Customer Reviews

The Usborne Story of Music (Fine Art Series)

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I read that the book gave detailed information about the development of music, and that it came with a list of suggestions for music to listen to. The book gives one or two sentences about several different music styles. I personally was disapointed by the music and religion statement that music was important to ancient religion because egyptians often showed their gods and goddesses playing instruments in their paintings. What about the fact that the people in the Bible sang and danced and played to worship the Lord. One entire book, the book of Psalms is actually a book of songs worshipping God. In the section on rock and roll the book states that it developed in the 1960's. Really? What was all that stuff going on when Chuck Berry and Elvis was causing a commotion in the 1950's? These two pioneers for rock who were not even mentioned. Also the Beatles were not mentioned. How can any one talk about the history of rock without mentioning any of these people? Then there's the sections about Appalacian, Blue Grass, Country, Motown, Gospel or Black Spirituals. Oh, wait a minute, none of those were even mentioned. I am a home school mom who bought this book hoping to give my children a lesson rich in musical history and how music has effected the every day life of people culturally,spiritually, romantically, politically, and even just for fun. I was disapointed.I didn't rate it less than a three because I thought it could give some one a place to start because of the music suggestions, and because of the nice pictures throughout.

I'm using this book with my homeschooled kindergartner to introduce her to various music styles from history. I don't have much background in music myself, so it is a good introduction for me, as well. We read a two-page section at a time. Each gives an overview of the time period or place and it's music -- examples are music in ancient times, Romantic music, jazz, and music in Africa. In the back is "music to listen to" giving several suggestions of specific works for each section. Tonight we read about Renaissance music, then used Amazon to find the works and artists mentioned. We listened to the samples on Amazon.

THIS BOOK WAS REFERRED TO ME BY AN INSTRUCTOR FOR THE MSAT TEST. THIS IS A BOOK FOR THOSE WHO HAVE NO KNOWLEDGE OR INTEREST IN MUSIC AND NEED SOME INFORMATION FOR THIS PARTICULAR TEST.