A Love of Classical
My recent radio silence has been in part due to the fact that I seem to be incessantly busy with refereeing articles, grading papers, writing letters and evaluating applications of various sorts. But that is not all. Many of my previous posts have been inspired by the best of recent indie music, but in the new year I have let that interest lag considerably. Instead, I have become obsessed with the “classical” tradition in music–to the point that I have taken up piano once again and have been studying music as though I were back in school. Unfortunately, I’m simply not educated enough to write very informatively about much of this music.
I can, however, sing the praises of a book that has reignited my interest in numerous composers and periods of music history: Jan Swafford’s Vintage Guide to Classical Music. I can’t say enough good things about this book. It takes one through a tour of Western Music through the early notes of Perotin and Machaut through the minimalists such as Reich and Glass. Its principle structure involves a chronological series of composer biographies, with a section recommending “beginning points” for each composer. Meanwhile, important concepts and trends in the tradition (polyphony, atonality, the sonata form, etc.) are explained in lucid sections running parallel to appropriate composers. While not entirely uncritical, Swafford almost always leaves the reader excited to hear pieces from each composer with an eye towards their ineluctable place in the grand Western tradition. It ends with a glossary and a nice list of pieces that should be part of an inclusive historical library.
So, while I’ve been reading other things as well, it is Swafford’s book that has won my heart recently. Check it out!
