The Rest Is Noise: Listening to the Twentieth Century

The scandal over modern music has not died down. While modern paintings by Picasso and Pollock sell for a hundred million or more, shocking musical works from Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring onward still send ripples of unease through audiences. Yet the influence of modern sound can be felt everywhere. Alex Ross, the brilliant music critic for the New Yorker, shines a bright light on this secret world and shows how it has pervaded every corner of twentieth century life.

The…