The Social Worlds of Nineteenth-Century Chamber Music is an important contribution to nineteenth-century studies. Its seven chapters illuminate a repertoire that is seldom studied – indeed never studied from the rich and detailed sociological angles that Lott presents. The Introduction sets the scene for the new perspectives that this study will embrace, touching on important themes that will surface throughout the book: conceptions of public and private in the era (notably the grey area in between); masculine leisure and musical performance; print culture; and ideas of high and low in music. The communities of chamber musical practice that Lott considers are mostly European – and largely German – but in the final chapter she does cast a wider net, considering American contexts in connection with Dvořák.

Immediately new and useful is Lott’s emphasis on chamber music’s audience: as she shows in the ensuing chapters, there are tangible, ‘market driven’ hallmarks of this music – stylistic features that make it suited to the gentlemen whose leisure time it filled. After an introduction to three of the main music publishers of the era – Peters, Hofmeister and Schlesinger – and relevant issues of print culture in Chapter 1, the remaining chapters are mostly framed in terms of the issue of the relationship between audience and style, which is her central concern. These deal, in turn, with chamber music arrangements of opera and folk songs; the ‘domestic’ style’ the ‘progressive’ style; programmatic chamber music; and matters of audience and style in relation to Brahms and Dvořák.

One of the most helpful aspects of this study is the discussion of print culture in Chapter 1, in relation to nineteenth-century cultures of chamber music. This chapter has plenty new to tell the reader about how the market helped to shape chamber music, and vice versa. Lott considers a fascinating duality that persisted throughout the era: sheet music was becoming cheaper to produce and certain chamber music was published only in parts, for immediate ‘consumption’ and disposal often shortly thereafter; but the publication of chamber music, perhaps especially score editions, concurrently contributed to canon formation. Lott reinforces our understanding of this duality (chamber music as both ephemeral and ‘eternal’) by considering three important publishers in the mid-to-late nineteenth century. One might want to know more about who was behind Edition Peters’ printing of ‘Classics’, as well as decisions on the part of publishers to shift the emphasis to folk materials. In other words, who were the important personalities in these cultures of chamber music, other than composers, in shaping the markets for chamber music?

There is a focus in Chapter 1, and elsewhere in the book, on north German publishers, which might seem at first to bias the discussion. But Lott takes care to generalize her observations at this point, considering the interaction of these German publishers with publishers and markets abroad. There is a good balance of data presentation and interpretation: one sees, for example, that the apparent decline in string chamber music in this era is offset to some extent when one looks at reprints, and the way demand shifts to older works in general. Lott’s discussion of the era’s favoured composers is one of several surprising and illuminating points in her narrative. But one wants to know to what extent these favoured composers are represented in publishing firms beyond north Germany, especially Louis Spohr and Wenzel Heinrich Veit, two favourites in the contexts of the publishing firms of Peters and Hofmeister, which she discusses in detail. The chapter also contains consideration of such factors as the proliferation of lending libraries – part of the total ‘ecology’ of chamber music, as Lott puts it (p. 37).

Lott now delves into the music of some of these today lesser-known but then popular German composers of chamber music, with an examination of what she terms the ‘domestic string style’. She considers works by Louis Spohr, George Onslow, and Friedrich Kuhlau in some analytical detail with respect to the ‘domestic style’. She defines this style with respect to three main features: the presentation and repetition of long lyrical melodies by as many members of the group as possible; the utilization of harmonic and melodic sequences to effect a transition; and the emphasis of this large-scale repetition through voicing and through smaller-scale repetitions (p. 85). She further identifies ‘singing’ tenor lines for the cello as a possible hallmark of the style. Together with this definition of style, and her discussion of Schubert’s use of it, one would like some more consideration of how it might relate to contemporary aesthetics. To what extent, for example, are these hallmarks linked to conceptions of musical melancholy of the time, particularly in Schubert’s Vienna, especially song and repetition? How long had these traits been prominent in chamber music (Boccherini is mentioned on p. 33, and Haydn might well have been)? In other words: what is new with the ‘domestic style’ in nineteenth century chamber music?

In general, a little more consideration of genre ideologies would add to the discussion. Lott explains her emphasis on quintets and quartets in the Introduction, which is highly necessary for the reader, who might otherwise, from the title of the book, expect a discussion of everything from Lieder and solo piano music to nonets. But there could be more discussion of who it was that established the emphasis on string quartets and quintets in music for male leisure time, not just how this emphasis came about. And a consideration of changing ideas, as well as ideals, of chamber music in the nineteenth century is an important omission. More discussion of genre ideology and changing definitions of chamber music would help to frame the otherwise highly informative chapters on two ‘other forms’ that chamber music took in this era, which might surprise the reader in terms of their extent and popularity: namely the arrangements of opera and folk music discussed in Chapter 2, and the programmatic chamber music discussed in Chapter 6.

A problem with writing about musical style in relation to audience is establishing the right kind of evidence, and enough of it, to make a good case. Lott does an admirable job in this respect, bringing a wealth of contextual detail to bear on the case study works that she analyses. It is especially enlightening to hear about how involved many of these composers were in the social milieux for which they wrote their chamber music – how well they knew their audiences because they were part of those audiences, or were performers. Lott acknowledges that insufficient evidence can be a problem, and perhaps most especially when one is trying to investigate music that took place largely in private and semi-private contexts: ‘In writing about musical consumers and their use of chamber music, it is important to note what we can and cannot know and what we must infer from a variety of incomplete, sometimes contradictory, sources’ (p. 6). Yet at times one wonders whether she has considered all the relevant evidence from published sources of the time. By the mid-nineteenth century, chamber music review culture was well established and one finds many reviews of compositions and performances that permit insights into genre ideology and canon formation, as well as reception. In addition, people (especially Germans) were starting to write histories of chamber music, which provide a fascinating window on some of the more conservatives taste of the time. Margaret Notley has considered some of this literature in relation to Brahms’s style in his Adagios, noting that some critics of the time who otherwise had little in common with the Wagnerian or so-called progressivist camp also acknowledged the peripheral position of the post-Classical string quartet and the special difficulty of writing an Adagio after Beethoven.Footnote ¹

Consideration of contemporary criticism could come more to the forefront in Lott’s discussion of the ‘progressive’ style, in Chapter 4, which is, however, nicely argued in terms of a dialogue between composers (and critics) of the past and present. This might help the reader to see how Beethoven’s works – especially the late works – were constructed as progressive, even though the music does not always conform to the way it was discussed. Lott writes:

But how is it that we (and more importantly they) came to see these works in this way? To what extent is ‘progressive style’ a product of where one places one’s emphasis as listener and interpreter, on aspects that they (and we) wanted to hear in ‘late Beethoven’? The choice of Bergmüller, Mendelssohn and Schumann as heirs to the Beethovenian tradition, as composers who responded variously to it (and of course themselves shaped it) in their chamber music, is nonetheless illuminating. Lott’s analyses are lively and usefully focused on these composers’ reception of the theatrical and songful aspects of Beethoven’s works; but are these aspects best described as ‘progressive’ – rather than, say, nostalgic or melancholic?

As well as clarifying her focus on string chamber music in the title, Lott might also have clarified her emphasis on German music and composers. There is some discussion of Danish contexts of chamber music – the work of Niels Gade in particular – and a detailed consideration of Dvořák, which helps to correct the emphasis on German culture that dominates studies of nineteenth-century chamber music. And yet even these sections are framed with respect to German culture, and tend to reinforce the canon – especially discussion of the influence of Beethoven’s late quartets. Let me not miss the point here: German culture was constructed as dominant, and Beethoven was constructed as the ‘giant’ of every budding composer’s European chamber musical heritage by German writers of the nineteenth century. In some very real sense, German culture did dominate, and Beethoven did cast a giant shadow. Lott’s emphasis on these aspects mirrors traditional historical narratives that still strongly influence our telling of chamber music’s history. A slightly more critical approach to these topics, in an otherwise critically aware book, would have been welcome.

Lott’s book, then, might be considered strongest when she is talking about the German culture of stringed chamber music in the mid-nineteenth century (to place some qualifiers in the title). Yet the final chapter, dealing with Dvořák, is in many senses the most powerful. It certainly does challenge dominant narratives in the writing about chamber music, if not narratives of Beethoven’s influence. This chapter deals with the great variety of audiences that Dvořák faced in his chamber music, and the musical means by which he sought to meet their needs and tastes. As Lott puts it:

Especially well done is her reading of the C major quartet as a work that takes the domestic style (as she has defined it) and repackages it for fin de siècle concert audiences. What is so useful in her analysis is the discussion of musical parameters other than the usual ‘primaries’ of melody and harmony (which tend to be privileged elsewhere in the book), particularly her consideration of the visual realm. Imagining performances led by ensembles such as the Hellmesberger or Joachim Quartet, Lott writes tantalizingly: ‘the visual spectacle of their bowings, the short rests, the constantly shifting intraensemble pairings, and so on – make this an especially appealing work to hear and see played by a star ensemble in a resonant hall’ (p. 232). Perhaps she could have contributed a few more comments on this visual nature of the late nineteenth-century string quartet – or is it the renewed appreciation of visual aspects by late nineteenth-century audiences? One is reminded of Theodore Helm’s comments in his seminal book on Beethoven’s quartets.Footnote ² Helm was among those listeners of the time who considered the visual experience of string quartets performance to be vital to its meanings. He observed that the finale of Beethoven’s Op. 59 No. 3, in particular, required a ‘genialer Führer’ [brilliant leader], someone like Joseph Joachim, and suggested that ‘the listener would do well to seek a place close to the quartet players in the performance of the C-major quartet’.Footnote ³

Lott’s new book is a useful corrective to dominant narratives, perhaps most especially her new contextual approach, and in the consideration of lesser-known composers. It also highlights three areas that would reward further study. First, it deals primarily with the mid-to-late nineteenth century, and charts some fascinating changes, especially with regard to canon formation and genre ideology, but without delving into detail. Second, Lott’s book focuses on Germany and German influence, and suggests how illuminating the study of chamber music cultures in locations outside Germany can be (notably those inhabited by Dvořák). Finally, it hints at the broad array of cultural factors that are relevant to the contextual study of chamber music in this and any era. Lott’s multifaceted approach paves the way for future investigations of chamber music that can take yet more account of the manifold relevant interactions that help shape its ‘social worlds’ – interactions not only between people and works, but also the surrounding social, institutional, and material environments.