The best one-volume history yet on the subject for musicians and enthusiasts, professional or amateur.
A superb, all-encompassing survey of music in America.
The US has the most diverse and complex musical culture in the world, mostly because all the rest of the world is its source. Over the last 150 years in particular, countless varieties of music have been brought here by immigrants and have made their way into the mainstream, often combining with other varieties and creating a new art form. Crawford (Music/Univ. of Michigan) has assembled an extremely impressive single-volume reference that tells this history in a most readable and pleasurable way. His approach is similar to that of Arthur Loesser in his classic Men, Women and Pianos: Crawford tells the story of American music from the larger point of view of American history. He maintains a scrupulous objectivity and avoids the problem endemic to other works of this sort, namely, the application of 20th-century mores to an earlier culture. Overall, his breadth of knowledge is astonishing. He is facile in every genre, whether it is 17th-century New England psalmody, 19th-century musical theater, 1950s rhythm-and-blues, the British invasion, etc. Because his expertise and interest are so broad, his work lacks the “us vs. them” quality found in musical surveys by more parochial scholars. When he delves into controversial subjects (e.g., “performance art”), he treads the careful path, presenting both sides. When venturing an opinion, he is considerate of the opposing view. One of his best chapters concerns what he refers to as “the Gap,” the separation of contemporary composers from their audiences. While fair-minded as always, he presents a damning picture of the “university music school composer” whose near-complete isolation from the concert-going public results in music that is often unplayable. The prose is invariably engrossing, if not scintillating, and the only complaint some readers may have is over the fairly scanty consideration of rap and hip-hop, which seems appended. To others, of course, that brief treatment may be an advantage.
The best one-volume history yet on the subject for musicians and enthusiasts, professional or amateur.Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-393-04810-1
Page Count: 923
Publisher: Norton
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2001
BOOK REVIEW
An enjoyable slice of 20th-century music journalism almost certain to provide something for most readers, no matter one’s...
Music journalist and musician Wald (Talking 'Bout Your Mama: The Dozens, Snaps, and the Deep Roots of Rap, 2014, etc.) focuses on one evening in music history to explain the evolution of contemporary music, especially folk, blues, and rock.
The date of that evening is July 25, 1965, at the Newport Folk Festival, where there was an unbelievably unexpected occurrence: singer/songwriter Bob Dylan, already a living legend in his early 20s, overriding the acoustic music that made him famous in favor of electronically based music, causing reactions ranging from adoration to intense resentment among other musicians, DJs, and record buyers. Dylan has told his own stories (those stories vary because that’s Dylan’s character), and plenty of other music journalists have explored the Dylan phenomenon. What sets Wald's book apart is his laser focus on that one date. The detailed recounting of what did and did not occur on stage and in the audience that night contains contradictory evidence sorted skillfully by the author. He offers a wealth of context; in fact, his account of Dylan's stage appearance does not arrive until 250 pages in. The author cites dozens of sources, well-known and otherwise, but the key storylines, other than Dylan, involve acoustic folk music guru Pete Seeger and the rich history of the Newport festival, a history that had created expectations smashed by Dylan. Furthermore, the appearances on the pages by other musicians—e.g., Joan Baez, the Weaver, Peter, Paul, and Mary, Dave Van Ronk, and Gordon Lightfoot—give the book enough of an expansive feel. Wald's personal knowledge seems encyclopedic, and his endnotes show how he ranged far beyond personal knowledge to produce the book.
An enjoyable slice of 20th-century music journalism almost certain to provide something for most readers, no matter one’s personal feelings about Dylan's music or persona.Pub Date: July 25, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-06-236668-9
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Dey Street/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 15, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
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