The history of American music writing – essays on music, criticism, reviews, pamphlets – is told in this chapter, beginning in the nineteenth century, when an identifiably American music still had not fully coalesced. The early twentieth century saw the arrival of strong music advocates and composer-writers who sought to create innovative music and write prolifically about these new sounds, for which they had become de facto evangelists. Early American music writers underscored the differences between American and European music. Essays on music took on an increasingly pedagogical function, teaching their readers about the intricacies and sometimes hidden features of new compositions. The earliest American music writing focused on classical music, but as jazz entered the scene, with its complex rules and unfamiliar rhythms and chord structures, a new cohort of essayists developed a language for writing about this American artform. Throughout the century, a more personal tone emerged in the music essay as composers, musicians, and music connoisseurs began to articulate their feelings, impressions, memories, and individual experiences.

Louis Niebur’s chapter 13, ‘Case Studies of Women in Electronic Music: The Early Pioneers’, considers a range of the earliest ground-breaking women working with electronic music, including Daphne Oram and Delia Derbyshire, at the BBC’s Radiophonic Workshop in the UK, and Wendy Carlos, Pauline Oliveros, and Suzanne Ciani, in the US.