The volume in hand deals with modes of inquiry and interpretation broadly organised into sections on theory, and historical and creative studies. The section on theoretical issues comprises papers on: the problem of meaning in African music; musicology and African music; the juncture of the social and the musical; integrating objectivity and experience in ethnomusicological studies; the aesthetic dimension in ethnomusicological studies; universal perspectives in ethnomusicology; and contextual strategies of inquiry and systematisation. The section on creative and historical topics covers the following: the history of music in African culture; history and the organization of music in West Africa; historical evidence in Ga religious music; processes of differentiation and interdependency in African music; African musical roots in the Americas; and developing contemporary idioms out of traditional music.

This essay collection celebrates the richness of Christian musical tradition across its two thousand year history and across the globe. Opening with a consideration of the fourth-century lamp-lighting hymn Phos hilaron and closing with reflections on contemporary efforts of Ghanaian composers to create Christian worship music in African idioms, the ten contributors engage with a broad ecumenical array of sacred music. Topics encompass Roman Catholic sacred music in medieval and Renaissance Europe, German Lutheran song in the eighteenth century, English hymnody in colonial America, Methodist hymnody adopted by Southern Baptists in the nineteenth century, and Genevan psalmody adapted to respond to the post-war tribulations of the Hungarian Reformed Church. The scope of the volume is further diversified by the inclusion of contemporary Christian topics that address the evangelical methods of a unique Orthodox Christian composer's language, the shared aims and methods of African-American preaching and gospel music, and the affective didactic power of American evangelical "praise and worship" music. New material on several key composers, including Jacob Obrecht, J.S. Bach, George Philipp Telemann, C.P.E. Bach, Zoltan Kodaly, and Arvo Part, appears within the book. Taken together, these essays embrace a stimulating variety of interdisciplinary analytical and methodological approaches, drawing on cultural, literary critical, theological, ritual, ethnographical, and media studies. The collection contributes to discussions of spirituality in music and, in particular, to the unifying aspects of Christian sacred music across time, space, and faith traditions. This collection celebrates the fifteenth anniversary of the Society for Christian Scholarship in Music.