American Popular Music and Its Business: The First Four Hundred Years, Volume I and II

New York: Oxford University Press, 1988. Hardcover. VG-/VG- (Ex-library with stamps and labels on spine, inside front and rear covers, ffep and block.). Two volumes bound in red paper boards, blue cloth spine with silver lettering; white dj with red and blue lettering, mylar cover; Volume 1 xvi, 469 pp. Volume 2 is vi, 482 pp. 2 volumes of a 3 volume set. "This three-volume work tells the complete story of American popular songs, their authors, and the business they set in motion. Volume one explores the inception of the music publishing business in Elizabethan England and traces music activity in England until 1790, examining popular balladry, copyright problems, the start of music printing, religious music, professional music makers, musical theater, eighteenth-century music, and such leading musical figures as Purcell, Handel, and Haydn. Also discussed are the beginnings of music in the United States, including musical theater, black music, and the Great Awakening and its relationship to music publishing." [Publisher description]. Contents: Vol. 1. Prologue : Summer at Drake's bay, California, 1579 -- Part one : The beginning to 1603 -- Popular music in Henry's England -- Music in Elizabeth's England -- English musical theater -- The music of God's Englishmen -- The business of music publishing. The growth of the Stationers' Company ; Religious music printing ; The Byrd-Tallis and Morley monopolies -- The darling songs of the common people. The broad-side ballad business ; The first great ballad writers -- Part two : 1603 to 1710 -- From James to Anne -- The music of God's Englishmen. The advent and rise of the English hymn -- Britain's professional music makers. The first public concerts -- English musical theater. Popular music in the restoration theater ; The birth pangs of an English opera tradition ; Henry Purcell : Orpheus Britannicus ; The musical theater before Handel -- The business of music publishing. The golden age of balladry and the rise of the newspaper ; John Plyford, the first full-service music publisher ; Charles and the stationers ; The invention of sheet music and the fall of the house of Playford ; The new music business -- Music making in America -- The business of music publishing in the colonies -- Black music comes to English America -- Part three : 1710 to 1790 -- England, America, and the world -- The business of music publishing. Music publishing in England ; John Walsh and the dance-book business ; Handel and music publishers ; Opera financing in London 1720 to 1726 ; Handel and music for the Hanovers ; Resurrection of the old ballad business ; Handel's oratorio triumphs ; Copyright in the mid-century ; The oratorio triumphs ; Some mid-Gregorian music publishers and their songwriters ; Haydn and the music business ; The first Haydn concerts in London ; Haydn's last yeras ; Copyright later in the century ; The darling songs of the common people -- The days of Watts and the Wesleys. The Wesleys and their followers ; America's first great and general awakening.; Vol. 1 (cont.). The business of music publishing. The Americans learn to sing ; The singing-school movement is born ; William Billings ; Andrew Law -- English musical theater. "It made rich gay and gay rich ...," ; The licensing act and popular music ; David Garrick and the Royal Playhouse composers ; Enter Samuel Arnold ; Charles Dibden, "Tyrtaeus of the British Navy," ; The new London songwriters -- America's musical theater. The Hallam companies of American comedians ; Musical theater during the Revolution ; The new musical theater ; Musical theater in federal Philadelphia ; Musical theater in federal Boston ; The circus and popular music ; The dawn of a new century -- The business of music publishing. American popular music : technology and copyright ; The state of the printers' art ; The Franklins ; John Peter Zenger, broadside ballads, and freedom of the press ; "Ingenious, public-spirited gentlemen, who have time to spare ...," ; The ballad writers go to war ; Thomas Paine, ballad writer ; "Gentleman Johnny" Burgoyne and other writer of popular music ; The printer-music publisher in federal America ; Ratifying the constitution with music ; Isaiah Thomas, full-service music publisher ; Noah Webster and American copyright -- Black music in America. Black secular music ; Black music and twentieth-century country music ; Black music and the music of a white God ; The Baptist invasion ; The new Wesleyan Methodism ; Richard Allen : Father of black hymnody.; Vol. 2. Music publishing in the new republic 1790-1800. Philadelphia, New York, and Boston -- The business of popular music 1800-1860. Copyright ; Changing technology -- Sheet music publishing in pre-Civil War America. Philadelphia ; New York ; The nineteenth-century social and stage dance ; European music publishers in New York ; Boston ; The South ; Frontier and western music publishers ; The Board of Music Trade ; The other music-publishing business -- American musical theater 1800-1860. In search of a national popular music ; Yankee Doodle on the stage ; Early growth of the frontier theater ; The black American discovered ; The American stage black and his music ; The American circus : incubator of the minstrel show ; The arrival of the minstrel show -- The music of God's Americans 1800-1860. Worship under the open skies ; The shape-note business ; The first great urban evangelists ; The lunch-hour revival movement ; The American Sunday school movement ; Lowell Mason and popular religious music -- The music of black Americans 1800-1860. Popular music and black Americans ; The emergence of the black spiritual -- "The singin'est war" 1861-1865. Song publishing in the Confederacy ; Song publishing in the North ; Some Civil War songs and their writers -- The music of God's Americans 1865-1909. The singing evangelists ; The shape-note business -- Black music in America 1860-1909. The spirituals ; Minstrels and the millionaires of minstrelsy ; The first great black songwriters ; Cakewalks and coon songs ; Classic ragtime : its rise and fall -- The American musical theater 1865-1909. Popular music on the post-Civil War stage ; Vaudeville and popular music -- Popular music in the age of gigantism 1866-1909. Music publishing in the Midwest ; Copyright and the music business ; Changing technology and distribution ; Mr. Edison's wonderful talking machine ; The Board of Music Trade ; The Pianola and the Victrola ; The pursuit of copyright revision ; Tin Pan Alley.