Good Music: What It Is and Who Gets to Decide

by John J. Sheinbaum

Over the past two centuries Western culture has largely valorized a particular kind of “good” music—highly serious, wondrously deep, stylistically authentic, heroically created, and strikingly original—and, at the same time, has marginalized music that does not live up to those ideals.
 
In Good Music , John J. Sheinbaum explores these traditional models for valuing music. By engaging examples such as Handel oratorios, Beethoven and Mahler symphonies, jazz improvisations, Bruce Springsteen, and prog rock, he argues that metaphors of perfection do justice to neither the perceived strengths nor the assumed weaknesses of the music in question. Instead, he proposes an alternative model of appreciation where abstract notions of virtue need not dictate our understanding. Good music can, with pride, be playful rather than serious, diverse rather than unified, engaging to both body and mind, in dialogue with manifold styles and genres, and collaborative to the core. We can widen the scope of what music we value and reconsider the conventional rituals surrounding it, while retaining the joys of making music, listening closely, and caring passionately.

320 pages, Paperback

Published November 29, 2018

Reviews

[Austin Hood · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved reading through Dr. Sheinbaum's philosophy and seeing all our class discussion topics pop up again in print! This issue of what makes "good music" is going to be a foundational one as I help to educate the next generation of performers, teachers, and listeners.

[Lynn Derks · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was given GOOD MUSIC as a birthday present. I am a life-long musician. I realized, quite a few year ago, that "good music" was in the ears of the beholder. Sheinbaum would agree, with the added encouragement to be open to the possibility of value in other genres of music.