum Schaffen Marianna Martines', und die vielen Notenbeispiele mach Lust darauf, diese Musik zu hören – man kann nur hoffen, dass das Buch Aufführungen und Einspielungen befördert! Geza Finke, Jahrbuch Musik und Gender
The captivating tale of an accomplished musician. Christopher Wiley, Journal for Eighteenth-Century Studies
Mozart on the Stage (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009)
Table of Contents, Preface.pdf
John A. Rice's book provides a superb, engrossing view of the theatrical business in eighteenth-century Germany and Italy, and the ways in which Mozart shaped and was shaped by it. Judith Malafronte, Opera News
With its expert handling of evidence of all kinds, Rice's study must count as the best portrait yet of Mozart as a man of the theatre, sharply and convincingly drawn. Ian Woodfield, Eighteenth-Century Music
Review by Stefano Aresi, in Drammaturgia musicale 4 (2010), 100–103
AmazonFront Matter.pdfIntroduction
Descriptions of the Temple not included in book
Recently published drawing of the Temple pdf
A wonderful reconstruction of not just a lost piece of splendid eighteenth-century garden architecture, but also of the cultural world that celebrated its construction and of the later decline of both the garden and its cultural milieu.
Rita Krueger, Austrian History Yearbook
Daniel Heartz, From Garrick to Gluck: Essays on Opera in the Age of Enlightenment, edited by John A. Rice (Hillsdale, NY: Pendragon, 2004)
Those of us who have read and benefited from Daniel Heartz's widely scattered publications of these thirty-five years will be delighted to have so many of them conveniently gathered in a single volume; those newer to the field will surely continue to find stimulation, as well as information, in them for a good while to come. Julian Rushton, Music & Letters
A model study of an enchanting subject. Patricia Howard, Musical Times
One cannot help but stand in awe of the scholarship presented in this volume. Caryl Clark, Journal of the American Musicological Society
Consistently engrossing... this scholarly and very enjoyable book represents musical publishing at its best. Tim Blanning, Beethoven Forum
Chapter 10 ("Joseph Haydn and Beethoven between Court and Nobility") reprinted in Music and Patronage, ed. Paul A. Merkley (Farnham, Surrey: Ashgate, 2012).
Antonio Salieri and Viennese Opera (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998)
A magnificent study of the complex musical and social circles that flourished at the court of Emperor Joseph II... Rice's book masterfully interweaves three strands of scholarship: biographical information, an overview of the traditions and conventions of Viennese opera during the latter half of the century, and a close examination of several of Salieri's own operas. Larry A. Lipkis, Library Journal
Undergraduates and "lay" readers interested in the bigger picture of the period will find Rice's clearly written and impeccably organized book not only a welcome antidote to the popular image of Salieri as the Anti-Mozart, but also a trove of vivid anecdote and detail about Vienna in the latter part of the century. Mary Hunter, Journal of the Royal Musical Association
Rice's descriptions of selected operas, with their entertaining plot summaries and perceptive comments on salient details (including the influence of singers on the music, about which he has a great deal to say), have an immediacy that is bound to encourage wider performance of the repertory. Dorothea Link, Notes
Part of the American Council of Learned Societies Humanities Ebook Collection
W. A. Mozart: La clemenza di Tito (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991)
Must now be regarded as essential reading. Notes
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