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Shows how musical instruments and the sounds they produce are not incidental, but an integral part of music theory.

Many musicians dread music theory: Its rules and diagrams can feel stern and lifeless, far removed from the sounds that make music so thrilling. In this book, Alexander Rehding looks at music theory from a different angle. He argues that the sounds of the instruments on which music theory is demonstrated—starting with the piano in the music classroom—play a much more active role than we usually notice. They are “instruments” in a double sense: musical noisemakers, but also tools in a kind of scientific experiment. Rehding strips these devices down to their sound-generating mechanisms to show us how to read musical instruments for their theoretical content.

Instruments of Music Theory turns our attention to instruments such as multiphonic sirens, tuning forks, Chladni plates, Aeolian harps, and Wheatstone concertinas—these devices generate sounds that call for new ways of listening, measuring, and thinking about music. Bringing together music theory, critical organology, and media theory, this book can be read as a user’s manual for how to put sound back into music theory. Rehding shows us how instruments do not only produce sound—they produce knowledge about music. Through the lens of these new instruments, Instruments of Music Theory recasts fundamental musical ideas such as pitch, harmony, form, and scale from the ground up to give new meaning to the stuff we call music.

An unprecedented portrait of Sikh devotional music demonstrating how musical traditions shift to meet changing needs.
 
Kirtan—the sung expression of sacred verses—spans the Indian subcontinent, but it plays a unique role in the Sikh faith. In Sikh Kirtan and ItsJourneys, musicologist Gurminder Kaur Bhogal introduces the devotional tradition of kirtan, examining it alongside the writings of holy figures, the Sikh Gurus and Bhagats, and its practice among musicians. The long-established tradition of kirtan originated in a canon of instruments and songs, each of which produces a singular spiritual and worldly effect when kirtan is sung. However, the realities of colonization and migration have necessitated changes to these canonical practices. Bhogal offers a deep exploration of the traditions that gave rise to kirtan and a robust portrait of the many transformations kirtan has undergone, particularly in the wide-ranging Sikh diaspora, dedicating special attention to marginal kirtan players such as women and innovators developing digital techniques and styles. A practicing kirtaniya, Bhogal has spent her life studying and performing this music, steeped in the histories and controversies her book describes.

Through a rigorous explanation of the traditions and evolutions of kirtan, Bhogal ultimately shows that kirtan is fluid, multi-faceted, and ever-changing because it reflects the shifting spiritual needs and musical tastes of devotees and practitioners across the world. Moreover, wherever kirtan is offered and received, it heightens corporeal vibrations between practitioners and devotees to motivate a sense of social purpose, social responsibility, and selfless service.
 

Pipe organs were once a central (and sometimes hotly debated) part of Manitoba's cultural life. The Organ in Manitoba portrays that history--the instruments, builders, players and critics--from the date of the earliest known installations to the 1990s, and includes information on musical organizations such as the Royal Canadian College of Organists. It documents over a century of evolution and changes, from concepts of tonal design to styles of musical commentary and tastes, and includes an inventory of installations and specifications for over 100 organs. Well-illustrated with photographs and excerpts from historical reviews and other documents, it will be of interest to musicians, teachers, and music, church, and cultural historians.