BBC Howard Goodall’s Story of Music 1of6 The Age of Discovery

The Story of Music is a work of nonfiction by English composer and broadcaster Howard Goodall, first published in 2013 by Chatto & Windus, which covers the history of largely Western classical music from pre-history to 2012. The book is associated with the 2013 BBC2 documentary series Howard Goodall’s Story of Music. The Story of Music is associated with a six-episode television series, Howard Goodall’s Story of Music, produced by Tiger Aspect and broadcast on BBC2 in January–March 2013. Aimed at a general viewer, the television series explains musical developments in nonspecialist English; Goodall states “This is an overview, for someone who doesn’t have a music degree. It’s an attempt to make the basic building blocks of music clear“. Both series and book try to avoid technical nomenclature, or “jargon“; Goodall considers when writing about the “aural sensation“ that is music: “quite a lot of the words begin to get in the way and become more of a hindrance.“ The series also avoids assigning music to the conventional eras, such as Baroque music, and is instead divided into six broad time periods, dubbed “ages“: “The Age of Discovery“, “...Invention“, “...Elegance & Sensibility“, “...Tragedy“, “...Rebellion“ and “The Popular Age“. 2:39 - Antiquity 5:14 - Lurs of Denmark 6:44 - Ancient Greece 8:18 - Roman Empire 8:49 - Christian Plainchant 10:44 - Addition of the Octave 11:38 - Organum 13:08 - Drone 14:30 - Multiple Organa 15:55 - Notation 17:59 - Guido d’Arezzo, 11th c. 19:34 - Guido Meets Bruno 21:04 - Perotin 24:08 - Secular Music, 12th c. 26:15 - Dunstable & the 3rd, 15th c. 30:10 - Triads & Cadences 34:09 - Refining Instruments, 16th c. 36:08 - Secular & Sacred 36:47 - Positioning the Melody 38:31 - The Printing Press 39:27 - Josquin des Prez 40:40 - Words & Melismas 43:36 - Martin Luther 45:31 - Sacred = Saddening 46:31 - Arcadelt’s Secular Fame 48:07 - John Dowland 49:30 - Opera 51:36 - Monteverdi’s Progress 54:43 - Poppea: The People’s Opera