Music: A Subversive History

Description

The phrase "music history" likely summons up images of long-dead composers, smug men in wigs and waistcoats, and people dancing without touching. In Music: A Subversive History, Gioia responds to the false notions that undergird this tedium. Traditional histories of music, Gioia contents, downplay those elements of music that are considered disreputable or irrational-its deep connections to sexuality, magic, trance and alternative mind states, healing, social control, generational conflict, political unrest, even violence and murder. They suppress the stories of the outsiders and rebels who created musical revolutions and instead celebrate the mainstream assimilators who borrowed innovations, diluted their impact and disguised their sources. Here, Gioia attempts to reclaim music history for the riffraff, the insurgents and provocateurs - the real drivers of change and innovation. In Music, Gioia tells the four-thousand-year history of music as a source of power, change, upheaval and enchantment. He starts by exploring humanity's first instruments, which were closely linked to the food chain: the first horns were animal horns, our earliest string instrument was a hunter's bow and our oldest known instrument, the Neanderthal flute, was constructed from a bear femur. He turns to neuroscience to explain why the Celtic love story of Tristan and Iseult echoes the eleventh century Gorgani Persian love epic about Vis and Ramin, or why the troubadours of Europe echo artisan singers of ancient Egypt. He investigates the idea of "song as sin" as Church leaders for the first thousand years of Christianity attempted to control and suppress the songs of the common people and he explains the shift of music from a social practice to an economic enterprise during the Renaissance. Gioia shows how social outcasts have repeatedly become the great trailblazers of musical expression: slaves and their descendants, for instance, have repeatedly reinvented music in America and elsewhere, from ragtime, blues, jazz, R&B, to bossa nova, soul and hip hop. A revolutionary and revisionist account, Music: A Subversive History will be essential reading for anyone interested in the meaning of music.

Ted Gioia is a music historian and the author of eleven books, including How to Listen to Jazz. His three previous books on the social history of music - Work Songs, Healing Songs and Love Songs - have each been honoured with ASCAP Deems Taylor Award. Gioia's wide-ranging activities as a critic, scholar, performer and educator have established him as a leading global guide to music past, present and future.

"A dauntingly ambitious, obsessively researched labor of cultural provocation."--Robert Christgau, Los Angeles Times "Gioia draws on social science research into the past and present to forge a sweeping and enthralling account of music as an agency of human change."--Booklist, starred review "One of the most perceptive writers on music has cut a wide swath down the path of history, illuminating details often left in the shadows and broadening our understanding of all things sonic. Gioia vividly points out that the wheels of cultural advancement are often turned by the countless unsung heroes of inventiveness. A mind opening and totally engaging read!"--Terry Riley "An entirely new way to look at how music evolved." --Rosa Inocencio Smith, The Atlantic "In the past, [Gioia has] written a series of acclaimed books about jazz, but Music: A Subversive History is by some distance the most wide-ranging and provocative thing he's come up with." --Alexis Petridis, Guardian "Music is Gioia's magnum opus, an inventive and original work that spans 4,000 years. . . . Throughout this vital book, Gioia shows that music is still a disruptive force." --DownBeat "[Gioia] uses the familiar scheme of cyclical rejuvenation through transformation as a mechanism to consider the whole history of music, from the sounds of the primordial world to electronic dance music today, in his latest and most ambitious book. . . . Smart but readable." --New York Times Book Review "Essential." --Jacksonville Journal-Courier "Gioia asserts that music history generally shares the whitewashed stories of the assimilators. . . . Exhaustively researched." --Christian Science Monitor "Gioia takes a look at the underside of music history, teasing out the episodes of sex, violence, and rebellion out of which music developed." --No Depression "In carefully examining its 'subversive' side . . . Ted Gioia does much to convince us that music, far from being incidental to deeper political purposes or a convenient index of popular taste, is a profound 'force of transformation and enchantment, ' intrinsic to human society." --New Criterion "In describing the kinds of music that existed throughout history, [Gioia] treats topics that have long been suppressed or ignored by historians who crave respectability, topics such as magic, sexuality, and violence. . . . As a writer and thinker he is compelling and thought provoking." --Choice "Invigorating." --Pop Matters "Marvelous." --Marc Myers, Jazz Wax "Mr. Gioia's alternative history of music is extraordinary, groundbreaking, and bone-chillingly real." --Washington Times "There is so much rich history in this book; so many interesting and startling facts and stories." --Syncopated Times "[A] sweeping study. . . . The author aims to subvert our ideas about music history. . . . Gioia challenges notions of progress based solely on aesthetic or stylistic innovation . . . characteriz[ing] music history as a cyclical power struggle with shifting battle lines."--Larry Blumenfeld, Wall Street Journal "A revisionist history highlights music's connections to violence, disruption, and power. In a sweeping survey that begins in 'pre-human natural soundscapes, ' music historian Gioia (How To Listen to Jazz, 2016, etc.) examines changes and innovation in music, arguing vigorously that the music produced by 'peasants and plebeians, slaves and bohemians, renegades and outcasts' reflected and influenced social, cultural, and political life. . . . A bold, fresh, and informative chronicle of music's evolution and cultural meaning."--Kirkus "As a fan of 'big histories' that sweep through space and time, I gobbled this one like candy as I found myself astounded by some idea, some fact, some source, some dots connected into a fast-reading big picture that takes in Roman pantomime riots, Occitan troubadours, churchbells, blues, Afrofuturism, surveillance capitalism, and much more. A must for music heads."--Ned Sublette, author of Cuba and Its Music and The World That Made New Orleans "Gioia's argument is persuasive and offers a wealth of possibilities for further exploration."--Library Journal "Gioia's sprawling and deeply interesting history of music defies all stereotypes of music scholarship. This is rich work that provokes many fascinating questions. Scientists and humanists alike will find plenty to disagree with, but isn't that the point? 'A subversive history, ' indeed."--Samuel Mehr, Director, The Music Lab, Harvard University "I can't speak highly enough about Music: A Subversive History. . . . [Gioia] is always fun to read. . . . Gioia remains something of an outsider critic, convinced that the passion for destruction can be a creative passion."--Michael Dirda, Washington Post "In the space of a sentence, Gioia has let even the most cautious prospective reader know he has a lovely light touch, a mischievous sense of humour, and a determinedly skewed take on how music has been chronicled over the past 2,000-odd years. The highlights are too many to list. . . . He knows how to tell a story in a way that will keep people reading."--Times Literary Supplement "In this excellent history, music critic Gioia (How to Listen to Jazz) dazzles with tales of how music grew out of violence, sex, and rebellion. . . . Gioia's richly told narrative provides fresh insights into the history of music."--Publishers Weekly, starred review "In this meticulously researched yet thoroughly page-turning book, Gioia argues for the universality of music from all cultures and eras. Subversives from Sappho to Mozart and Charlie Parker are given new perspective--as is the role of the church and other arts-shaping institutions. Music of emotion is looked at alongside the music of political power in a fascinating way by a master writer and critical thinker. This is a must-read for those of us for whom music has a central role in our daily lives."--Fred Hersch, pianist and composer, and author of Good Things Happen Slowly: A Life In and Out of Jazz "Scintillating. . . . Gioia is writing about evolution and magic--this is a music history that synthesizes both Darwin and Frazer, and, at least in terms of writing for a general audience, is the first to do so. We need this story."--Brooklyn Rail "Ted Gioia's Music: A Subversive History is one of the most important and welcome books I've encountered in the last decade. If ever there were a book the world sorely needed, it's Gioia's."--Buffalo News "This book feels like the summation of a lifetime's avid musical exploration and reading. It has an epic sweep and passionate engagement with the topic that carries one along irresistibly."--Telegraph