The Film Music of Alberto Ginastera

FAIN: HR-50038-04

Deborah Schwartz-Kates
University of Kansas, Lawrence (Lawrence, KS 66045-7505)

My proposed research examines the previously unknown film music of the Argentine composer, Alberto Ginastera (1916-1983), who is considered one of the leading musical spokesmen of the Americas. In my study, I aim to show how Ginastera's cinematic works contributed to the human experience by aesthetically inscribing the Argentine search for identity. My work will demonstrate how Ginastera's motion picture music constructed a pastoral trope of the Argentine landscape and how the composer's distinguished North American colleague, Aaron Copland, significantly shaped his work through parallel representations of the American West. To support this project, I request NEH funding to help cover the cost of travel to the Paul Sacher Stiftung in Basel, Switzerland, where Ginastera's film music manuscripts are stored. I will publish my research in an article-length study and a chapter in my forthcoming book on Alberto Ginastera and the musical construction of Argentine pastoral space.

Associated Products

"The Film Music of Alberto Ginastera: An Introduction to the Sources and Their Significance" (Article)
Title: "The Film Music of Alberto Ginastera: An Introduction to the Sources and Their Significance"
Author: Deborah Schwartz-Kates
Abstract: This article focuses on the film music of Alberto Ginastera, a repertoire that remains largely unknown and that the composer produced outside of the space of his officially catalogued works. For many years, logistical difficulties impeded a detailed study of this repertoire since the visual film footage resided in Buenos Aires and the corresponding music manuscripts were housed at the Paul Sacher Stiftung in Basel, Switzerland, where the Ginastera collection is stored. Recent developments, however, have made it possible to coordinate study of the sources and conceptually bring film and score back together again. This article presents the preliminary results of such an investigation. Here I argue that the film music not only fills in a map of the composer’s uncharted territory, but serves as a site for exploring new critical issues in Ginastera scholarship.
Year: 2006
Primary URL: http://iiiprxy.library.miami.edu:10038/docview/222869193/abstract
Primary URL Description: ProQuest Full Text article
Format: Journal
Periodical Title: Latin American Music Review
Publisher: University of Texas Press

The Film Music of Alberto Ginastera: A Preliminary Review of the Sources (Article)
Title: The Film Music of Alberto Ginastera: A Preliminary Review of the Sources
Author: Deborah Schwartz-Kates
Abstract: Brief review of the Ginastera film music holdings at the Paul Sacher Foundation that includes a reproduction of a manuscript facsimile in the composer's hand.
Year: 2006
Format: Journal
Periodical Title: Mitteilungen der Paul Sacher Stiftung, no. 19 (April 2006), pp. 22-27.
Publisher: Paul Sacher Foundation (Basel, Switzerland)

Revealing Screens: The Film Music of Alberto Ginastera (Book)
Title: Revealing Screens: The Film Music of Alberto Ginastera
Author: Deborah Schwartz-Kates
Abstract: This book explores the cinematic contribution of the Argentine composer, Alberto Ginastera (1916-1983), who is regarded as one of the leading musical spokesmen of the Americas. In this study, I focus on the composer’s eleven full-length film scores that he elaborated between 1942 and 1958 during his most fertile nationalist years. Although Ginastera’s motion picture music has attracted considerable attention, it has remained untouched and unstudied to this date. Because the visual film footage resides in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and the corresponding music manuscripts in Basel, Switzerland, it has been impossible until now for scholars to study this unknown but engaging repertoire. My proposed book, based on ten years of active research on three continents, forms a breakthrough study since it reconstructs Ginastera’s cinematic repertoire and accounts for its significance within the totality of the composer’s work. From this study, a fascinating portrait of the composer emerges: one that alters canonical representations of Ginastera as a composer exclusively devoted to the national art music scene. Instead, the film scores reveal a divergent picture—that of a savvy businessman conversant in the latest popular trends, who combined commercial and artistic forms to create a new style of modernist Argentine film music. The proposed title of the book, Revealing Screens, illustrates the way that Ginastera’s film music allows us to view the composer as a complex creative artist and a multifaceted human being.
Year: 2013
Publisher: Oxford University Press (forthcoming)
Type: Single author monograph

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