Companion to medieval and Renaissance music

Much pre-1600 music sounds unfamiliar and strange to modern ears accustomed to the harmonies and rhythms that later came to dominate the Western musical tradition. How to account for this strangeness and how to weave it into our own musical experience are questions that confront us whenever we attempt to draw nearer to the music. In this important new study, Tess Knighton and David Fallows invite a number of international researchers and performers to contribute short essays on some of the most intriguing aspects of the subject. The essays examine such issues as: What was it like to be a composer in the Middle Ages? Can we appreciate the difference between a good and a bad piece of medieval polyphony? And why did certain musical genres flourish and others fall into disuse? Spanning over eight centuries of music-making, the Companion to Medieval and Renaissance Music will broaden and stimulate the reader's interest in this beautiful, but often elusive, music.