ALEX HALL is disgusted by the misuse of ‘emotional narratives’ to justify uninformed geo-political prejudice
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What is music for?
ANDY HEDGECOCK revels in an open-minded exploration of music that provokes reflection on the determinants of musical taste
PICKING UP THE PIECES: A music instructor with recovering soldier in a session of neurologic music therapy at a US Naval Medical Center in San Diego
SUE TURNER welcomes a thoughtful, engaging book that lays bare the economic realities of global waste management
JOHN GREEN welcomes an insider account of the achievements and failures of the transition to democracy in Portugal
SIMON PARSONS applauds an imaginative and absorbing updating of Strindberg’s classic
PETER MASON is enthralled by an assembly of objects, ancient and modern, that have lain in the mud of London’s river
MICK McSHANE rubs shoulders with Mod legend Steve Craddock and joins in with the joyous Glasgow choir
DENNIS BROE sifts out the ideological bias of the newest TV series offerings, and picks out what to see, and what to avoid
Listen (On Music, Sound and Us)
Michel Faber, Canongate, £20
MICHEL FABER has near-perfect recall of the lyrics and contributing musicians of Leo Sayer’s Just a Boy, an album he hasn’t listened to for 45 years. On the other hand, he forgets the names of outstanding artists he has heard more recently.
Listen is not a book of music criticism, nor does its author want to influence your taste. His focus is the psychology, sociology and phenomenology of our engagement with sound as a mode of expression.
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