Psychology of Music

So far there are two reviews preceding mine. One gives the book five stars, the other gives it one. The one star reviewer complains that the book is out of date, and that is true. Unfortunately the author is not in a position to bring it up to date, since he was born in 1866 and is now continuing his research in a different realm. You would be foolish to take everything in this book as the gospel truth, but the quality of this man as a scientist and as a writer is head and shoulders above what we are capable of doing today. "They don't make 'em like this anymore." The field has advanced in the more than 100 years since the author commenced his research, and much of what we have achieved collectively today is the result of successive generations of people standing on Seashore's shoulders. I think this book is still of very great value today, at various levels. As I said above, I won't accept everything in this book at face value, but it is a book worth reading through more than once. In a world full of books that aren't even worth reading through one time, that's saying a lot, especially when you consider that it was published in 1937. The author was 70 years old at the time and you can see a lifetime of effort has gone into it.

The author is a physicist and has made lot of research publications himself. The thoughtful stylist presentation on all aspects of sound is an excellent introduction on the field of music. There is also enormous ideas pointers for researchers. Thava Alagu