The Mystery of Music

The Mystery of Music PDF Author: Lewis M. Holmes
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780692197875
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 346

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Book Description
Why do we like music? What does it do for us? How has it become part of our being? Questions about the origin and relevance of human musicality have fascinated many of the greatest thinkers in history, including Confucius, Plato, Rousseau, and Darwin. This book is a novel approach to the subject. The text is built around brief biographies, or 'profiles, ' of thirty musicians from the distant past. These musicians lived between approximately 2500 BCE and 1500 CE at locations that span half the globe. They came from a variety of social classes, and the group includes both men and women. The biographies provide a unique glimpse into the geographical spread and variety of ancient musical life. They form the basis for an exploration of the 'why, ' 'what, ' and 'how' of our attraction to music. As described in this book, ancient musical activities resembled those of the present: The Mesopotamian princess Enheduanna composed hymns to her gods. The Greek composer Pindar sold songs about athletes. The Roman emperor Nero got an ego boost by singing on stage. The Arabian songstress Jamila performed erotic music for her ecstatic fans. The European troubadour Marcabru used music to criticize upper-class immorality. The blind Japanese lutenist Akashi no Kakuichi composed a massive and influential musical war epic. Present-day musicians carry out a number of social, political, religious, entertainment, and other functions in society. Information from the profiles demonstrates that ancient musical practice involved carrying out the same musical functions as at present. To the author's knowledge, this is the first time that such a conclusion has been based on firm historical evidence. This evidence of constancy through different historical stages adds support to the view that human musicality is a genetically determined trait, rather than a characteristic that is acquired from the individual's cultural context. The text reviews and comments on evolutionary theories concerning the acquisition of musicality. 'Musical entrainment, ' which has recently received a great deal of attention from evolutionary scientists, is singled out for special attention. Examples taken from the profiles and elsewhere help to clarify this rather obscure concept. The book is introduced by an historical overview of the ideas expressed by philosophers, scientists, and others about music. Appendices to the text establish the relation of this study to traditional ethnomusicology and describe the anthropological framework that has been employed. More than 400 bibliographic references and a detailed index complete the presentation.

The Mystery of Music

The Mystery of Music PDF Author: Lewis M. Holmes
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780692197875
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 346

Get Book

Book Description
Why do we like music? What does it do for us? How has it become part of our being? Questions about the origin and relevance of human musicality have fascinated many of the greatest thinkers in history, including Confucius, Plato, Rousseau, and Darwin. This book is a novel approach to the subject. The text is built around brief biographies, or 'profiles, ' of thirty musicians from the distant past. These musicians lived between approximately 2500 BCE and 1500 CE at locations that span half the globe. They came from a variety of social classes, and the group includes both men and women. The biographies provide a unique glimpse into the geographical spread and variety of ancient musical life. They form the basis for an exploration of the 'why, ' 'what, ' and 'how' of our attraction to music. As described in this book, ancient musical activities resembled those of the present: The Mesopotamian princess Enheduanna composed hymns to her gods. The Greek composer Pindar sold songs about athletes. The Roman emperor Nero got an ego boost by singing on stage. The Arabian songstress Jamila performed erotic music for her ecstatic fans. The European troubadour Marcabru used music to criticize upper-class immorality. The blind Japanese lutenist Akashi no Kakuichi composed a massive and influential musical war epic. Present-day musicians carry out a number of social, political, religious, entertainment, and other functions in society. Information from the profiles demonstrates that ancient musical practice involved carrying out the same musical functions as at present. To the author's knowledge, this is the first time that such a conclusion has been based on firm historical evidence. This evidence of constancy through different historical stages adds support to the view that human musicality is a genetically determined trait, rather than a characteristic that is acquired from the individual's cultural context. The text reviews and comments on evolutionary theories concerning the acquisition of musicality. 'Musical entrainment, ' which has recently received a great deal of attention from evolutionary scientists, is singled out for special attention. Examples taken from the profiles and elsewhere help to clarify this rather obscure concept. The book is introduced by an historical overview of the ideas expressed by philosophers, scientists, and others about music. Appendices to the text establish the relation of this study to traditional ethnomusicology and describe the anthropological framework that has been employed. More than 400 bibliographic references and a detailed index complete the presentation.

Pink Floyd: The Music and the Mystery

Pink Floyd: The Music and the Mystery PDF Author: Andy Mabbett
Publisher: Omnibus Press
ISBN: 0857124188
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 168

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Book Description
A chronology and analysis of albums, shows, and recordings by Pink Floyd and individual band members as solo artists.

The Song That I Am

The Song That I Am PDF Author: Elisabeth-Paule Labat
Publisher: Liturgical Press
ISBN: 0879076801
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 160

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Book Description
The Song That I Am: On the Mystery of Music is a short but full-to-the-brim essay on the decisive role that great music (whether Bach, Tavener, or Gregorian chant) ought to play in the spiritual life. With admirable restraint Élisabeth-Paule Labat shares her interior experience of music and thus continually opens up fresh vistas through worlds of sound and spirit. With her uncanny gift of language, Labat precisely describes soundings and yearnings of the soul that many of us glimpse fleetingly. Because "only the lover sings" (St. Augustine), her final illumination is that the experience of profound music ought to transform us into the beauty that we hear.

What Is Music?

What Is Music? PDF Author: Philip Dorrell
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781411621176
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 318

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Book Description
This books outlines the author's new and original scientific theory about music - that music is a super-stimulus for the perception of musicality, where musicality is a perceived aspect of speech that provides information about the speaker's internal mental state.

Broken Music

Broken Music PDF Author: Marjorie Eccles
Publisher: Allison & Busby
ISBN: 0749016841
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 300

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Book Description
The year is 1919 and the population of Great Britain is still struggling to its feet after being hit by the atrocities of the First World War. Progress is slow, even in quiet spots like the village of Broughton Underhill, on the edge of the Black Country. Gradually, soldiers return, wounds begin to heal and people try to move on with their lives. But for the Wentworth family, this proves to be impossible as former police sergeant Herbert Reardon returns to the village, determined to finally find out what happened the night that his daughter, Marianne, was found drowned in the lake all those years ago, when the war was just beginning.However, as Reardon begins to investigate, it becomes clear that secrets still abound and lips are staying sealed. When Edith Huckaby, a maid from Oaklands Park, is found murdered in exactly the same spot, Reardon is convinced that the two cases are linked. As Reardon tries to discover the hidden truth, his suspects and witnesses are painstakingly trying to rebuild their lives, in a world which has been changed and scarred forever. Broken Music is a masterful portrait of the horrors of the frontline and the anxiety of the home front, as the loves and losses of wartime Britain are woven together and the truth slowly dawns on a local tragedy.

The Devil in Music

The Devil in Music PDF Author: Kate Ross
Publisher: Felony & Mayhem Press
ISBN: 1937384721
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 421

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Book Description
Julian Kestrel, gentleman sleuth and dandy, becomes fascinated with the unsolved case of the murder of a Milanese aristocrat and the disappearance of his protégé, a brilliant young English opera singer. What has become of the singer’s fiancée and the aristocrat’s notoriously surly manservant? Could the murder be tied to Italy’s tumultuous politics? Furthermore, the murdered marquis left a widow whose beauty makes Kestrel’s heart skip faster.

The Mystery of Samba

The Mystery of Samba PDF Author: Hermano Vianna
Publisher: Univ of North Carolina Press
ISBN: 0807898864
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 168

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Book Description
Samba is Brazil's "national rhythm," the foremost symbol of its culture and nationhood. To the outsider, samba and the famous pre-Lenten carnival of which it is the centerpiece seem to showcase the country's African heritage. Within Brazil, however, samba symbolizes the racial and cultural mixture that, since the 1930s, most Brazilians have come to believe defines their unique national identity. But how did Brazil become "the Kingdom of Samba" only a few decades after abolishing slavery in 1888? Typically, samba is represented as having changed spontaneously, mysteriously, from a "repressed" music of the marginal and impoverished to a national symbol cherished by all Brazilians. Here, however, Hermano Vianna shows that the nationalization of samba actually rested on a long history of relations between different social groups--poor and rich, weak and powerful--often working at cross-purposes to one another. A fascinating exploration of the "invention of tradition," The Mystery of Samba is an excellent introduction to Brazil's ongoing conversation on race, popular culture, and national identity.

The Music Festival Mystery

The Music Festival Mystery PDF Author: Carolyn Keene
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1439114161
Category : Juvenile Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 160

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Book Description
The International Friendship Club is sponsoring a fun weekend—but Nancy finds a melting pot of sabotage! For Nancy and her friends, Worldbeat Weekend at Emerson College is supposed to be a good time. Nancy gets to spend time with her boyfriend, Ned, and everyone plans to enjoy music and food from around the world. But the two candidates running to be the next president of IFC are from rival countries, and when they accuse each other of smearing their campaigns with dirty tricks, the chaos begins. Missing money and collapsing tents are just the start of the trouble. As tensions rise, the weekend spirals toward disaster. The local press is sniffing around. A public scandal would ruin IFC, and only Nancy can uncover the clues to track down the culprit in time!

The Mystery of the Stolen Music

The Mystery of the Stolen Music PDF Author: Gertrude Chandler Warner
Publisher: Turtleback Books
ISBN: 9780785776024
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
For use in schools and libraries only. The Alden children are thrilled when a famous orchestra comes to their town to perform, and when an original Mozart score turns up missing, they solve the mystery of its disappearance.

YEAR OF WONDER: Classical Music for Every Day

YEAR OF WONDER: Classical Music for Every Day PDF Author: Clemency Burton-Hill
Publisher: Headline Home
ISBN: 1472251830
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 448

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Book Description
As featured in the Telegraph and on Radio 4's Today programme. 'A magnificent treasury . . . a fascinating tour de force.' Observer 'Year of Wonder is an absolute treat - the most enlightening way to be guided through the year.' Eddie Redmayne Classical music for everyone - an inspirational piece of music for every day of the year, celebrating composers from the medieval era to the present day, written by award-winning violinist and BBC Radio 3 presenter Clemency Burton-Hill. Have you ever heard a piece of music so beautiful it stops you in your tracks? Or wanted to discover more about classical music but had no idea where to begin? Year of Wonder is a unique celebration of classical music by an author who wants to share its diverse wonders with others and to encourage a love for this genre in all readers, whether complete novices or lifetime enthusiasts. Clemency chooses one piece of music for each day of the year, with a short explanation about the composer to put it into context, and brings the music alive in a modern and playful way, while also extolling the positive mindfulness element of giving yourself some time every day to listen to something uplifting or beautiful. Thoughtfully curated and expertly researched, this is a book of classical music to keep you company: whoever you are, wherever you're from. 'The only requirements for enjoying classical music are open ears and an open mind.' Clemency Burton-Hill Playlists are available on most streaming music platforms including Apple Music.