New Publications,
New Music Book Publications - 13th January 2020
Welcome to our latest selection of new music books. Our picks this time round include biographies of Johann Sebastian Bach and Irving Berlin; a history of fifteenth-century music; philosophical explorations of both the bodily experience and the love of music; an encyclopedia of Johnny Cash; a look at the evolving choreography of Broadway legend, Bob Fosse; a guide on how to deal with voice changes in adolescent singers; a basic course for music theatre students who have not been formally trained in music; and a discussion of the increasingly blurred distinction between music and sound effects in the modern soundtrack.
Composers
In this book, Peter Williams revisits Bach's biography through the lens of his music. Reviewing all of Bach's music chronologically, he reveals the development of Bach's interests and priorities. He also gives the keyboard music its proper emphasis, revealing it as crucial to Bach's biography, as a young organist and a mature composer, as a performer in public and teacher in private, and as a profound thinker in the language of music.
Available Format: Book
This fast-moving, musically astute portrait of arguably the greatest composer of American popular music explores the interplay of Irving Berlin's life with the life of New York City, offering a visceral narrative of Berlin as self-made man and witty, tough Jewish immigrant.
Available Format: Book
Music History & Philosophy
The Cambridge History of Fifteenth-Century Music
Anna Maria Busse Berger & Jesse Rodin (editors); Cambridge University Press; Paperback
This collection of essays offers overviews of composers, genres, and musical institutions as well as new and provocative reassessments of the work concept, the boundaries between improvisation and composition, the practice of listening, humanism, musical borrowing, and other topics. Multidisciplinary studies of music and architecture, feasting, poetry, politics, liturgy, and religious devotion rub shoulders with studies of compositional techniques, musical notation, music manuscripts, and reception history.
Available Format: Book
An authoritative and readily understandable study of the core compositional style of the eighteenth century. Gjerdingen adopts a unique approach, based on a massive but little-known corpus of pedagogical workbooks used by the most influential teachers of the century, the Italian partimenti.
Available Format: Book
There's nothing wrong with the human instinct to safeguard beloved music, except, perhaps, when this instinct leads us to hurt or neglect fellow human beings in turn: say, by heaping outsized shame upon those who seem to do music wrong. This book is a capacious exploration of how people's head-over-heels attachments to music can variously align or conflict with agendas of social justice. How do we respond when loving music and loving people appear to clash?
Available Format: Book
Enacting Musical Time: The Bodily Experience of New Music
Mariusz Kozak; Oxford University Press; Hardback
Offering a compelling approach to issues such as temporality, phenomenology, and the ecologies of the new sound worlds, this book argues that musical time is itself the site of the interaction between musical sounds and a situated, embodied listener, created by the moving bodies of participants engaged in musical activities.
Available Format: Book
The Oxford Handbook of Music and Virtuality
Sheila Whiteley & Shara Rambarran (editors); Oxford University Press; Paperback
A kaleidoscope of interdisciplinary perspectives from scholars on the way in which virtuality mediates the dissemination, acquisition, performance, creation, and reimagining of music. Authors explore phenomena including holographic musicians and virtual bands, and the issues surrounding the free circulation of music on the internet, as well as the dynamics of audience participation and community-building in a virtual environment.
Available Format: Book
Patrick Schmidt offers a variety of ways for K-12 music educators to engage with, analyse, and develop effective policy. He provides a conceptual vision for how to consider policy in the fast-pace of 21st-century music education environments, alongside a practical set of ideas specific to music education for a closer and more active interaction with policy, directed at providing 'tools for action' in the daily working lives of music educators.
Available Format: Book
Popular Music
Get Tusked: The Inside Story of Fleetwood Mac's Most Anticipated Album
Ken Caillat & Hernan Rojas; Backbeat Books; Hardback
In this behind-the-scenes look at the making of Fleetwood Mac's epic, platinum-selling double album, Tusk, producers and engineers Ken Caillat and Hernan Rojas tell their stories of spending a year with the band in their new million-dollar studio trying to follow up Rumours, the biggest rock album of the time. They detail not only the trials and sacrifices made to finish the album, but also triumphs of musical inspiration and technical innovation that have made Tusk the darling of music critics.
Available Format: Book
Thinking Outside the Voice Box: A Holistic Approach to Adolescent Voice Change
Bridget Sweet; Oxford University Press; Paperback
An holistic approach to female and male adolescent voice change, taking full consideration of the body, brain, and auditory system, vocal anatomy and physiology, and the impact of hormones on the adolescent voice, this book also addresses emotional and psychological components: ideas of perseverance that are essential to adolescent navigation of voice change, and stereotypes in pop culture that influence how people anticipate voice change experiences.
Available Format: Book
Everything Man: The Form and Function of Paul Robeson
Shana L. Redmond; Duke University Press; Paperback
From his cavernous voice and unparalleled artistry to his fearless struggle for human rights, Paul Robeson was one of the twentieth century's greatest icons and polymaths. This book traces Robeson's continuing cultural resonances in popular culture and politics, following his appearances in the forms of sonic and visual vibration and holography; theatre, art, and play; and the physical environment.
Available Format: Book
Musical Theatre & Film Music
Big Deal: Bob Fosse and Dance in the American Musical
Kevin Winkler; Oxford University Press; Paperback
With his first Broadway musical, The Pajama Game, in 1954, the "Fosse style" was already fully developed, with its trademark hunched shoulders, turned-in stance, and stuttering, staccato jazz movements. This fascinating look at the evolution of Fosse as choreographer and director considers his career in the context of changes in Broadway musical theatre over four decades.
Available Format: Book
Musical theatre students are frequently asked to learn musical material in a short space of time; sight-read pieces in auditions; collaborate with accompanists; and communicate musically with peers. Many of these performers will have had no formal musical training. This book offers a series of lessons in music fundamentals, including theory, sight-singing and aural tests, giving readers the necessary skills to navigate music and all that is demanded of them.
Available Format: Book
Sound Design is the New Score: Theory, Aesthetics, and Erotics of the Integrated Soundtrack
Danijela Kulezic-Wilson; Oxford University Press; Paperback
The practice of blurring the line between score and sound design has transformed contemporary film by challenging the hierarchical relationships between dialogue, music, and sound effects. This book explores the theoretical, aesthetic, and sensuous dimensions of this new trend, providing a multifaceted portrait of a practice which recognises the interconnectedness of all soundtrack elements and emphasises their inherent musicality.
Available Format: Book
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