Book Reviews

The Social and Applied Psychology of Music

by Adrian C. North & David J. Hargreaves.
Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008.
464 pp., 31, paperback. ISBN:
0198567421.

The Social and Applied Psychology of Music

contributes to the growing body of literature
representing a shift in the research questions
and methods of music psychology. Sitting
alongside books such as Musical Identities
(MacDonald et al., 2002) and Musical
Communication (Miell et al., 2005), this
book aims to reflect the ways in which music
interacts with audiences in the variety of
everyday situations in which it is heard. It is
an ambitious project, as the title of the book
suggests, with manifold aims and ideals and
whilst it sometimes suffers as a result of its
broad scope, The Social and Applied
Psychology of Music is a valuable overview
of developments in the field since the
publication of its predecessor The Social
Psychology of Music (Hargreaves & North,
1997) over a decade ago.
The approach adopted by the authors
has five main features: (1) a topic-based
approach which makes it possible to
describe the routes along which individual
lines of research have proceeded [and] leads
to clearer and simpler explanations (p. 5);
(2) an interdisciplinary approach in the hope
that, by juxtaposing related bodies of
research that are largely uninformed by one
another, researchers will be more inclined to
draw on related work and increase the
coherence of the field (p. 5); (3) an interest
in all approaches to the social psychology of
music be they psychological or sociological;
European or North American;
intraindividual, interindividual/situational,
socio-positional, or ideological (p. 6); (4) a
concern for how the research might be
applied to real world problems and issues
(p. 6); and (5) a concern with the purpose of
music, since people now actively use music

for many more different purposes in many

more areas of everyday life than hitherto,
and so our understanding of its effects are of
more widespread and general interest within
psychology (p. 8). This approach is
successful overall; throughout the majority of
the book each of these five features is
apparent and they add a general sense of
coherence to the book. Attempts are made to
highlight potential applications of the
research and in many instances ideas for
future research are considered, although
there is some inconsistency in the extent to
which such ideas are offered. In addition, the
authors attempt to consider pop music rather
than focus on only western classical music in
order to reflect the kinds of music that most
people experience in their daily lives,
although, as the authors rightly highlight, a
lack of research in this area makes this
difficult. That said, those ideas presented are
timely and the target audience, which seems
to be students of the discipline (the future
researchers (p. 12)), will find this an
extremely useful resource.
The book is divided into seven chapters:
the first is a general introduction which
provides the context for the book and the last
is a brief three-page chapter of Concluding
remarks which seeks to refine the old
paradigm of music psychology (Sloboda,
1985) by appealing for a more social and
applied approach to the domain. The authors
present a convincing case for the paradigms
enhancement and the research described
throughout the book is unified by this
premise. The main thematic chapters
consider Composition and Musicianship
(Chapter 2), Musical Preference and Taste
(Chapter 3), Problem Music and Subcultures
(Chapter 4), Music, Business and Health
(Chapter 5), and Musical Development and
Education (Chapter 6). Of these, Chapter 4 is
the longest at 94 pages because it represents
the first comprehensive review of
psychological research on music censorship,

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Book Reviews

delinquency, and subculture (p. 11), and

Chapter 6 the shortest at 44 pages. The other
chapters are extremely detailed and, at times,
dense and are all about 70 pages long. The
authors attempt to divide each chapter into
themes using subheadings, but even so, the
length of the chapters sometimes makes the
aims of each chapter difficult to sustain and
follow, with the exception of Chapter 6 the
relative brevity of the writing which identifies
key themes and ties together a range of
different approaches meant that this, for me,
was the most successful chapter in the book.
For researchers and students, the
amount of material contained within the
book is impressive with helpful suggestions
for wider reading. The authors adopt an
objective and evaluative approach
throughout, identifying the limitations of
particular approaches to the domain as well
as examining the implications of different
research approaches for the types of results
obtained. Both approaches are utilised to
good effect in Chapter 4 (Problem Music and
Subcultures): the authors consider the
difference between correlational and
experimental studies in separate sections for
each theme and also provide Caveats
sections, offering a necessary discussion of
alternative interpretations and explanations
for the phenomena under consideration. This
approach works particularly well here due to
the nature of the subject matter and since the
chapter aims to provide the first
comprehensive review of this material it
seems to be the most logical way to present a
sufficiently detailed and objective account of
the research.
There is certainly a sense that research
in social psychology has progressed a great
deal over the last decade and the inclusion
of the chapters on Problem music and
subcultures and Music, business and
health are useful reviews of recent
developments in a rapidly expanding area of
study. Inevitably, some of the material

102

considered in these chapters repeats some of

the detail from The Social Psychology of
Music (Hargreaves & North, 1997),
presumably because it provides a useful
context, but there is sufficient inclusion of
more recent research to make this book feel
different from its predecessor; certainly, the
inclusion of the applied focus does work
particularly well in these contexts. I would
not go so far as to say that this book focuses
mainly on new research as the authors claim
in the introduction (p. 11). At times the
writing and review is not as comprehensive
as I would have liked. For example, I was
disappointed that the section on live music
within the Music consumption and sales
charts section in chapter 5 was so brief and
also surprised that the sub-section on
pricing strategies within the same section
did not include any mention of online
purchasing. However, given the ambitious
scope of this project, it is hardly surprising
that some elements are not as detailed as
others. The pressure of such a huge
undertaking sometimes manifests itself
throughout the book in unhelpful ways; for
example, Chapter 2 (Composition and
Musicianship) considers the Mozart Effect at
the end of a discussion about Musicianship;
after an objective consideration of the
relevant research there is no conclusion and
no attempt to unify the diverse themes of the
chapter.
The Social and Applied Psychology of
Music has diverse aims and is an impressive
assimilation of literature about a rapidly
expanding area of research. It claims to be a
state of the art account of the field (p. 1)
and in the sheer amount of detail provided
the authors have succeeded in achieving
their goal. The framework provided by the
proposed refinements to the paradigm
provides a sense of unity to the book, and
the authors attempts to identify possibilities
for the application and future direction of the
field helps to support such a proposal.

Book Reviews

Overall, this is a useful textbook for those

studying and researching within the
discipline.
References
HARGREAVES, D. J. & NORTH, A. C. (Eds.) (1997)
The Social Psychology of Music. Oxford:
Oxford University Press.
MACDONALD, R., HARGREAVES, D. J. & MIELL,
D. (Eds.) (2002) Musical Identities. Oxford:
Oxford University Press.
MIELL, D., MACDONALD, R. & HARGREAVES,
D. J. (Eds.) (2005) Musical Communication.
Oxford: Oxford University Press.
SLOBODA, J. A. (1985) The Musical Mind:
The Cognitive Psychology of Music. Oxford:
Oxford University Press.

KAREN BURLAND

UNIVERSITY OF LEEDS, UK

Improvisation Games for Classical Musicians

by Jeffrey Agrell. Chicago, IL: GIA
Publications, 2008. Pbk, 372 pp., 25,
paperback. ISBN 9781579996826.

This collection of over 500 improvisation

games delivers a non-stylistic approach to
introducing and developing musicians
improvisational confidence and abilities. The
text points towards methods of de-coding the
rabbit-in-headlight syndrome that
improvisation can induce in many musicians
and seeks also to engage with creative
inquisitiveness. The somewhat misleading
title disguises its applicability to many
different types of musician: classical to rock;
inexperienced to the well versed;
community musicians to the professional
performer. It also offers alternative
approaches for those already steeped in the
improvisation language: I know at least two
jazz educators who, impressed with this
books approach, have incorporated some of
its elements into their own teaching.

Some texts in this area of work try to be

inclusive of all forms of music and fail
because they are too dull or not specific
enough in their directions. Conversely, some
are too steeped in stylistic tradition to allow
for inter-stylistic learning, such as the
scale/chord improvisation theory that I am
told is the foundation of jazz studies.
Fortunately, this is not something that
Improvisation Games suffers from. It neither
falls into the trappings of new-age hyperbole
nor limits participation by stylistic elitism. In
the form of musical games of exploration,
Jeffrey Agrell provides work on motivic and
rhythmic development, harmony, musical
interaction and many more areas, even
exploring modes and chromatic iiVI
progressions.
The genesis of this collection comes
from Agrells own teaching of an
undergraduate introductory improvisation
course at the University of Iowa, but the
range of this book is not confined to
undergraduate training. Indeed, its beauty
lies in its adaptability: Agrell gives enough
information to describe each games aim and
content but allows enough flexibility to
enable them to be translated for many
different age ranges and abilities. Originally,
Agrell wanted his students to focus on
learning how to improvise through listening
to themselves and each other, so the book is
set out with no musical notation. This means
that students who are both musically literate
and those who are not confident with
musical notation can participate equally in
any of the games. Clear, concise, practical
and fun, the games are adaptable for any
situation but focused enough that you know
that your students are learning key musical
concepts through the improvisation process.
Agrell also includes a useful resources list
and there are some very well-formatted
tables of musical information (e.g. chord
structures and scale constructions) that are
easily usable by any music teacher.

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Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.