Books on Music History

As far as readability goes, you won't do much better than "The Lives of the Great Composers" by Harold C. Schonberg. It covers all the major dudes and the theoretical stuff they were grappling with. Then, for your 20th century stuff, read "To Boulez and Beyond: Music in Europe Since the Rite of Spring" by Joan Peyser, which is all your highbrow stuff emanating from Schoenberg and Stravinsky, and the recent "Music Downtown" by Kyle Gann, which'll get you your minimalists and maximalists and John Cage. Good shit!

i was thinking of getting that gann book, you recommend then?

It's a treasure trove! I mean, since it's a compendium of previously published stuff there's a little bit of repetition and points HAMMERED HOME, but the guy's such a good writer and a lot of those people I've never read about in the same way. It really made me wanna listen to Morton Feldman, who so far has not disappointed. Lots of more conceptual pieces on the state of the scene, too.

I don't own it, but if you're looking for something comprehensive, Grout's History of Western Music is apparently the standard for college music courses. pretty daunting, though.. there's a "concise" version, too.

i'll second The Lives of the Great Composers.

and i'll buy the other ones

Yeah, that Grout/Palisca's what we used in college. It's fine and is a textbook, and if you're looking for depth of theoretical info and musical examples and all that, by all means. Not the kind of thing you'd take to bed with you.

whoa, amazon reviews pretty harsh about that peyser book.

Though it might work as a sleep aid! (xp)

Morgan's "Twentieth Century Music" and Griffith's "Modern Music and After" look great, though.

Eek! (xp) Those reviewers sound like they might prefer the Gann book. Um, yeah, if you're writing a paper and you care about Beethoven's city of birth, use the Grout/Palisca. But Peyser's book was good for a broad overview of (mostly) academic music, of the Stravinsky vs. Schoenberg camps, and of Boulez's thought. (Hmmm, now I wonder how much getting the city wrong should discredit her...) It was a good read.

Sanneh's Major Labels is a pretty solid survey of the last 50 years, though as such it lacks a thesis and sometimes remains (imo) frustratingly neutral. Plus, as more or less a peer of mine in terms of interests and age and general background, there were few illuminating observations he made, as much as I enjoyed reading it. The best parts are where he talks about criticism, which is to say, the book's most personal bits, which makes me wish he had written that book instead.

Did you see Christgau’s criticism of the book.? He listed a bunch of names he felt were unfairly left out and sometimes his points seemed more petty than needed.

Reading his review just now I think what Christgau is missing is that Sanneh’s book is only a history of popular music genres from 1970 till now, not a complete history of popular music. This is why there’s nothing in it about Bing Crosby or Fats Waller or several other names Christgau whines about. And there’s no reggae chapter, that’s why there’s little talk about reggae. But he does make a few good points toward the end of the review… e.g. Sanneh is kind of weak on dance music, does not acknowledge deep structures in pop such as James Brown-derived funk rhythm,, etc. It’s an interesting book but by no means is it all I wanted to know on this topic. And I definitely agree with the “frustratingly neutral” complaint made by JiC.

Jeezus, these are some long sentences in the 1st paragraph of Xgau’s review.

Just looked at a recent “Xgau Sez” Q&A—didn’t know he did “political” commentary, this is fairly fierce stuff.

I assumed the revive would be for Bob Stanley's new book, which looks like it covers the period up to 'Yeah Yeah Yeah'.

Bob’s new book Let’s Do It:The Birth of Pop will be published next May. There will be events! And exclusives! pic.twitter.com/FIiwSLp8wO

— Saint Etienne (@bobpetesarah) November 24, 2021

X-post from Christgau re Sanneh book ( as noted above Sanneh likely was not intending to cover all American popular music from 20 th century, but Christgau does name some more recent artists)

Sanneh’s history doesn’t even mention in reverse chronological order—Laurie Anderson, the Gang of Four, Al Green, Captain Beefheart, the Kinks, the Shirelles, Etta James, the Drifters, Lefty Frizzell, Fats Waller, Bing Crosby, Bill Monroe, and, last but also first, Louis Armstrong, who was often called Satchmo but preferred nothing more or less than Pops, recede ever further into the mists of literature. But though it’s pretty strange to stick Bob Marley in with the singer-songwriters because you have no room for pre-dancehall reggae, Sanneh does well enough with a general practice of devoting paragraphs or anyway sentences to many other faded and present kings and queens of pop.

But Sanneh's book is a study of genres and their significance and evolution, it's not a biographical survey. And it's only about the handful of major genres that he chose to give a chapter to. Perhaps the cover of the book is a bit misleading, suggesting something wider in scope than that.