When I started to study the history of music, I did not know what I was getting into. I had a notion that music history was somewhat of a trivial pursuit. In fact, I only followed my history of classical music class because I wanted the credits. I did not know how fully interesting music history is.



You see, in our culture many of us do not actually learn to understand music. For a lot of people, music is a language, but for our civilization it is a thing that we consumed passively. When I began to learn about the history of Western music, however, it changed all that for me. I have had some experience using musical instruments, but I have not mastered one enough to truly comprehend what music is all about. This class taughed me.

When the majority of us think about the music history, we think of the history of rock music. We presume that the history is simple because the music is simple. Actually, neither is the case. The historyofmusic, whether you're talking about classical music, rock music, jazz music, or any other kind, is always complicated. New chord structures are set up taking with them new forms of comprehending humanity. New rhythmic patterns are introduced, bringing with them new methods of understanding time. And music shows all of it.

Even when the class was over, I could not stop learning about the historyofmusic. It had whetted my appetite, and I required more. I acquired all the music history volumes that I could find. I even began to study forms of music that had not interested me before in the hopes of developing my musical knowledge further. Although I was in school studying toward a very different subject - a degree in engineering - I had thought about quitting and going back to get a degree in musicology.

That is how much I am captivated by the subject.

If you never took a course in the history of music, you do not know what you are missing out on. The radio will never sound the same to you again. The whole thing will sound a lot more rich, a lot more luminous, and much more significant. A new song can be a sign of a new way of being, and a new way of imagining life on earth. This is what learning about the history of music would do to many of us.