Synopses & Reviews
In today's digital landscape, we have the luxury of experiencing music anytime, anywhere. But before this instant accessibility and dizzying array of formats--before CDs, the eight-track tape, the radio, and the turntable--there was only one recording technology: music notation. It allowed singers and soloists to travel across great distances and perform their work with stunning fidelity, a feat that we now very much take for granted.
Review
"From the sparest clues showing the contour of early chant to the most intricate and beautiful musical symbols ever devised, is engaging at every turn. Tom Kelly is a master storyteller." Ross W. Duffin, author of How Equal Temperament Ruined Harmony (and Why You Should Care)
Review
"Readers will delight in the exquisite beauty of this volume--it looks like a richly illuminated manuscript! And with Blue Heron's expertly and lovingly produced recordings, this is so much more than a book--it is something rare and wonderful." Susan Hellauer, founding member of Anonymous 4
Review
"With his characteristic blend of deep scholarship and clarity of style, Tom Kelly has written a timely history of the most significant revolution in musical practice of the last thousand years." Peter Phillips, founder and director, Tallis Scholars
Review
"Tom Kelly's is a splendid introduction to the wonders of medieval notational technology, written in an engaging way." Margot Fassler, Keough-Hesburgh Professor of Music History and Liturgy, University of Notre Dame
Review
"For generations to come, this lucid book will be the go-to study of notation for performers of early music, and a soothing balm for anyone who wants to understand how visual technology reflected the ways music was conceived, performed, and documented." Benjamin Bagby, director of Sequentia
Review
"Marvelously witty and engaging." Publishers Weekly
Review
"Mr. Kelly's fascinating book tracks the centuries-long process by which pitches and rhythms were codified." Eric Felten
Review
"Gorgeously illustrated... If you have ever wondered how a system of dots and lines in space came to express the arrangement of sounds in time, this engaging, chatty book explains how... Thomas Forrest Kelly's witty and colloquial prose style makes the book much more approachable than you might expect." Wall Street Journal
Synopsis
An entertaining history of how musicians learned to record music for all time, filled with art that sings.
About the Author
Thomas Forrest Kelly is professor of music at Harvard University. He studied musicology and chant on a Fulbright in France, and he has taught at Wellesley, Smith, Amherst, and Oberlin Colleges. His previous books include First Nights: Five Musical Premieres and First Nights at the Opera. He lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.