David Conway

David Conway

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Introduction

David Allen Conway (born 17 February 1950) is a British music historian. Born in London, and educated at Haberdashers' Aske's Boys' School, he studied economics and psychology as an undergraduate at King's College, Cambridge and later obtained a PhD degree at University College, London, where he has been since 2008 an Honorary Research Fellow. He is the brother of the journalist Barbara Conway (1952–1991).

In 2012 his book Jewry in Music was published by Cambridge University Press. It "analyses why and how Jews, virtually absent from western art music until the end of the eighteenth century, came to be represented in all branches of the profession as leading figures – not only as composers and performers, but as publishers, impresarios and critics." The musicologist Tina Frühauf has commented "This is the first book that surveys the history of Jews in Western music in an analytical and systematic way, focusing particularly on those countries that had well-developed musical centers at the time." The music historian John Deathridge, on the BBC radio programme Music Matters, has called it "an excellent book about the role of Jews in the emancipation of music from the Church and the court at the end of the eighteenth century."

Conway is also a contributor to journals including Slavonic and East European Review, The Wagner Journal and Jewish Renaissance.

Since 1991 Conway has acted as a Senior Expert for the European Commission in development aid projects in the countries of the former Soviet Union. He is a founder and director of the music festival Levočské babie leto in Levoča, Slovakia.

Publications

include:

  • Jewry in Music: Entry to the Profession from the Enlightenment to Richard Wagner (2012). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9781316639603.
  • "A New Song" in The Cambridge Companion to Jewish Music ed. Joshua Walden (2015). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9781107623750
  • "The Real Faust: Heine's Faust Ballet Scenario 1846–1948", in The Oxford Handbook of Faust in Music. ed. Lorna Fitzsimmons and Charles McKnight (2017). Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780199935185.