The organ books and part-books used in Durham Cathedral over the centuries form the greatest part of this collection, those from the early seventeenth century being particularly well known and of special interest to music scholars and historians. In addition, instrumental music is significantly represented here in the donations made by Philip Falle (1656-1742) and Richard Fawcett (1714-1782), both prebendaries of the cathedral.
The contributors are leading scholars from the United States, Canada, Great Britain and Italy. The essays examine the history of music publishing from its inception to the early twentieth century. The Dissemination of Music provides new insight into the social history of music, illustrating how certain types of music were made popular because publishers made them more available, and how the reputations of composers were made or broken by the whims of publishers. This important reference work will interest scholars and students in all areas of music This collection brings the history of music publishing into the realm of social history, looking beyond the printing process to examine why and for whom music publishers produced their work. The book shows how technological limitations and printers' and publishers' preferences significantly influenced musical tastes in Europe from medieval times to the modern age.
The period covered by this volume, roughly from Purcell to Elgar, has traditionally been seen as a dark age in British musical history. Much has been done recently to revise this view, though research still tends to focus on London as the commercial and cultural hub of the British Isles. It is becoming increasingly clear, however, that by the mid-eighteenth century musical activity outside London was highly distinctive in terms of its reach, the way it was organized, and its size, richness, and quality. There was an extraordinary amount of musical activity of all sorts, in provincial theatres and halls, in the amateur orchestras and choirs that developed in most towns of any size, in taverns, and convivial clubs, in parish churches and dissenting chapels, and, of course, in the home. This is the first book to concentrate specifically on musical life in the provinces, bringing together new archival research and offering a fresh perspective on British music of the period. The essays brought together here testify to the vital role played by music in provincial culture, not only in socializing and networking, but in regional economies and rivalries, demographics and class dynamics, religion and identity, education and recreation, and community and the formation of tradition. Most important, perhaps, as our focus shifts from London to the regions, new light is shed on neglected figures and forgotten repertoires, all of them worthy of reconsideration.
This book is a volume in the Penn Press Anniversary Collection. To mark its 125th anniversary in 2015, the University of Pennsylvania Press rereleased more than 1,100 titles from Penn Press's distinguished backlist from 1899-1999 that had fallen out of print. Spanning an entire century, the Anniversary Collection offers peer-reviewed scholarship in a wide range of subject areas.
