Music-History & Criticism

The Texas Panhandle's frontier days were fresh in memory when fiddler Eck Robertson (1887-1975) arrived. Cowboys still worked on ranches in the 1910s but barbed-wire fences abounded too. Robertson pursued a continually evolving strategy to profit from the feverish transformation of living history into...

Writing Jazz presents interviews with fourteen distinguished jazz scholars: Whitney Balliett, Bob Blumenthal, Stanley Crouch, Linda Dahl, Maxine Gordon, Farah Jasmine Griffin, John Edward Hasse, Willard Jenkins, Hettie Jones, Robin D. G. Kelley, Laurie Pepper, Tom Piazza, Ricky Riccardi, and A. B. Spellman. This...

In this insightful new volume, Jack Chambers explores Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington's music thematically, collating motifs, memes, and predilections that caught Ellington's attention and inspired his restless muse. In presenting Ellington's work in this manner, Chambers situates the music in the context in which...

In this insightful new volume, Jack Chambers explores Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington's music thematically, collating motifs, memes, and predilections that caught Ellington's attention and inspired his restless muse. In presenting Ellington's work in this manner, Chambers situates the music in the context in which...

From the mid-1950s to the mid-1970s, showbands became all the rage among Ireland's dancing audiences. Performing covers of rock 'n' roll and pop hits from American and British weekly Top 10 charts, they riveted their audiences, dismayed parish priests, and offered Irish youth a...

From the mid-1950s to the mid-1970s, showbands became all the rage among Ireland's dancing audiences. Performing covers of rock 'n' roll and pop hits from American and British weekly Top 10 charts, they riveted their audiences, dismayed parish priests, and offered Irish youth a...

Between 1937 and 1940 fieldworkers in the Works Progress Administration's Federal Writers' Project interviewed around 3,500 formerly enslaved people in North America, resulting in roughly 20,000 pages of still unedited and inadequately indexed typescript. These accounts--the WPA ex-slave narratives--are the most substantial collection by...

A new analysis of Mahler's symphonies, placing each within the context of his musical way of being in and experiencing the world. Between 1888 and 1909 Gustav Mahler completed nine symphonies and the orchestral song cycle Das Lied von der Erde; his tenth symphony...

This book provides a record and analysis of the method of the late Madame Jenny Lind-Goldschmidt. It covers her life, her training, and her performances. The text is suitable for anyone interested in the history of classical music and the art of singing.This work...

On the possibilities and limits of the means of production in music-making todayThis book explores the many channels through which music is recorded and disseminated--from recycling and processing systems to the endless stream of lip sync videos--tracking their power as the engines defining music...

The former first horn of the Boston Symphony Orchestra writes about playing under Klemperer, Koussevitzky, Munch etc, the french horn, and specific horn passages. In this volume, Harold Meek, former first horn of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, shares anecdotes and insights about the joys...

Contributions by Amiri Baraka, Doris J. Dyen, Dena J. Epstein, David Evans, Kenneth S. Goldstein, Anthony Heilbut, William Ivey, Charles Keil, A. L. Lloyd, Bill C. Malone, Robert Palmer, Vivian Perlis, Mark Slobin, Richard Spottswood, and Charles K. Wolfe The essays in this collection...

Interlacing material from previously unknown Russian archives, original recordings, photographs, and essays, Gregory Haimovsky: A Pianist's Odyssey to Freedom is the story of an extraordinary Russian concert pianist who, fighting the cultural prohibitions of the USSR, eventually succeeded in performing and recording major works...

Some of Franz Liszt's most renowned pieces -- most famously his Hungarian Rhapsodies -- are written in a nineteenth-century Hungarian style known as verbunkos. Closely associated with the virtuosic playing tradition of the Hungarian-Gypsy band, the meaning and uses of this style in Liszt's...

A history -- the first ever -- of the abundant traditions of German-American musical theater in New York, and a treasure trove of songs and information. Nineteenth-century New York was, after Berlin and Vienna, the third largest German-populated city in the world. German-language musical...

Seventeen studies by noted experts that demonstrate recent approaches toward the creative interpretation of primary sources regarding Renaissance and Baroque music, Mozart, Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Verdi, Debussy, and beyond. How do we know what notes a composer intended in a given piece? -- how those...

The American Academy in Rome launched its Rome Prize in Musical Composition in 1921, a time in the United States of rapidly changing ideas about national identity, musical values, and the significance of international artistic exchange. Music and Musical Composition at the American Academy...

A major step in the rediscovery of one of the towering composers of the twentieth century; this brings to Schmidt's music the scholarship it so richly merits. Franz Schmidt is increasingly being recognised as a major composer. His music covers symphonies, quartets, opera and...

The songs of Roger Quilter are a staple of the English art song repertoire, yet little is known of his life, and his popularity suffered an eclipse in postwar years largely through changing musical fashions. Championed by the great English tenor Gervase Elwes, Quilter...

The Oratorio in the classical Era is the third volume of Howard Smither's monumental History of the Oratorio, continuing his synthesis and critical appraisal of the oratorio. His comprehensive study surpasses in scope and treatment all previous works on the subject. A fourth and...

Music hall reflected the lifestyles and preoccupations of working people in a way that only television in the modern era has done since. While London dominated the wider British music hall, Glasgow was the centre of a vigorous Scottish performing culture developed in a...

Germany in the Loud Twentieth Century seeks to understand recent German history and contemporary German culture through its sounds and musics, noises and silences, using the means and modes of the emerging field of Sound Studies. German soundscapes present a particularly fertile field for...

The Eloquent Oboe is a history of the hautboy, the oboe of the Baroque period. It reflects recent interest in this instrument, which was the first of the woodwinds to join with strings in creating the new orchestra, and had by the end of...

In 1981, David Bowie and Queen both happened to be in Switzerland: They met and made "Under Pressure." Recorded on a lark, the song broke the path for subsequent pop anthems. In Under Pressure, Max Brzezinski tells the classic track's story, charting the relationship...

Author: Kevin NikkelISBN-10: 1772841102ISBN-13: 9781772841107Publisher: University of Manitoba PressLanguage: EnglishPublished: 05/22/2025Pages: 400Format: Paperback

This book transforms our understanding of a fifteenth-century musical revolution. Renaissance composers developed fresh ways of handling musical flow in pursuit of intensifications, unexpected explosions, dramatic pauses, and sudden evaporations. A new esthetics of opposition, as this study calls it, can be contrasted with...

This book addresses the complex conceptual, historical, and philosophical questions posed by Eduard Hanslick's influential aesthetic treatise, On the Musically Beautiful (1854). The contributions reveal the philosophical foundations and subtleties of his aesthetic approach.The collection features original essays written by leading scholars in philosophical...

In 1959, Belgian singer-songwriter Jacques Brel wrote and performed "Ne me quitte pas" (Don't leave me), a visceral and haunting plea for his lover to come back. As a teenager, Maya Angela Smith was so captivated by Nina Simone's powerful 1965 cover of the...

Famously signed to Decca instead of The Beatles, Brian Poole and The Tremeloes spent four years topping the charts, touring the world, and appearing in movies. Incredibly, when they split from their former lead vocalist, The Tremeloes went on to even greater success, with...

David Friddle explores choral methods and community choral ensembles that originated in the nineteenth century. Using more than one hundred musical examples, illustrations, tables, and photographs, he documents the expansion of choral singing beginning in the early 1800s.Author: David FriddleISBN-10: 1666911135ISBN-13: 9781666911138Publisher: Lexington BooksLanguage:...

From 1940 to 1990, new machines and devices radically changed listening to music. Small and large single records, new kinds of jukeboxes and loudspeaker systems not only made it possible to playback music in a different way, they also evidence a fundamental transformation of...

Originally published in 1911, this book provides a detailed account of the sword-dances of northern England. The book includes descriptions of the dances, their history, and the cultural significance of the tradition. Sharp's work is a valuable resource for folklorists, historians, and anyone interested...

Explore the rich history of music in Maine with this fascinating book. From fiddlers' conventions to classical ensembles, the author covers it all, shedding light on the people, places, and events that have shaped Maine's musical traditions. Featuring photographs, personal stories, and in-depth research,...

Essays on the history of bands in America from ca. 1820 to 1930, offering new insights on a major sphere of music making that brought diverse repertories to wide audiences. The essays in this volume, written by leading scholars in the field of American...

This volume brings together prominent scholars, artists, composers, and directors to present the latest interdisciplinary ideas and projects in the fields of art history, musicology and multi-media practice. Organized around ways of perceiving, experiencing and creating, the book outlines the state of the field...

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it.This work is in the "public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States,...

Southern Fiddlers and Fiddle Contests explores the phenomenon of American fiddle contests, which now have replaced dances as the main public event where American fiddlers get together. Chris Goertzen studies this change and what it means for audiences, musicians, traditions, and the future of...

Bach to Brahms presents current analytic views by established scholars of the traditional tonal repertoire, with essays on works by Bach, Handel, Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Chopin, and Brahms. The fifteen essays are divided into three groups, two of which focus primarily on the...

The long-awaited memoir of Julius Rudel, the legendary opera conductor and arts administrator, gives insight into his ground-breaking repertory choices and his collaborations with Beverly Sills, Plácido Domingo, and others. As a seventeen-year-old Jewish boy, Julius Rudel escaped from Austria after the Nazi invasion...

The first book about Elliott Carter's only opera--or indeed about any single work by this still-productive modern master. In 1997, the eminent American composer Elliott Carter teamed with British music critic/librettist Paul Griffiths to create the one-act opera What Next? Hailed by the New...

A half century after his death in 1960, Swedish tenor Jussi Björling remains one of the most beloved singers in the world. He spent forty-five of his forty-nine years performing in public, rapidly conquering opera-house and concert stages on both sides of the Atlantic....

Interdisciplinary articles bridge the gulf between classical and popular music. Modern musical-analytical techniques are applied to a wide range of Western music, disregarding barriers between different kinds of music. Topics discussed fall into three sections: compositional poietics (poietics being the pre-compositional activities of composer...

Ferruccio Busoni is most widely known today as the composer of such works as the Second Violin Sonata, the incidental music for Gozzi's Turandot, and the most monumental piano concerto in the repertory (some eighty minutes long, with male chorus in the finale). But...

A full-length study of two of Berlioz's most unique works, which combine the highest goals of both symphony and opera and incorporate two of the greatest classics of Western literature into a total fusion of the arts. This work studies two works that are...

A collection of essays commemorating Hector Berlioz's life and work on the 200th anniversary of his birth. This far-reaching collection of heretofore unpublished studies ushers in the two-hundredth anniversary of the birth of Hector Berlioz [1803-1869]. The contributors include leading music historians and two...

North Florida's proud folk music heritage reaches back more than half a century. The region claims many talented artists and song writers, including Frank Thomas, Bob Patterson and Charlie Robertson, while hundreds of solo, duo and group performers regularly inspire audiences at local venues....

Originally published London, 1924. Contents Include: The Serenade at Caserta "Les Indes Galantes" The King and the Nightingale Biography etc. Many of the earliest books, particularly those dating back to the 1900s and before, are now extremely scarce and increasingly expensive. Home Farm Books...

This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the original. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our...

""An Introduction to Music"" is a comprehensive guide to the world of music written by the renowned composer and conductor Leonard Bernstein and musicologist Martin Bookspan. The book is designed to help readers understand the fundamentals of music theory and history, as well as...

""The Illustrated Book of Scottish Songs from the Sixteenth to the Nineteenth Century"" is a collection of traditional Scottish songs compiled by Nathaniel Cooke Publisher and originally published in 1854. The book features over 100 songs, including ballads, love songs, and patriotic songs, all...