Adorno and the Aesthetics of Performance

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Context: This project focuses on Adorno's work on a theory of musical reproduction, left incomplete at his death and now the subject of increasing interest. I studied Adorno's fragmentary notes and drafts on musical performance during research leave at the Theodor W. Adorno Archive in Frankfurt in 1999, and was able to discuss these materials with the Director of the Archive, Dr Rolf Tiedemann (now retired), and Dr Henri Lonitz, who was editing the documents for publication. The fragments have now been published in German as 'Zu einer Theorie der musikalischen Reproduktion' (Frankfurt: Suhrkamp Verlag, 2001), and will shortly appear in an English translation (Cambridge: Polity, 2006). My book will be a conceptual study of Adorno's theory of performance, with a particular focus on the concepts of mimesis, gesture, expression, temporality, spatialization (in relation to the score), mediation, and exakte Vorstellung (precise imagination) in the context of what Adorno sees as the tension between the 'work as performance' and the 'work as score', with special reference to his 'limiting concept' of the 'silent work'. The basic research has been completed (although some further detailed conceptual research is now called for), and about 20,000-25,000 words have been drafted so far. I am now approaching Cambridge University Press with a proposal. A number of conference papers and publications have already resulted from this project, begun during my previous research leave (see my list of publications - those publications marked with an asterisk are directly related to the current proposal). This research leave will be used to complete a certain amount of additional research into concepts and to complete the book (which will total ca 80,000 words).Aims and objectives: The aim of this project is to expand the conceptual terms of reference for the discussion of musical performance through a detailed consideration of Adorno's writings on musical performance, with particular reference to the posthumously published fragments (Adorno, 2001, see above). My objectives are:1. to interpret and expand Adorno's terms of reference in his 'reproduction project' through making overt the influences on his thinking from, for example, Benjamin, Lukács, and Kolisch; 2. to offer an interpretative and critical commentary on the fragments through tracing the way they connect with the main motifs in his work as a whole (especially with his writings on composition, the concepts of the musical work and of musical material, and the commodification of music); 3. to put Adorno's work in the context of current thinking about performance theory and suggest ways in which his conceptual framework will both enrich and extend current ideas; and4. to contribute to the, as yet, small body of literature and conference contributions referring to Adorno's 'theory of musical reproduction' (e.g., Danuser (2003), Seiwert (2003), Johnson (1999)). Applications and benefits: The orientation of the book that will result from this research will be towards the aesthetics of musical performance rather than directly towards musical practice. In spite of much work done on performance theory and performance studies in recent years, there remains a relatively restricted conceptual terminology for the discussion of the aesthetics of performance. Adorno's pioneering work, although never completed, offers an enrichment of the terms in which we can 'think' performance and which can be of benefit to musicology, musical performance, and music aesthetics. My research in this field will also serve to complement research done on other areas of Adorno's aesthetics of music which has understandably emphasised the spheres of musical production, distribution and reception/consumption, but has tended to neglect the sphere of reproduction as performance.