Five Straight Lines. The Complete History of Music

Music has shaped the world we live in: from ancient singers plucking the strings of the lyre to the great Ludwig van Beethoven, from harmony and rhythm to modern musicals. But what shaped it itself? British composer and writer Andrew Grant tells the story of music, spanning many centuries: from the moment our ancestors first learned to distinguish pitch and extract from instruments the noise that would eventually become music. Andrew Grant portrays music in the context of key milestones in our history. Troubadours performing their songs beneath the arches of medieval castles. Thomas Tallis, who served four different monarchs of the 16th century, including Elizabeth I. "Pirates" printing counterfeit copies of musical works. Jean-Baptiste Lully, whose music delighted the "Sun King" Louis XIV, as well as Schubert, Tchaikovsky, Shostakovich, Ella Fitzgerald, David Bowie, Andrew Lloyd Webber, and many others - all their lives intertwined on the vivid and dramatic, amusing and touching canvas of musical history.