James Joyce, Portrait of the Artist as a Music Fan

"In literature, the figure of James Joyce casts a long shadow. That his influence also extends into music should come as no surprise, given the musicality of the language employed by the Irish writer, who was also an excellent singer and an accomplished pianist. But the creator of some of the most iconoclastic and difficult works of 20th-century fiction was surprisingly conservative in his own musical tastes. Joyce liked opera—especially Bellini—and Elizabethan lute songs. 'He was one of these creative figures who limit their experimentation to their own field,' says Leon Botstein, who on Wednesday will lead his American Symphony Orchestra in a Carnegie Hall concert that focuses on Joyce's musical universe."

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