Book Reviews
The Social and Applied Psychology of Music by Adrian C. North & David J. Hargreaves. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008. 464 pp., £31, paperback. ISBN: 0198567421.
The Social and Applied Psychology of Music contributes to the growing body of literature representing a shift in the research questions and methods of music psychology. Sitting alongside books such as Musical as Musical Identities (MacDonald et (MacDonald et al., al., 2002) and Musical and Musical Communication (Miell Communication (Miell et et al ., ., 2005), this book aims to reflect the ways in which music interacts with audiences in the variety of everyday situations in which it is heard. It is an ambitious project, as the title of the book suggests, with manifold aims and ideals and whilst it sometimes suffers as a result of its broad scope, The scope, The Social and Applied Psychology of Music is is a valuable overview of developments in the field since the publication of its predecessor The predecessor The Social Psychology of Music (Hargreaves (Hargreaves & North, 1997) over a decade ago. The approach adopted by the authors has five main features: (1) a topic-based approach which makes it possible to ‘describe the routes along which individual lines of research have proceeded [and] leads to clearer and simpler explanations’ (p. 5); (2) an interdisciplinary approach ‘in the hope that, by juxtaposing related bodies of research that are largely uninformed by one another, researchers will be more inclined to draw on related work and increase the coherence of the field’ (p. 5); (3) an interest in all approaches to the social psychology of music ‘be they psychological or sociological; European or North American; intraindividual, intraindividual, interindividual/situational, interindividual/situational, socio-positional, or ideological’ (p. 6); (4) a concern for how the research might be applied ‘to ‘real world’ problems and issues’ (p. 6); and (5) a concern with the purpose of music, since ‘people now actively use music
for many more different purposes in many more areas of everyday life than hitherto, and so our understanding of its effects are of more widespread and general interest within psychology’ (p. 8). This approach is successful overall; throughout the majority of the book each of these five features is apparent and they add a general sense of coherence to the book. Attempts are made to highlight potential applications of the research and in many instances ideas for future research are considered, although there is some inconsistency in the extent to which such ideas are offered. In addition, the authors attempt to consider pop music rather than focus on only western classical music in order to reflect the kinds of music that most people experience in their daily lives, although, as the authors rightly highlight, a lack of research in this area makes this difficult. That said, those ideas presented are timely and the target audience, which seems to be students of the discipline (‘the future researchers’ (p. 12)), will find this an extremely useful resource. The book is divided into seven chapters: the first is a general introduction which provides the context for the book and the last is a brief three-page chapter of ‘Concluding remarks’ which seeks to refine the old paradigm of music psychology (Sloboda, 1985) by appealing for a more social and applied approach to the domain. The authors present a convincing case for the paradigm’s enhancement and the research described throughout the book is unified by this premise. The main thematic chapters consider Composition and Musicianship (Chapter 2), Musical Preference and Taste (Chapter 3), Problem Music and Subcultures (Chapter 4), Music, Business and Health (Chapter 5), and Musical Development and Education (Chapter 6). Of these, Chapter 4 is the longest at 94 pages ‘because it represents the first comprehensive review of psychological research on music censorship,
Book Reviews
delinquency, and subculture’ (p. 11), and Chapter 6 the shortest at 44 pages. The other chapters are extremely detailed and, at times, dense and are all about 70 pages long. The authors attempt to divide each chapter into themes using subheadings, but even so, the length of the chapters sometimes makes the aims of each chapter difficult to sustain and follow, with the exception of Chapter 6 – the relative brevity of the writing which identifies key themes and ties together a range of different approaches meant that this, for me, was the most successful chapter in the book. For researchers and students, the amount of material contained within the book is impressive with helpful suggestions for wider reading. The authors adopt an objective and evaluative approach throughout, identifying the limitations of particular approaches to the domain as well as examining the implications of different research approaches for the types of results obtained. Both approaches are utilised to good effect in Chapter 4 (Problem Music and Subcultures): the authors consider the difference between correlational and experimental studies in separate sections for each theme and also provide ‘Caveats’ sections, offering a necessary discussion of alternative interpretations and explanations for the phenomena under consideration. This approach works particularly well here due to the nature of the subject matter and since the chapter aims to provide the first comprehensive review of this material it seems to be the most logical way to present a sufficiently detailed and objective account of the research. There is certainly a sense that research in social psychology has progressed a great deal over the last decade and the inclusion of the chapters on ‘Problem music and subcultures’ and ‘Music, business and health’ are useful reviews of recent developments in a rapidly expanding area of study. Inevitably, some of the material
considered in these chapters repeats some of the detail from The Social Psychology of Music (Hargreaves & North, 1997) , presumably because it provides a useful context, but there is sufficient inclusion of more recent research to make this book feel different from its predecessor; certainly, the inclusion of the applied focus does work particularly well in these contexts. I would not go so far as to say that this book focuses mainly on new research as the authors claim in the introduction (p. 11). At times the writing and review is not as comprehensive as I would have liked. For example, I was disappointed that the section on live music within the ‘Music consumption and sales charts’ section in chapter 5 was so brief and also surprised that the sub-section on ‘pricing strategies’ within the same section did not include any mention of online purchasing. However, given the ambitious scope of this project, it is hardly surprising that some elements are not as detailed as others. The pressure of such a huge undertaking sometimes manifests itself throughout the book in unhelpful ways; for example, Chapter 2 (Composition and Musicianship) considers the Mozart Effect at the end of a discussion about ‘Musicianship’; after an objective consideration of the relevant research there is no conclusion and no attempt to unify the diverse themes of the chapter. The Social and Applied Psychology of Music has diverse aims and is an impressive assimilation of literature about a rapidly expanding area of research. It claims to be a ‘state of the art account of the field’ (p. 1) and in the sheer amount of detail provided the authors have succeeded in achieving their goal. The framework provided by the proposed refinements to the paradigm provides a sense of unity to the book, and the authors’ attempts to identify possibilities for the application and future direction of the field helps to support such a proposal.
Book Reviews
Overall, this is a useful textbook for those studying and researching within the discipline. References
HARGREAVES, D. J. & NORTH, A. C. (Eds.) (1997) The Social Psychology of Music . Oxford: Oxford University Press. MACDONALD, R., HARGREAVES, D. J. & MIELL, D. (Eds.) (2002) Musical Identities . Oxford: Oxford University Press. MIELL, D., MACDONALD, R. & HARGREAVES, D. J. (Eds.) (2005) Musical Communication. Oxford: Oxford University Press. SLOBODA, J. A. (1985) The Musical Mind: The Cognitive Psychology of Music. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
KAREN BURLAND UNIVERSITY OF LEEDS, UK
Improvisation Games for Classical Musicians by Jeffrey Agrell. Chicago, IL: GIA Publications, 2008. Pbk, 372 pp., £25, paperback. ISBN 9781579996826.
This collection of over 500 improvisation ‘games’ delivers a non-stylistic approach to introducing and developing musicians’ improvisational confidence and abilities. The text points towards methods of de-coding the ‘rabbit-in-headlight’ syndrome that improvisation can induce in many musicians and seeks also to engage with creative inquisitiveness. The somewhat misleading title disguises its applicability to many different types of musician: classical to rock; inexperienced to the well versed; community musicians to the professional performer. It also offers alternative approaches for those already steeped in the improvisation language: I know at least two jazz educators who, impressed with this book’s approach, have incorporated some of its elements into their own teaching.
Some texts in this area of work try to be inclusive of all forms of music and fail because they are too dull or not specific enough in their directions. Conversely, some are too steeped in stylistic tradition to allow for inter-stylistic learning, such as the scale/chord improvisation theory that I am told is the foundation of jazz studies. Fortunately, this is not something that Improvisation Games suffers from. It neither falls into the trappings of new-age hyperbole nor limits participation by stylistic elitism. In the form of musical games of exploration, Jeffrey Agrell provides work on motivic and rhythmic development, harmony, musical interaction and many more areas, even exploring modes and chromatic ii–V–I progressions. The genesis of this collection comes from Agrell’s own teaching of an undergraduate introductory improvisation course at the University of Iowa, but the range of this book is not confined to undergraduate training. Indeed, its beauty lies in its adaptability: Agrell gives enough information to describe each game’s aim and content but allows enough flexibility to enable them to be translated for many different age ranges and abilities. Originally, Agrell wanted his students to focus on learning how to improvise through listening to themselves and each other, so the book is set out with no musical notation. This means that students who are both musically literate and those who are not confident with musical notation can participate equally in any of the games. Clear, concise, practical and fun, the games are adaptable for any situation but focused enough that you know that your students are learning key musical concepts through the improvisation process. Agrell also includes a useful resources list and there are some very well-formatted tables of musical information (e.g. chord structures and scale constructions) that are easily usable by any music teacher.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
