Prairie Avenue evolved into Chicagorsquo;s most exclusive residential street during the last three decades of the 19th century. The cityrsquo;s wealthiest citizensmdash;Marshall Field; Philip Armour; and George Pullmanmdash;were soon joined by dozens of Chicagorsquo;s business; social; and civic leaders; establishing a neighborhood that the Chicago Herald proclaimed ldquo;a cluster of millionaires not to be matched for numbers anywhere else in the country.rdquo; Substantial homes were designed by the leading architects of the day; including William Le Baron Jenney; Burnham and Root; Solon S. Beman; and Richard Morris Hunt. By the early 1900s; however; the neighborhood began a noticeable transformation as many homes were converted to rooming houses and offices; while others were razed for construction of large plants for the printing and publishing industry. The rescue of the landmark Glessner house in 1966 brought renewed attention to the area; and in 1979; the Prairie Avenue Historic District was designated. The late 1990s saw the rebirth of the area as a highly desirable residential neighborhood known as the South Loop.
#1086284 in eBooks 2009-04-17 2009-04-17File Name: B0092WMFFK
Review
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful. Generally pretty horribleBy Christopher CulverPirkko Moisalas book about Kaija Saariaho. published by University of Illinois Press in 2009. is one of the few monographs on the Finnish composer. Unfortunately. it is a great disappointment.The problems are legion. For one. it appears that there was little to no real editing of the manuscript. Typos ("the ensemble LItinerairen"). spelling mistakes ("Karl-Heinz Stockhausen") and ungrammatical direct translations from Finland ("from the Finlands Academy") abound. Theres hardly a single page without such errors. Moisalas English style is atrocious and I wish she had simply written the book in Finnish to begin with and then had it professionally translated into English. Also. the book is lightweight. Discussion of her music is all generalities. At less than 150 pages long. it still manages to be highly repetitive. How many times do we need to hear the same general statement that Saariaho has incorporated timbre and tone-to-noise transitions into her basic musical grammars? There are sketches of the form of two works. but not a single score sample.I guess that the book does have some value for its trivia (the stuff that isnt mispelt to unintelligibility at any rate). and Saariaho provides something of an apology for why she no longer uses electronics as much as before. Still. anyone interested in Saariahos life and work can get the same information as here. and much more detailed analysis of her music. by simply doing a search at JSTOR and reading the articles which the Finnish Music Information Centre has placed online. The IRCAM publication about her music also has some lovely discussion of certain works.1 of 1 people found the following review helpful. First book about Saariaho in englishBy Jane SchwarzThis is absolutely a very good and profound introduction to Kaija Saariaho and her music. You get a lot of biographical and musicological information. and this coherent presentation is nice. especially if you have no access to all the finnish articles. interviews etc. You get a very good overview of the composers different phases e.g.. and a very profound description of the works related to the different periods of composing. You also get access to different kinds of statements from Saariaho herself (often translated from finnish). which is also nice. because she does not speak very much about her own music or aesthetics. and a description of her relationship to close colleagues and their common approach to art.It is written. as the author describes it. out of love for Kaija Saariahos music and you can sense the undercurrent of deep insight and understanding for this music. which makes the book special. There are how ever a lot of errors in the different types of data. and all though you find out. when the numbers do not make sense - as when it is said. that Peter Sellars direction of Messiaens Saint Francois dAsisse in Salzburg was in 1998 (it was in 1992). when it is supposed to have been an inspiration for Saariaho for her first opera. which must have been something like half-way finnished by then - it is a pity. that you have to do an extra check elsewhere to make sure. that you get the right information. If it was not for these errors I would have given the book 5 stars. because it is a very well written book.
