Beyond Fingal's Cave: Ossian in the Musical Imagination

James Porter, MA 1958

This is the first comprehensive study in English of musical works inspired by the poems of Ossian (1760s). Over 300 compositions emerged between 1780 and the present: operas, cantatas, tone poems, lieder, and instrumental works. Among the composers who absorbed Ossian were Gluck, Beethoven, Schubert, Mendelssohn (who visited Staffa in 1829), Spohr, Weber, Brahms, Massenet and even Arnold Schoenberg, who left a substantial if unfinished cantata in 1903. The latest work based on Ossian is James MacMillan's symphonic essay, "The Death of Oscar" (2012). Other Scottish composers dealt with in this study are Erik Chisholm ("Night Song of the Bards," 1944-51) and the author's teacher, Cedric Thorpe Davie ("Dirge for Cuthullin," 1936).

ISBN: 978-1-58046-945-6