I'm trying to get a copy of this book for my own library because I keep referring to it so often. If you teach history and are looking for a way to make it come alive for your classes, try this book (if you can get it--check a good university library). You will find songs that the patriots sang during the Revolutionary War, songs from the Civil War, and songs from presidential campaigns. The pictures are invaluable, gleaned from libraries by the author, a renowned historian in this area. This huge book covers a large time span, but doesn't spare the details that make history "live" in a different era. I think this book is a must for anyone entering the interdisciplinary field in a serious way.

I have read a great deal about the cultural history of 19th-century America. And in particular I have tried to learn more about what was going on musically in our country during those times. Pianist/musicologist Vera Brodsky Lawrence happened upon George Templeton Strong's extensive diaries perhaps twenty years ago and realized that he was a true cultural man about town in New York during the middle years of the century and that his comments on musical goings-on were invaluable. So she extracted his musical observations, collected them into three volumes, of which this is the first, and wrote extensive footnotes that explain references that would have little meaning to modern readers. In the process she has written what may be the definitive musical history of the time in New York.

A side note: George Templeton Strong's son, who has the same name, became an important composer of his own era and Naxos is currently recording some of his hitherto ignored orchestral music.

I'm not one given to this sort of thing, but after I read this volume I wrote a fan letter to Ms. Lawrence.

This book is a complete and precise collection of Scott Joplin's works. The book also gives a summary of the composers lifetime.

I highly recommend this book.