The history of medieval English music on record

The history of medieval English music on record
Edward Breen

Now that we have simple access to vast quantities of recorded music it is all too easy not to notice that many great albums have still to be invited to this digital party. Great swathes of our recorded history, which Tom Moore neatly described a few years ago in Early Music America as ‘Our disappearing LP legacy’, are waiting to be rediscovered and time is running out as many libraries find they just do not justify the shelf space. Such challenges make historical record collecting rather adventurous; it takes intrepid listeners on voyages through sound archives (physical and online), record shops and digital download sites. It follows therefore that we must ask ourselves why preserving old recordings is important. Are we merely attempting to ensure a future for our nostalgia? The answer, as I hope to demonstrate, [...]

For the full text of this article please refer to Early Music (Oxford University Press: Jun 2017).
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/em/cax027