Electronic and Computer Music

By Peter Manning

Book Overview

This book provides a unique critical perspective on electronic music from its inception to the present day, placing emphasis on the works as well as on the philosophical, artistic, and technical features that have shaped the music's growth. Beginning with the antecedents of electronic music from the turn of the century to World War II, the book covers the design philosophy and output of the "classical" studios of the 1950s; the advent of voltage control and the resulting upsurge of creative activity; and the burgeoning field, of computer music over the past twenty years. The volume is enhanced by a bibliography and an extensive discography.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0193119234
• ISBN13: 9780193119239
• Release Date: September 1987
• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Length: 300 Pages
• Weight: 0.96 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.5" x 0.8" x 5.4"

Customer Reviews

Complete and Detailed

This book is a must have in addition with the Chadabe's Electric Sound, and Holmes's Electronic and Experimental Music. Manning gets more specific about the qualities and characteristics of electronic music. A must have for those actively involved in the production, recording, technical, compositional, or performance aspects of computer music.

Technical but digestable

This book is a nice overview of electronic and computer music (as one might gather from the title.) It's great to sit near a computer and research some of the composers and pieces discussed, as many of them are on youtube and at least sound clips are available somewhere online. You're not going to learn how to program or compose from this book, but it's great for getting a decent background of what went on from 1890-1990.