Capturing Music: The Story of Notation [Hardcover]

In todays digital landscape, we have the luxury of experiencing music anytime, anywhere. But before this instant accessibility and dizzying array of formatsbefore CDs, the eight-track tape, the radio, and the turntablethere 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.From the sparest clues showing the contour of early chant to the most intricate and beautiful musical symbols ever devised,Readers will delight in the exquisite beauty of this volumeit looks like a richly illuminated manuscript! And with Blue Herons expertly and lovingly produced recordings, this is so much more than a bookit is something rare and wonderful.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.Tom KellysFor 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.Marvelously witty and engaging.Mr. Kellys fascinating book tracks the centuries-long process by which pitches and rhythms were codified.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 Kellys witty and colloquial prose style makes the book much more approachable than you might expect.An entertaining history of how musicians learnedto record music for all time, filled with art that sings.