Skip to main content

One Good Thing #2

 

Connaissez-vous le prix littéraire des musiciens ? Chaque année, un jury récompense des livres qui ont pour thématique commune la musique classique. Il y a trois catégories : fiction, non-fiction et jeunesse.

Le jury est composé principalement de musiciens et musiciennes. Mais on y trouve aussi un professeur de neurologie, un compositeur, un auteur-dramaturge ainsi qu’une éditrice. Les lauréats seront connus en novembre.

Voici la sélection 2022 dans la catégorie fiction :

-        Des diables et des saints, Jean-Baptiste Andrea

-        Berlin Requiem, Xavier-Marie Bonnot

-        555, Hélène Gestern

-        Putzi, le pianiste d’Hitler, Thomas Snégaroff

Je n’ai découvert ce prix que tout récemment, au moment de l’écriture de mon texte sur Opus 77, d’Alexis Ragougneau. Son roman faisait partie de la sélection 2021 !

Le dernier lauréat dans la catégorie roman était Akira Mizubayashi pour Âme brisée. Pour celles et ceux qui ne connaissent pas ce livre, l’auteur y met à l’honneur les luthiers, les interprètes et les mélomanes, mais s’intéresse aussi à une autre forme d’interprétation, la traduction.

 

Have you heard of « le prix littéraire des musiciens »? Each year, a jury awards a prize to books whose common theme is classical music. There are three categories: fiction, non-fiction and children’s literature.

The panel is made up mostly of musicians. But one also finds a neurology professor, a composer, a writer-playwright and a publisher among the judges. Winners will be announced in November.

Here is the 2022 shortlist in the fiction category:

-        Des diables et des saints, Jean-Baptiste Andrea

-        Berlin Requiem, Xavier-Marie Bonnot

-        555, Hélène Gestern

-        Putzi, le pianiste d’Hitler, Thomas Snégaroff

It was only recently that I found out the existence of this prize. It happened while I was writing my text on Opus 77, by Alexis Ragougneau. His novel was shortlisted in 2021!

The last recipient of the prize in the fiction category was Akira Mizubayashi for Âme brisée. For those who do not know his book, the author shines a light on luthiers, interpreters and music lovers, but also brings into focus another form of interpretation, translation.

 

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

"Coming Through Slaughter", by Michael Ondaatje (2)

I have written before about Michael Ondaatje’s novel Coming Through Slaughter (here’s the link to the English version ). A few recent searches led me to an article by Emily Petermann and the albums of Dave Lisik and Jerry Granelli. Back in 2010, Emily Petermann published an article entitled “Unheard Jazz: Music and History in Michael Ondaatje’s Coming Through Slaughter ” . Thanks to this article, I have learned the meaning of the term “ekphrasis” as it applies to the description of music in literature.   Back in 2009, Dave Lisik released a whole album based on the Ondaatje novel: Coming Through Slaughter, The Bolden Legend . Each track title is a reference to a scene from the book. If you listen to the opening track, you too will marvel at the beauty of the low end of the trombone’s range. Hear how effectively the Bb signals a repeat of the theme’s first section, as though the whole ensemble was breathing through that one tone. And what about the drummer’s cross stick work a
Post a Comment
Read more

Hésitant, Rusé, Nerveux, Doux

Philip Roth a écrit un court roman au titre en forme d’adieux : Goodbye, Columbus . Neil Klugman, le narrateur, entame une relation amoureuse, avec Brenda Patimkin. Les Patimkin sont plus riches que la famille de Neil. Il vit avec sa tante à Newark, tandis que les Patimkin vivent à Short Hills.     L’histoire mentionne Kostelanetz et Mantovani. Des titres de chanson tels que “Night and Day,” “I Get a Kick out of You,” “Get Me to the Church on Time” ainsi que le titre de la comédie musicale My Fair Lady apparaissent dans le texte. Ce n’est que dans la seconde moitié du roman que la musique gagne du terrain. Cependant le plus merveilleux des passages sur l’expression musicale se trouve dans la première moitié du texte. Et il ne concerne pas de chanson existante. Et il ne se rapporte pas à un genre musical précis. Neil et Brenda, deux jeunes amants, apprennent à exprimer leurs sentiments l’un pour l’autre dans un échange de vers improvisés qui est à la fois timide et en
Post a Comment
Read more

"Grandiose, in a corrupted romantic style"

Next up in our cast for Ian McEwan's revisiting of Hamlet is Claude, the hero’s uncle.   He conspires to kill his brother, John, with the help of his lover (and sister-in-law), Trudy. She is pregnant with our hero-narrator, whose hatred of Claude has some roots in the man's musical ignorance. The patronym brings about the first mention of a European composer. Whenever he introduces himself, the plotting uncle says “Claude, as in Debussy,” so as to help with the pronunciation of his name. This does not fail to disgust our narrator. (Chapter One, p. 5). For the man seems to revel in his ignorance. Claude conjures up the French composer's name as a mere icebreaker, without any interest for the composer’s works.  Our fetus-narrator sets us right immediately: “This is Claude as in property developer who composes nothing, invents nothing.” At the beginning of Chapter Three, the narrator tries to understand who his uncle really is. The description addresses the musical featu
Post a Comment
Read more