The History of Music
The Britannica Guide to the Visual and Performing Arts
Music is an art that, in one guise or another, permeates every human society. Though musical theory did not develop until the nineteenth century, rhythm has had the power to move people for millennia. Readers will travel the river of musical time, from early Indian and Chinese conceptions, when music was first used as a sonic vector for religion, through its development in the Middle Ages to great classical composers of the late eighteenth century to the music of today.