The Art of the Music Critic

This book attempts to illuminate and define the many criteria of music criticism in their aesthetic, social, historical, and cultural contexts. Music criticism is an art that balances perception with knowledge - intuition with understanding, critical analysis, and judgement. It is an aesthetic pursuit directed to the varied worlds of sound experience, and it is distinct from its more highly profiled cousins: art criticism (which focuses on the many aspects of the visual), and literary criticism (in relation to language and the word). While the attention of the music critic is primarily directed towards music and musicians, the critic's outreach encompasses dimensions over and beyond the intricacies of musical composition to reviews of concert performances, previews and summaries of cultural events and festivals, CD reviews, and book reviews along with topics of social relevance. Sometimes external events enter the picture and impinge upon concert life, while historic controversies may emerge as issues that call for our response. In addition, manifold aspects of personalities, biographies, commemorative notices, and obituaries need to be addressed. Because music criticism is a subjective art, opinions and facts often interact and overlap. Nothing is ever absolute or unequivocal. Nonetheless, let us move forward in search of objective paradigms for evaluating the vast and wondrous phenomenon known as the 'World of Music.'