Books like Ways of Hearing by Damon Krukowski

David Byrne explores how time, place, and recording technology shape music, tracing evolutionary patterns and cultural responses that culminated in the transformative practices of the 20th century.

224 pages : 21 cm

At once exalted and shadowy, Chopin cuts a curious figure in contemporary culture. A Pole working among Frenchmen, he exudes exoticism even as he partakes of European tradition. A male composer who wrote in "feminine" gnres like the nocturne for domestic settings such as the salon, he confuses our sense of the boundaries of gender. Central to our repertory, he nevertheless remains a marginalized figure. The complex and unsettling status of Chopin in our culture - what it means and how it came aboutis Jeffrey Kallberg's subject in this absorbing book. Combining social history, literary theory, musicology, and feminist thought. Chopin at the boundaries is the first book to situate Chopin's music historically within his native Polish and adopted French cultures and to demonstrate the powerful effects of these historical constructions on present experience.

A Century of Recorded Music traces the evolution of 20th‑century sound recording from early engineers and classical labels to the cultural questions of authenticity, artistic intention, and the impact of recordings on performers and audiences.