… studied musicology and philosophy at the University of Vienna and attained his doctorate in 2016. His research interests include aesthetics, musical criticism, the relations between musicology and art history, and the history of science and musicology in particular.
At the ACDH-CH, Alexander Wilfing is part of the research unit Musicology. From 2014 to 2021, he has been part of several research projects on the historical contexts of Hanslick’s aesthetics. From 2021 to 2023 he oversaw a project on the institutional establishing of musicology as an academic discipline in 19th-century Vienna, located in Frankfurt, Brno, and Vienna. He is currently leading a FWF-funded project on Hanslick’s criticism and its complex relation to his aesthetics and scholarly writings (2022–2025), conducted in Vienna, Salzburg, and at Stanford University. Since 2018, he is editor of Musicologica Austriaca: Journal for Austrian Music Studies.
Publications
Lectures
Wilfing, Alexander (20.04.2023) When Style Came Into Style: Guido Adler, Alois Riegl, and the Scientification of Musicology and Art History. Vortrag bei: Influence of the Vienna School of Art History III: Origins, Modifications, and Influences of its Theoretical Concepts, Prag/CZECH REPUBLIC <https://www.academia.edu/100175722/Conference_Program_The_Vienna_School_Of_Art_History_Origins_Modifications_and_Influences_of_Its_Theoretical_Concepts_?uc-sb-sw=94709409>.
Wilfing, Alexander (27.02.2023) Modernizing Musicology: Adler, Riegl, and the Concept of Stylistic Analysis. Vortrag bei: Viennese Modernism and Its Legacies: A Symposium in Celebration of Bojan Bujić’s 85th Birthday, Oxford/UNITED KINGDOM <https://www.music.ox.ac.uk/event/viennese-modernism-and-its-legacies>.
Wilfing, Alexander; Bunzel, Anja (24.11.2022) ‚Známý videňský a již zemřelý professor a aesthetik‘: Eduard Hanslick’s Double Lives. Vortrag bei: Učenecká korespondence a praxe vícejazyčnosti mezi republikou učenců a počátky moderní národní společnosti, Prag/CZECH REPUBLIC <https://komeniologie.flu.cas.cz/images/korespondence_program_net2.pdf>.
Wilfing, Alexander (29.09.2022) Politik, Kultur, Philosophie: Frühe Weichenstellungen der Musikwissenschaft und ihre Folgen. Vortrag bei: Jahrestagung der Gesellschaft für Musikforschung, Berlin/GERMANY <https://www.musikundmedien.hu-berlin.de/de/musikwissenschaft/Historische/gfm-tagung-2022>.
Wilfing, Alexander (22.08.2022) Guido Adler, Musicological Methodology, and 'Austrian' Positivism: Creating an Integrative Conception of Musical Research. Vortrag bei: 21st Quinquennial Congress of the International Musicological Society, Athen/GREECE <https://pcoconvin.eventsair.com/ims22/program>.
Wilfing, Alexander (07.07.2022) Of Pianists, Painters, and the Idea of Style: Guido Adler’s Attempt at the Scientification of Musicology and his Reception of Art-Historical Principles. Vortrag bei: Music and the University: History, Models, Prospects, London/UNITED KINGDOM <https://musicandtheuniversity2022.wordpress.com/>.