In the last ten years or so an interest in 'authenticity' has reached a wide public. Many of the best-selling records of Bach, Handel, Haydn and Mozart are those in which period techniques and period instruments are used. There is however a danger that new 'authentic' dogmas of style and interpretation will come to replace the anachronistic dogmas of the late romantic tradition. 'The search for an 'authentic' interpretation', writes Peter le Huray in his opening chapter, 'is not the search for a single hard and fast answer, but for a range of possibilities from which to make performing decisions.' This book introduces the performer to the problems that must be faced when preparing an 'authentic' interpretation. It does so by focusing on nine representative and well-known works from the Baroque and Classical periods, defining some of the more important questions that the performer and listener should ask, and suggesting fruitful lines of enquiry. It is essential reading and reference material for player, student and listener alike.

This is an abridged, paperback edition of Peter le Huray and James Day's invaluable anthology of writings concerned with the role of music in eighteenth- and early-nineteenth-century aesthetics. This volume retains all the most important and significant items from the original hardcover edition. Over fifty writers are represented here, including such major figures as Rousseau, Kant, Schlegel, Schopenhauer and Hegel, and the useful introductions and biographical details of the original are also retained. The aesthetic literature of the period is profuse but this carefully edited volume offers a balanced selection which illuminates the ways people experienced music and how they came to an understanding in particular of the new music of their day.

The period covered by this volume is one of the most eventful and fruitful in the history of English music. This selection - embracing the motet, festal psalm, anthem, canticle and devotional song - has been edited according to modern scholarly standards, but with the needs of practical performance in mind. The choice of music gives a comprehensive picture of the period, with many well-known works included as outstanding examples of their kind. Less familiar compositions are also featured, and they fill important gaps in the available repertory - notably settings of the Nunc dimittis by Tye, Robert Parsons and Thomas Tomkins, a festal psalm by Tallis, verse anthems by William Mundy and Walter Porter, and full anthems by Amner, Batten, Thomas Tomkins and William Child. A general historical introduction and a calendar of events are supplied, together with notes on each piece and a list of the sources used.

In the years following the Act of Uniformity in 1549, musicians seemed to thrive on the challenge of the New Prayer Book, and the successive reigns of Elizabeth I, James I and Charles I bought a rich and varied repertory of vernacular church music. Peter Le Huray traces these developments in great detail, drawing on many contemporary sources to illuminate the music and its social and religious background.

for SAATB and organ or strings Material for viols or modern strings is also available .