NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • David Byrne’s incisive and enthusiastic look at the musical art form, from its very inceptions to the influences that shape it, whether acoustical, economic, social, or technological—now updated with a new chapter on digital curation. “How Music Works is a buoyant hybrid of social history, anthropological survey, autobiography, personal philosophy, and business manual”—The Boston Globe Utilizing his incomparable career and inspired collaborations with Talking Heads, Brian Eno, and many others, David Byrne taps deeply into his lifetime of knowledge to explore the panoptic elements of music, how it shapes the human experience, and reveals the impetus behind how we create, consume, distribute, and enjoy the songs, symphonies, and rhythms that provide the backbeat of life. Byrne’s magnum opus uncovers thrilling realizations about the redemptive liberation that music brings us all.

"Any readers whose love of music has somehow not led them to explore the technical side before will surely find the result a thoroughly accessible, and occasionally revelatory, primer."—Seattle Post-Intelligencer What makes a musical note different from any other sound? How can you tell if you have perfect pitch? Why do ten violins sound only twice as loud as one? Do your Bob Dylan albums sound better on CD vinyl? John Powell, a scientist and musician, answers these questions and many more in How Music Works, an intriguing and original guide to acoustics. In a clear and engaging voice, Powell leads you on a fascinating journey through the world of music, with lively discussions of the secrets behind harmony timbre, keys, chords, loudness, musical composition, and more. From how musical notes came to be (you can thank a group of stodgy men in 1939 London for that one), to how scales help you memorize songs, to how to make and oboe from a drinking straw, John Powell distills the science and psychology of music with wit and charm.

Music education in the classroom with children from five to nine years.

How do we understand culture and shape its future? How do we cross the bridge between culture as ideas and feelings and physical, cultural objects, all this within the endless variety and complexity of modern and traditional societies? This book proposes a Physical Culture Theory, taking culture as a self-organizing impulse pattern of electric forces. Bridging the gap to consciousness, the Physical Culture Theory proposes that consciousness content, what we think, hear, feel, or see is also just this: spatio-temporal electric fields. Music is a perfect candidate to elaborate on such a Physical Culture Theory. Music is all three, musical instrument acoustics, music psychology, and music ethnology. They emerge into living musical systems like all life is self-organization. Therefore the Physical Culture Theory knows no split between nature and nurture, hard and soft sciences, brains and musical instruments. It formulates mathematically complex systems as Physical Models rather than Artificial Intelligence. It includes ethical rules for maintaining life and finds culture and arts to be Human Rights. Enlarging these ideas and mathematical methods into all fields of culture, ecology, economy, or the like will be the task for the next decades to come.

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book. Sample Book Insights: #1 The path of creation is different from the romantic notion of how creative work emerges out of an upwelling of passion. We unconsciously and instinctively make work that fits the preexisting formats. We work backward, creating work that fits the available venues. #2 The room at CBGB, where some of the music I wrote was first heard, was remarkably good for sound absorption and uneven acoustic reflections. Because of the lack of reverberation, one could be fairly certain that details of one’s music would be heard. #3 The New York club was initially meant to be a bluegrass and country venue like Tootsie’s Orchid Lounge in Nashville. The audience behavior was similar in both places, and the music was identical. #4 The music and dance styles of these cultures are metaphors for the social and sexual mores of the societies they emerge from. The music perfectly suits the available niche, and it is absolutely ideally suited for this situation.

Canadian-Argentinean pianist and composer alcides lanza is internationally renowned for his avant-garde approach to percussion, electroacoustics, and music theatre in works such as eidesis II, sensors III, un mundo imaginario, and vôo. Director of the Electronic Music Studio at McGill University since 1974, lanza was recognized by the Organization of American States with a Lifetime Achievement Award in 1996 and by the Canada Council for the Arts with the Victor Martyn Lynch-Staunton Award in 2003.