Comparing Notes
1st Edition
Published on 1. May 2018
336 pages
978-1-68177-810-5 (ISBN)
Description
A tap of the foot, a rush of emotion, the urge to hum a tune; without instruction or training we all respond intuitively to music. Comparing Notes explores what music is, why all of us are musical, and how abstract patterns of sound that might not appear to mean anything can, in fact, be so meaningful. Taking the reader on a clear and compelling tour of major twentieth century musical theories, Professor Adam Ockelford arrives at his own important psychologically grounded theory of how music works. From pitch and rhythm to dynamics and timbre, he shows how all the elements of music cohere through the principle of imitation to create an abstract narrative in sound that we instinctively grasp, whether listening to Bach or the Beatles. Authoritative, engaging, and full of wonderful examples from across the musical spectrum, Comparing Notes is essential reading for anyone who's ever loved a song, sonata, or symphony, and wondered why.
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10/2019
Pegasus Books
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06/2018
Pegasus Books
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Person
Adam Ockelford
Content
- Cover
- Title
- Contents
- Prelude Insights from the Blind
- 1. How Does Music Work?
- Heinrich Schenker: The Radical Conservative
- Positivism and Postmodern Approaches
- Music Analysis Using Linguistic Models
- Explaining Music in its Own Terms: Arnold Schoenberg
- Degrees of Repetition
- Intervals and Transposition
- Coda
- 2. The Zygonic Conjecture
- Derek
- Building a New Theory of How Music Works
- Connections between Connections
- Frameworks of Pitch
- Rhythm and Metre
- Timbre, Loudness and Location
- Coda
- 3. How We Construct Musical Meaning
- Structure in Music and Syntax in Language
- Responding to Sound
- Structure and Content in Music
- Meaning in Language
- Meaning in Music: The Art of Simplicity in Sound
- Complexity and the Problem of 'Greatness'
- Other Forms of Musical Meaning
- Defining Music
- What isn't Music?
- Coda
- 4. We Are All Musical
- From Music Theory to Developmental Psychology
- The Sounds of Intent Project
- Musicality in Blind Children and Those on the Autism Spectrum
- Exceptional Musical Ability: Savants
- Coda
- 5. Composing, Performing and Listening
- The Challenge of Understanding Composers' Work
- Defining Originality in Music
- What Constitutes a Piece of Music?
- Understanding the Listening Experience
- The Problem of 'Atonal' Music
- Coda
- Postlude -Notes Compared
- Notes
- Further Reading
- List of Figures
- Acknowledgements
- Index
- Also by Adam Ockelford
- Copyright
