Grand aspirations: German composers' contributions to European history: a review of Alexander Rehding's "Music and Monumentality: Commemoration and Wonderment in Nineteenth Century Germany."

What makes a piece of music monumental? When does a composer deserve a ceremony to commemorate his or her work? In his Music and Monumentality, Alexander Rehding discusses "musical monumentality"and attempts to answer these questions. He notes that the term is used frequently, but rarely defined. Indeed, the Grove Dictionary of Music, a fine starting point for any musical research, does not have an entry for monumentality; rather, it sprinkles the term freely throughout many articles. The originating list for this review is H-German (November, 2010).