Rose Rosengard Subotnik (née Rosengard; born 1942) is a leading American

musicologist Musicology (from Greek μουσική ''mousikē'' 'music' and -λογια ''-logia'', 'domain of study') is the scholarly analysis and research-based study of music. Musicology departments traditionally belong to the humanities, although some m ...

, generally credited with introducing the writing of Theodor Adorno to English-speaking musicologists in the late 1970s.

Early life

Subotnik was born in 1942 to Bruna Hazan (1909–2004) and David E. Rosengard (1910–1988) in

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

. David E. Rosengard was a math teacher who would later become the assistant superintendent of the Boston public schools. Subotnik graduated first in her class from Girls Latin High School (1959) and then first in her class at

Wellesley College Wellesley College is a private women's liberal arts college in Wellesley, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1870 by Henry and Pauline Durant as a female seminary, it is a member of the original Seven Sisters Colleges, an unofficial ...

(BA 1963). Upon graduation, she entered a PhD program in musicology at

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

(MA 1965, PhD 1973), under her advisor Edward Lippman. Her dissertation was on Albert Lortzing and the Social Analysis of German Popular Opera. While at Columbia, she also took classes with Paul Henry Lang, Jacques Barzun, and Lionel Trilling.

Personal life

Rose Subotnik married Dan Subotnik in 1969. Dan Subotnik is a professor of law at Touro Law Center, and has written extensively on tax, race and gender. They have two children.

Professional life

Subotnik began her teaching career as an assistant professor of musicology at the

University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, U of C, or UChi) is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois. Its main campus is located in Chicago's Hyde Park neighborhood. The University of Chicago is consistently ranked among the b ...

(1973–80). She received fellowships from the

American Council of Learned Societies American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, p ...

(1977), the

John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation The John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation was founded in 1925 by Olga and Simon Guggenheim in memory of their son, who died on April 26, 1922. The organization awards Guggenheim Fellowships to professionals who have demonstrated exceptional ...

(1977). Later, she was a visiting associate professor of music at the Graduate Center, CUNY (1986–7), joining the faculty of

Brown University Brown University is a private research university in Providence, Rhode Island. Brown is the seventh-oldest institution of higher education in the United States, founded in 1764 as the College in the English Colony of Rhode Island and Providenc ...

(1990); she was appointed full professor of music in 1993. In 2009, she won the American Musicological Society's Slim award which "recognizes an outstanding musicological article published in the previous year by a scholar beyond the early stages of her or his career" and was made an honorary member of the AMS. Early in her career, Subotnik's academic interests focused on the German philosopher Theodor Adorno (of the Frankfurt school), as she argued that music could not be dissected and fully analyzed out of context, i.e. without understanding its place in society. In recent years, Subotnik’s interests have turned to Tin Pan Alley and American musical theatre as well as critical theory.Brown University, http://research.brown.edu/research/profile.php?id=10316

Books

* ''Developing Variations: Style and Ideology in Western Music'' (University of Minnesota Press, 1991) * ''Deconstructive Variations: Music and Reason in Western Society'' (University of Minnesota Press, 1995)

Selected Additional Writings

* "Adorno and the New Musicology," in ''Adorno: A Critical Reader'', ed. Nigel Gibson and Andrew Rubin (Blackwell, 2000) * “Afterword: Towards the Next Paradigm of Musical Scholarship,” in ''Beyond Structural Listening: Postmodern Modes of Hearing'', ed. Andrew Dell’Antonio (University of California Press, 2004) * "Shoddy Equipment for Living?: Deconstructing the Tin Pan Alley Song," in ''Musicological Identities: Essays in Honor of Susan McClary'', ed. Raymond Knapp, Steven Baur and Jacqueline Warwick (Ashgate, 2008) * "How Many Ways Can You Idolize a Song?," in ''Idol Anxiety'', ed. Josh Ellenbogen and Aaron Tugendhaft (Stanford University Press, 2011)

References