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Jan 18, 2008

Greg rated it:

This book took me way too long to read, which is a little strange because I found it very interesting and quite inspiring. I'm tempted to give it five stars, but I'm too much of a dilettante when it comes to cough, serious music to not necessarily take everything that the author is saying at face value. I do have two complaints about the books though, the first is that the author clearly dislikes the one of the few people I probably do count as an actual hero of mine. I don't hold it strongl More...

3 comments like (13 people liked it)

Dec 30, 2011

Austen rated it:

Ross brings a lot of enthusiasm to the subject of 20th Century classical composition. Unfortunately, that is one of the few highlights here. The book's problems are many. It is probably a little too dense and heavy on music theory for many casual readers, but also too light and uncritical to make waves in a scholarly sense. Books of that sort tend to only succeed when the writing is taut and engaging. But this is too long by at least a third (a whole chapter on Britten, really?). Ross is a More...

0 comments like (3 people liked it)

Dec 29, 2007

Gary rated it:

alex ross is one of the few remaining music critics for a major american periodical (there used to be many more, but it's a dwindling profession/art), in his case, the new yorker. he attends a concert more than once if possible, with the score and without, in order to both understand the music and feel it. and he's young, so his ears aren't burdened with decades of ear wax, "received wisdom," archaic prejudice, etc.

how rare is it to ever find anyone who can write about mu More...

10 comments like (6 people liked it)

Jan 28, 2008

Tosh rated it:

Alex Ross' wonderful trip to the 20th Century via the world of classical music and it's composers. As I mentioned I had very little knowledge of classical music - especially modern. I knew Glass, Reich, Satie, but overall this is pretty much a new world music wise.

Saying that this is also the history of cultural life in the 20th Century. The best chapeters deal with Nazi Germany and Stalin's Russia and how they used music -and how it affected the composers of that place and time. More...

13 comments like (3 people liked it)

Dec 05, 2008

Bob rated it:

I heard many positive comments on this book, and being a lover of contemporary classical music, finally picked up a used copy. What's unique about the writing is that Ross mixes in just the right amount of historical context to the lively music scene of the past hundred years. You get into the heads of Stravinsky, Schoenberg, Strauss and Copland -- just to name a few -- and come to understand that their musical styles were tightly woven into the politics of the time. Schoenberg and his students More...

10 comments like (2 people liked it)

Jan 05, 2008

Joe rated it:

I began this book almost wholly ignorant of most of its central figures. I knew that "twelve-tone music" was something controversial and supposedly inaccessible, but I didn't know what it was or if I'd ever heard any. So there may be major composers skipped, controversies skirted, opinions presented as fact; I probably wouldn't know.

What I do know is that Alex Ross is a wonderfully passionate music writer, and he did a great job tying the history of 20th century music int More...

0 comments like (3 people liked it)

Jan 17, 2008

Alex rated it:

Ross, whose articles in the New Yorker I have followed religiously for years, and continue to anticipate with a zeal otherwise reserved for The Wire, delivers a multi-layered and exhaustively researched portrait of a century's music and its reception. His account includes not only a collection of nuanced miniature biographies of composers—both the duly celebrated and the tragically neglected—and sweeping, intertextual analyses of "the music"—from jazz rags and pop songs to symphonic m More...

1 comment like (2 people liked it)

May 22, 2009

Barnaby rated it:

This ambitious, thrilling guide to notational music in the twentieth century admirably succeeds in its many goals. Alex Ross, recent recipient of a MacArthur "Genius" Grant, is an accomplished music critic of the New Yorker. He maintains one of the most readable blogs on the internet: http://www.therestisniose.com.

In this his first book Ross traces the development of music from Strauss's epoch-inaugurating "Salome" through to the work of John Adams, considering m More...

2 comments like (1 person liked it)

Nov 06, 2008

Jason rated it:

This is a fantastic book for the most part.

Beginning with Mahler and Richard Strauss, Ross brings the century's greatest composers and their works to life. The book is part musical criticism, part history, telling the major events of the Twentieth Century through the accompanying soundtrack. Both tonal and atonal masters get good coverage, with Schoenberg, Strauss, Stravinsky and Mahler casting the longest shadows.

Ross is the music critic for The New Yorker, and his p More...

1 comment like (1 person liked it)

Apr 19, 2009

Brooke rated it:

Alex Ross is, in my opinion, one of the better writers for The New Yorker. This history of 20th-century art music is quite a feat: how to make some of the world's most difficult music accessible and understandable to the average music fan?

Really, even though Ross' ability to describe the music and explain its placement and importance in history is stellar, I was frustrated with my unfamiliarity with some of the pieces he describes. Here's a sample, from a description of Schoenber More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Mar 26, 2008

Jesse rated it:

As a music major, I studied 20th century classical music. However, it seemed to be placed at the end of the music history courses as kind of a novelty. The dark plots of the 20th century operas were marveled at. We thought that Harry Partch's 43 note scale was interesting, but never really considered if anything serious was done with it. I have no recollection of learning about any of John Cage's ideas. I'm pretty sure I would have loved Steve Reich's music if I had been exposed to it at t More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

May 08, 2008

Lawrence A rated it:

This is a truly amazing critical and historical survey of "classical" or "composed" music in the 20th century by an author conversant in both the "high art" of the European composers and their progeny, and the ragtime, jazz, folk, rock, and hip-hop music that informed and informs 20th-century composition throughout the world. Beginning with Wagner and Mahler, the giants of late-19th-century European composition, Ross traces the musicial, social, and political dimen More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Dec 15, 2007

Andy rated it:

Not sure what this book ultimately is - it's neither truly educational nor openly personal in approach. It's somewhere loose and in-between - like a series of magazine articles that each aims simply to be interesting more than anything else, often via flourishes that don't necessarily add up to anything, tasteful though they may be. That said, it's always intelligent and I enjoyed reading it. The outline of the chapters sketches a framework for thinking about 20th century music that's more reaso More...

1 comment like (1 person liked it)

Mar 13, 2008

pianogal rated it:

This one vacillates between a 3 and a 4. When Ross talks about listening to the 20th century - he mean the WHOLE thing. Everything from Strauss to the Velvet Underground. He also includes quite a bit of theory behind the myriad of pieces he mentions. I thought it was fine - if a bit overexplanatory - but for the novice music lover who has no idea what a tritone is, this book might prove to be too much. If a comprehensive overview of Mahler to minimalism sounds like more than you can handle, More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Dec 02, 2008

Ben rated it:

This ranks with some of the best non-fiction for laymen out there (much of which is written by John McPhee.)

A glut of information, generously larded through with singular anecdotes and quotes, surrounded by the obvious and intense love for the subject felt by Alex Ross.

In some ways it is the chronicle of necessity of the implosion of an art form. In other ways it suggests a crippling hubris in those who imploded it. It is also the story of how technology changed society More...

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Aug 08, 2011

Juan-Pablo rated it:

In the Preface, Ross writes: "[...]Still, even if history can never tell us exactly what music means, music can tell us something about history. My subtitle is meant literally; this is the twentieth century heard through its music." If you are looking for a History of Music, this book will surely disappoint. However, if you want to read the History of the Twentieth Century through Music, this book is a really enjoyable ride.

This is largely the story of how composers, musicia More...

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Apr 30, 2011

Andrew rated it:

By the last scene of Act I, when the brutish Drum Major forces himself on Marie to the tune of dissonated C-major chords and the strains of “We poor people,” the method of the opera is clear. Strongly dissonant writing suggests the working of abstractions: the cruelty of authority, the relentlessness of fate, the power of economic oppression. Tonal elements represent basic emotions—a mother’s love for her child, a soldier’s lust for flesh, Wozzeck’s jealous rage. The theme contradicts Schoenber More...

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Apr 22, 2011

Tony rated it:

This is a remarkable overview of the music of the twentieth century, brimming with insight and an obvious enthusiasm for the subject. Ross-- the music critic for the New Yorker-- accomplishes the difficult task of neither talking down to his audience nor affecting pretentious airs, while taking on the monumental task of presenting the continuum of modern music in the context of world events and social trends. To his credit, he deals with all manner of music of the past century, including stage m More...

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Apr 06, 2011

Adam rated it:

Everyone has different fantasies about what career they would have chosen if they didn't do what they currently do. For me, I would love to be a New Yorker essayist/critic. I'm not saying that it would use all my talents or would tempermentally suit me--that's why it's a fantasy. It just seems so cool.

Which brings me to this book. Which I absolutely loved (thus the five stars). Roos has a combines a comprehensive knowledge of his subject, 20th century "classical" music i More...

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Oct 27, 2010

lyell rated it:

good things about this book:

a) learn a lot of kewl things about your favorite 20th c. composers. schoengerg thot of musical notes as a weird physionognomy thing! berg, webern and schoenberg all enlisted for wwi service and here was a cute picture of them all geared up but it's not printed. morton fieldman was a sibelius fan! messiaen was straight laced and boring, in his personal life newayz! stravisky was on the payolla of the cia even tho he didn't know it! the cia also funded and pr More...

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Jul 16, 2010

Brian rated it:

Well, I must commend Alex Ross on a thorough history of the first half of the 20th century. Its insights into and narratives about the Second Viennese school as well as Stalinist Russia are quite detailed and fun to read. He also has what I think is a pretty good blog that continues his advocacy of new music.

I am a little miffed, however. My first critique is of how he handled Benjamin Britten. Granted, my first encounter with Britten was A Death in Venice which is probably the w More...

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Mar 16, 2010

William rated it:

This in not a book for everyone. But if you love classical music you will find it a means of widening your horizon. This is the history of 20th century music. We all know Beethoven and Mozart, but how many of us know Reich and Young. Well, we do, actually, because much of what they created as classical forms has morphed into Rock and Pop. Classical music in the 20th century has much to do with composers trying to make a living in the shadow of Beethoven and Mozart and mostly starving in More...

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Sep 10, 2009

Bruce rated it:

Alex Ross’ The Rest is Noise is a more or less chronological narrative of 20th century classical music, beginning with Richard Strauss and more or less ending with John Adams. Initially culled from Ross’ various New Yorker essays, concert reviews, and liner notes, Ross has done a nice job of seaming the whole together to form a more or less continuous narrative that only rarely falls into the trap of one darned thing after another. There are few epiphanies for those already well-versed in musi More...

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Jul 09, 2009

T rated it:

One’s ignorance -- one being the hodge-podge listener of all musics obviously known and rarely rare -- that ignorance smacks right up against this book, which blends interesting tidbits of ‘great man’ biography and historical watersheds with the motivations mysterious and crass whereby putative genius stretches and recombines the old into the what’s not been there before.

The incubation of novelty gets explained in terms both of audience reaction and insider musical techno-language More...

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Apr 29, 2009

Patrick rated it:

I was at odds when I started reading this book. I felt that when I was in college attempting to become a musician, my interest in 20th century music was minimal. (note: NOT minimalist!) Over the past few years however, my thoughts and ideas on music and shifted more toward the artists represented in this book.

There is an excellent amount of history on composers and even actual pieces in this book. Alex Ross does an amazing job of connecting the dots for readers who do not have a More...

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Apr 20, 2009

Josh rated it:

A gigantic survey, with all the weaknesses of surveys: speed, superficiality, and the eventual creation of a vague hum in my head, as if I'd been listening to, rather than just reading about, all these works over the last two weeks, at high volume and through very large headphones. That having been said, the biggest compliment I can think to give Ross's book is that, two weeks ago, I knew nothing about classical music; now I know something and have the desire to learn and listen to much more. So More...

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Apr 15, 2009

Jim rated it:

The great charm of this book comes from the way Ross ties together the work, the lives of the composers, and the general trends in history much in the way Kenneth Clark did in Civilisation, the great art history book (and TV series) of my youth.

The sections on music under Stalin and Hitler are particularly dramatic. When politicians decide that serious music is truly important, it turns out that not every artist benefits. Nobody really wants a critic that can have you killed if th More...

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Jan 03, 2009

Kyle rated it:

While some of the sections spent discussing familiar works and composers can become tiresome for those who have encountered similar material in other books, 'The Rest is Noise' sheds new light on the complexity of the relationships between composers, their works, and their contemporaries. Pieces aren't discussed in a vacuum. Many famous and well regarded pieces, as well as their composers, are approached honestly, fairly, and without all the pretense of idol worship most authors generally approa More...

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Aug 10, 2008

Pia rated it:

I'm gobbling this up. I grew up with musician parents but we never talked about music. So Alex Ross feels like the family I always wanted. My copy's studded with 3M markers and I've been on a Mahler binge since I started reading this. I want to hear every piece he mentions, which will keep me busy and happy and moved for the rest of the year. The writing's accessible, generous, and the vivid lives of the composers he discusses make for better reading than People Magazine.

1 comment like (2 people liked it)

Oct 24, 2010

Brenda C rated it:

I suppose many people would call this a revisionist view of 20th century music, but in my mind, it's quite a valid perspective. For one thing, he shows the indelible affect that American jazz has had upon classical music.

His descriptions of the social and political upheavals people experienced in the Western make so obviously evident that the dissonance of twelve-tone composition and other "modern" compositional techniques reflected the dissonance and darkness of the tim More...

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