The Oxford History of Western Music

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The Oxford History of Western Music is a narrative history from the "earliest notations" (taken to be around the eighth century) to the late twentieth century. It was written by the American musicologist Richard Taruskin. Published by Oxford University Press in 2005, it is a five volume work on the various significant periods of Western music and their characteristic qualities, events and composition styles. A paperback edition in five volumes followed in 2009. Oxford University Press had previously published narrative histories of music, although Taruskin's was the first sole author work, spanning over 4000 pages. [1]

Musical notation graphic writing of musical parameters

Music notation or musical notation is any system used to visually represent aurally perceived music played with instruments or sung by the human voice through the use of written, printed, or otherwise-produced symbols.

Richard Taruskin American writer

Richard Taruskin is an American musicologist, music historian, and critic who has written about the theory of performance, Russian music, 15th-century music, 20th-century music, nationalism, the theory of modernism, and analysis. As a choral conductor he directed the Columbia University Collegium Musicum. He played the viola da gamba with the Aulos Ensemble from the late 1970s to the late 1980s. Taruskin received his B.A. magna cum laude (1965), M.A. (1968) and Ph.D. in historical musicology (1976) from Columbia University.

Oxford University Press Publishing arm of the University of Oxford

Oxford University Press (OUP) is the largest university press in the world, and the second oldest after Cambridge University Press. It is a department of the University of Oxford and is governed by a group of 15 academics appointed by the vice-chancellor known as the delegates of the press. They are headed by the secretary to the delegates, who serves as OUP's chief executive and as its major representative on other university bodies. Oxford University has used a similar system to oversee OUP since the 17th century. The Press is located on Walton Street, opposite Somerville College, in the suburb of Jericho.

Contents

Oxford History of Music

The Oxford History of Music was first published in six volumes under the general editorship of Sir Henry Hadow between 1901 and 1905. [2] The first two volumes, written by H. E. Woolridge, were entitled The Polyphonic Period and began with the music of ancient Greece: these volumes dated quite quickly. The third volume, on seventeenth century music, was written by Sir Hubert Parry. J. A. Fuller Maitland wrote volume four on the age of Bach and Handel, Hadow himself wrote the fifth volume (The Viennese Period) and Edward Dannreuther covered the Romantic period in volume five. Other volumes were reprinted as they stood, but Sir Percy Buck, who was also involved with the OUP's Tudor Church Music, revised the first two volumes (1929 and 1932), and edited a new introductory volume (1929). The introductory volume included a contribution from Sylvia Townsend Warner. [3] In 1940 H C Colles added a seventh volume, Symphony and Drama, 1850-1900.

Harry Ellis Wooldridge English music antiquary

Harry Ellis Wooldridge was an English musical antiquary, artist and Professor of Fine Arts. His music collections included transcripts of 17th- and 18th-century Italian music.

Music of ancient Greece

The music of ancient Greece was almost universally present in ancient Greek society, from marriages, funerals, and religious ceremonies to theatre, folk music, and the ballad-like reciting of epic poetry. It thus played an integral role in the lives of ancient Greeks. There are significant fragments of actual Greek musical notation as well as many literary references to ancient Greek music, such that some things can be known—or reasonably surmised—about what the music sounded like, the general role of music in society, the economics of music, the importance of a professional caste of musicians, etc. Even archaeological remains reveal an abundance of depictions on ceramics, for example, of music being performed.

Edward Dannreuther German musician

Edward George Dannreuther was a German pianist and writer on music, resident from 1863 in England. His father had crossed the Atlantic, moving to Cincinnati, and there established a piano manufacturing business. Young Edward, under pressure from his father to enter banking as a career, a prospect he found uncongenial, escaped to Leipzig in 1859.

New Oxford History of Music

The New Oxford History of Music, initially produced under the general editorship of Sir Jack Westrup, began to appear in 1954 and was finally completed (with Volume IX) in 1990. It spanned ten volumes. [4]

Sir Jack Westrup was an English musicologist, writer, teacher and occasional conductor and composer.

Egon Joseph Wellesz was an Austrian, later British composer, teacher and musicologist, notable particularly in the field of Byzantine music.

Gerald Ernest Heal Abraham, was an English-Jewish musicologist; he was President of the Royal Musical Association, 1970–74.

Anthony Lewis (musician) British composer

Sir Anthony Carey Lewis, was an English musicologist, conductor, composer, and music educator. He co-founded and served as the first chief editor of Musica Britannica, producing scholarly editions of British music hitherto unavailable. He published critical editions of operas by Handel, Purcell and John Blow.

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References

  1. "A History of Western Music? Well, It's a Long Story" (brief interview with Taruskin by James Oestreich in the New York Times )
  2. The New Oxford History of Music, Questia library
  3. Anne Pimlott Baker, ‘Buck, Sir Percy Carter (1871–1947)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 accessed 16 Aug 2016 (subscription or membership of a UK public library required)
  4. Oxford University Press