Media Review: Writing about Music: An Introductory Guide

Abstract

Richard J. Wingell. Writing About Music: An Introductory Guide(4th ed.). Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Prentice Hall, 2009. Xvi + 166 pp. Appendix, Index. Softcover, ISBN 978-0-13-615778-6, $49. University students must develop the necessary skills to write intelligently about the subject they study. This scholarly form of writing requires in-depth knowledge of the subject area and understanding of how to concisely communicate in written form. While each subject area poses its own unique set of challenges, music majors must learn to use words to describe an art form that is aural and temporal in nature. Richard Wingell's manual, Writing About Music: An Introductory Guide has long been the standard writing guide for undergraduate and graduate music majors. The fourth edition of this manual keeps pace with recent changes relating to perceived needs among university students, discusses new technological developments in music research, and adjusts to the new conventions listed by the latest editions of writing guides. Wingell, professor emeritus of music history at the University of Southern California, currently works as a freelance editor for Norton Press. Along with Writing About Wingell has co-authored an introduction to music research text, authored chapters in multiple music history books, and written research articles published in the Quarterly Journal of the Music Library Association and Renaissance Quarterly. The first chapter, Why We Write About Music, describes the types of writing that university music majors tend to encounter during their course work and addresses how the writing process helps the student develop critical thinking skills. Through writing, students are able to clarify and refine their thoughts while engaging in music analysis and historical research, creating program notes, or simply completing essay questions. Students face multiple challenges in their work as they attempt to use words to describe music, choose their focus and wrestle with the idea of whether or not one can judge art. When done improperly, Wingell emphasizes that writing can often result in literary fluff without descriptive substance, may overuse metaphor, and may over emphasize a composer's life history rather than analyze his/her music. Novice writers fall into the trap of analyzing all musical styles using the same techniques or they give play-by-play descriptions of music selections rather than making connections between and within pieces. Chapter two focuses on the stylistic analysis of music with the primary purpose of encouraging young researchers to consider ways to craft new ideas about the music they are considering. According to Wingell, well-written stylistic analysis is more than simply providing harmonic and structural overviews of a musical selection. While descriptive analysis is important, researchers are expected to move beyond entry-level thinking in order to place a composer or a work within a larger musical context. This requires researchers to compare and contrast the qualities found in a work to describe stylistic traits of a composer or a musical period. According to Wingell, researchers must consider numerous factors when analyzing music, such as formal and structural traits, relation to contemporary styles and world events, and the composer's intent, inspiration, and influence. The last section of the chapter provides an array of musical examples from various periods and suggests appropriate analytical approaches a researcher may pursue. By using examples from widely differing styles and genres, Wingell demonstrates a need to adapt analytical approaches to accommodate stylistic issues that emerge from the music. Research is the first phase for creating papers on musical topics. Chapter three, Getting Started: Research, addresses many of the difficulties students encounter at this stage of writing. Wingell begins by discussing the importance of narrowing a topic, stressing that students must decide based on which primary and secondary sources are available and on the type of topic students tend to study. …