Peter Kaminsky 
Unmasking Ravel 
New Perspectives on the Music

Collection of critical and analytical scholarly essays on the music of Ravel by prominent scholars.


Unmasking Ravel: New Perspectives on the Music fills a unique place in Ravel studies by combining critical interpretation and analytical focus. From the premiere of his works up to the present, Ravel has been associated with masks and the related notions of artifice and imposture. This has led scholars to perceive a lack of depth in his music and, consequently, to discourage investigation of his musical language. This volume balances and interweavesthese modes of inquiry. Part 1, ‘Orientations and Influences, ‘ illuminates the sometimes contradictory aesthetic, biographical, and literary strands comprising Ravel’s artistry and our understanding of it. Part 2, ‘Analytical Case Studies, ‘ engages representative works from Ravel’s major genres using a variety of methodologies, focusing on structural process and his complex relation to stylistic convention. Part 3, ‘Interdisciplinary Studies, ‘ integratesmusical analysis and art criticism, semiotics, and psychoanalysis in creating novel methodologies.


Contributors include prominent scholars of Ravel’s and fin-de-siècle music: Elliott Antokoletz, Gurminder Bhogal, Sigrun B. Heinzelmann, Volker Helbing, Steven Huebner, Peter Kaminsky, Barbara Kelly, David Korevaar, Daphne Leong, Michael Puri, and Lauri Suurpää.


Peter Kaminsky is Professor of Music at the University of Connecticut, Storrs.

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Ravel’s Poetics: Literary Currents, Classical Takes – Steven Huebner

Re-presenting Ravel: Artificiality and the Aesthetic of Imposture – Barbara L. Kelly

Adorno’s Ravel – Michael J. Puri

Ravel’s Approach to Formal Process: Comparisons and Contexts – Peter Kaminsky

Repetition as Musical Motion in Ravel’s Piano Writing – Daphne N. Leong and David Korevaar

Playing with Models: Sonata Form in Ravel’s String Quartet and Piano Trio – Sigrun Heinzelmann

Spiral and Self-Destruction in Ravel’s ‘La valse’ – Volker Helbing

Diatonic Expansion and Chromatic Compression in Maurice Ravel’s
Sonate pour violonet violoncelle – Elliott Antokoletz

Deception, Reality, and Changes of Perspective in Two Songs from
Histoires Naturelles – Lauri Suurpää

Not Just a Pretty Surface: Ornament and Metric Complexity in Ravel’s Piano Music – Gurminder K. Bhogal

The Child on the Couch; or, Toward a (Psycho)Analysis of
L’enfant et les sortilèges – Peter Kaminsky

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STEVEN HUEBNER is the James Mc Gill Professor (musicology) at the Schulich School of Music, Mc Gill University, Quebec, Canada.