Ted Gioia describes himself as “a critic, scholar, performer and educator,” which indicates something of the breadth of knowledge he brings to his many books about jazz, among them “The Jazz Standards: A Guide to the Repertoire.” He’s also been honored four times with the Deems Taylor Award for excellence in music criticism, notably for each of the three volumes in what one might call his song cycle: “Healing Songs,” “Work Songs” and “Love Songs.”
As with his previous books, Gioia’s latest, “Music: A Subversive History,” is intended for the general reader: You can tell this immediately because it doesn’t contain a single bar of musical notation. Rather than devote space to yet another analysis of the sonata form, Gioia’s focus is primarily sociocultural: He wants to explain the dynamics of music history, to track how styles and forms evolve, run their course and are eventually replaced or re-energized. Naturally, he has a thesis. Just as societies need carnivalesque holidays such as Mardi Gras to remain healthy, so too does music require regular infusions of Dionysian eroticism and violence. Conservative practices and arthritic genres must be periodically disrupted and undermined.
