Virtuosity as rhetoric: Agency and transformation in Paganini's mastery of the violin

Abstract

While virtuosic‐or incredibly skilled‐action is recognized as an important facet of symbolic activity, talk of virtuosity is often limited to the superficial and deceptive uses of talent, a trend that constrains the rhetorical nature of human agency. This essay examines virtuosity as a performance in which the agent's display of extraordinary skill is valued because it transfigures cultural ideals concerning the expressive power of the human agent. The study examines in detail a concert by Nicola Paganini, the nineteenth century violinist whose striking expressive force functioned rhetorically to expand ideas concerning music and human agency, and to evoke a unique sense of communitas by embodying the ideals of the Romantic era.

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