Introduction to Contemporary Music (Second Edition)
Category: Books,Arts & Photography,Music
Introduction to Contemporary Music (Second Edition) Details
About the Author The late Joseph Machlis was professor of music at Queens College of the City University of New York. Among his many publications are Introduction to Contemporary Music (Norton) and singing translations for many operas. Read more
Reviews
Sadly, this book is far too out of date being published in 1979 (according to Amazon). We are currently updating David Ewen's classic work "The World of 20th Century Music" published by Prentice Hall in 1968. The number of changes and new faces between 1968 - 2016 are far too numerous to begin to elaborate upon. Having studied with American composer, Aaron Copland, we noted that most of these older works do not include his death in 1990. In the case of American composer William 'Bill' Schuman, most older volumes do not include data about all of his works as he worked on several vocal works before his passing in 1992. There are a number of newer composers still omitted from most references including the large 20 volume Groves (1980). Groves is now on line electronically but at a high a price for the average subscriber, it remains out of reach for most students. In an age of electronics, it is still worthwhile to have text on a printed page rather than having to retrieve it electronically. Many of our colleagues believe electronics and published text go hand in hand. In the case of Groves Dictionary of Music, the only newer published edition is the "concise" single volume published in 1994, although Oxford has an edition published in 1999 which we use along with Colliers (out of print). If you truly enjoy 20th or 21st Century serious (classical) music, we do not recommend this book.
