The books listed in this column address music as it relates to political expression or focus to a significant degree on power relationships between individual musicians or musical communities and a governing authority. Readers are welcome to submit additional titles to [email protected] for possible inclusion in the next issue.

  • Anthem Quality: National Songs, a Theoretical Survey. By Christoper Kelen. Bristol, UK: Intellect, 2014. [204 p. ISBN-13 9781841507378. $64.50.]
  • Becoming Belafonte: Black Artist, Public Radical. By Judith E. Smith. (Discovering America.) Austin: University of Texas Press, 2014. [xiii, 352 p. ISBN-13 9780292729148, $35 (hbk.); 9780292767331, price varies (ebk.).]
  • The Black Musician and the White City: Race and Music in Chicago, 1960-1967. By Amy Ashber. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2014. [xi, 202 p. ISBN-13 9780472119172, $55 (hbk.); 9780472029983, price varies (ebk.).]
  • Brecht, Music, and Culture: Hans Eisler in Conversation with Hans Bunge. Edited and translated by Sabine Berendse and Paul Clements. London: Bloomsbury Metheuen Drama, 2014. Originally published as Hanns Eisler, Gespräche mit Hans Bunge: Fragen Sie mahr über Brecht by Deutscher Verlag für Musik, 1975. [xv, 289 p. ISBN-13 9781472524355, $86 (hbk.); 9781472528414, $29.95 (pbk.); 9781472534415, price varies (ebk.).]
  • Cairo Pop: Youth Music in Contemporary Egypt. By Daniel J. Gilman. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2014. [280 p. ISBN-13 9780816689279, $75 (hbk.); 9780816689286, $25 (pbk.); 9781452942797, price varies (ebk.).]
  • Center Stage: Operatic Culture and Nation Building in Nineteenth-Century Central Europe. By Philipp Ther. Translated by Charlotte Hughes-Kreutzmuller. (Central European Studies.) West Lafayette, IN: Purdue University Press, 2014. [xii, 291 pp. ISBN-13 9781557536754, $39.95 (pbk.); 9781612493305, price varies (ebk.); 9781612493299, price varies (ebk.).]
  • Composing the Canon in the German Democratic Republic: Narratives of Nineteenth-Century Music. By Elaine Kelly. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014. [xiii, 246 p. ISBN-13 9780199998098, $45 (hbk.); 9780199394371, price varies (ebk.); 9780199998104, price varies (ebk.).]
  • Convent Music and Politics in Eighteenth-Century Vienna. By Janet K. Page. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014. [xii, 307 p. ISBN-13 9781107039087, $99 (hbk.); 9781139910699, $125 (ebk.); 9781139856447, $125 (ebk.); 9781139922432, price varies (ebk.).]
  • Countercultures and Popular Music. Edited by Sheila Whitely and Jedediah Sklower. (Ashgate Popular and Folk Music Series.) Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2014. [xx, 295 p. ISBN-13 9781472421067, $119.95 (hbk.); 9781472421074, price varies (ebk.).]
  • Defining Deutschtum: Political Ideology, German Identity, and Music-Critical Discourse in Liberal Vienna. By David Brodbeck. New York: Oxford University Press, 2014. [xviii, 365 p. ISBN-13 9780199362707, $40 (hbk.); 9780199362714, price varies (ebk.).]
  • Dislocated Memories: Jews, Music, and Postwar German Culture. Edited by Tina Frühauf and Lily E. Hirsch. New York: Oxford University Press, 2014. [xvii, 302 p. ISBN-13 9780199367481, $74 (hbk.); 9780199367498, price varies (ebk.); 9780199367504, price varies (ebk.).]
  • “I Hear America Singing: Folk Music and National Identity. By Rachel Clare Donaldson. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2014. [xi, 225 p. ISBN-13 9781439910788, $89.50 (hbk.); 9781439910795, $34.95 (pbk.); 9781439910801, price varies (ebk.).]
  • Eine Institution zwischen Repräsentation und Macht: Die Universität für Musik und darstellende Kunst Wien im Kulturleben des Nationalsozialismus. Edited by Juri Giannini, Maximilian Haas, und Erwin Strouhal. (Musikkontext, 7.) Vienna: Mille Tre Verlag, 2014. [392 p. ISBN-13 9783900198367. €48.]
  • Klingendes Bekenntnis zu Führer und Reich: Musik und Identität im Reichsgau Tirol-Vorarlberg 1938–1945. By Kurt Drexel. Innsbruck: Universitätsverlag Wagner, 2014. [325 p. ISBN-13 9783703008436. €37.]
  • Living Politics, Making Music: The Writings of Jan Fairley. Edited by Simon Frith, Stan Rijven, and Ian Christie. (Ashgate Popular and Folk Music Series.) Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2014. [x, 208 p. ISBN-13 9781472412669, $109.95 (hbk.); 9781472414175, price varies (ebk.).]
  • The Lure and Legacy of Music at Versailles: Louis XIV and the Aix School. By John Hajdu Heyer. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014. [xxii, 277 p. ISBN-13 9780521519885, $99 (hbk.); 9781139027793, $125 (ebk.); 9781316129715, $125 (ebk.); 9781316130803, $125 (ebk.).]
  • Lyrical Nationalism in Post-Apartheid Namibia: Kings, Christians, and Cosmopolitans in Catholic Youth Songs. By Wendi A. Haugh. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2014. [xvi, 283 p. ISBN-13 9780739188453, $95 (hbk.); 978739188460, price varies (ebk.).]
  • The Militant Song Movement in Latin America: Chile, Uruguay, and Argentina. Edited by Pablo Vila. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2014. [ix, 282 p. ISBN-13 9780739183243, $95 (hbk.); 9780739183250, price varies (ebk.).]
  • Music along the Rapidan: Civil War Soldiers, Music, and Community during Winter Quarters, Virginia. By James A. Davis. [xiii, 346 p. ISBN-13 9780803245099, $45 (hbk.); 9780803262768, price varies (ebk.); 9780803262775, $45 (ebk.).]
  • Music and Diplomacy from the Early Modern Era to the Present. Edited by Rebekah Ahrendt, Mark Ferraguto, and Damien Mahiet. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014. [304 p. ISBN-13 9781137468321. $76.]
  • Music and Social Change in South Africa: Maskanda Past and Present. By Kathryn Olsen. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2014. [xiv, 222 p. ISBN-13 9781439911365, $64.50 (hbk.); 9781439911389, price varies (ebk.).]
  • Music behind Barbed Wire: A Diary of Summer 1940. By Hans Gal. London: Toccata Press, 2014. [243 p. ISBN-13 9780907689751, $70.]
  • Music, Politics, and Nationalism in Latin America: Chile during the Cold War. By Jedrek Mularski. Amherst, NY: Cambria Press, 2014. [xxi, 273 p. ISBN-13 9781604978889. $109.99.]
  • Nikolay Myaskovsky: The Conscience of Russian Music. By Gregor Tassie. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 2014. [438 p. ISBN-13 9781442231320, $85 (hbk.); 9781442231337, price varies (ebk.).]
  • The Organic Globalizer: Hip Hop, Political Development, and Movement Culture. By Christopher Malone. New York: Bloomsbury Academic, 2014. [276 p. ISBN-13 9781628920055, $120 (hbk.); 9781628920031, $29.95 (pbk.); 9781628920062, price varies (ebk.).]
  • The Politics of Verdi’s Cantica. By Roberta Montemorra Marvin. (Royal Musical Association Monographs, 24.) Farnham, Surrey: Ashgate, 2014. [xiii, 183 p. ISBN-13 9781409417859, $104.95.]
  • Punk Rock and the Politics of Place: Building a Better Tomorrow. By Jeffrey S. Debies-Carl. (Routledge Advances in Sociology, 127.) New York: Routledge, 2014. [xvi, 309 p. ISBN-13 9780415840422, $140 (hbk.); 9781135022273, price varies (ebk.).]
  • Queen Anne: Patroness of Arts. By James Anderson Winn. New York: Oxford University Press, 2014. [xxi, 792 p. ISBN-13 9780199372195, $39.95 (hbk.); 9780199372201, price varies (ebk.).]
  • Roots of the Revival: American and British Folk Music in the 1950s. Ronald D. Cohen and Rachel Clare Donaldson. (Music in American Life.) Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2014. [182 p. ISBN-13 9780252038518, $85 (hbk.); 9780252080128, $25 (pbk.); 9780252096426, price varies (ebk.).]
  • Sámi Musical Performance and the Politics of Indigeneity in Northern Europe. By Thomas R. Hilder. (Europea: Ethnomusicologies and Modernities, 17.) Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 2015. [xviii, 243 p. ISBN-13 9780810888951, $85 (hbk.); 9780810888968, price varies (ebk.).]
  • Sounds of the Citizens: Dancehall and Community in Jamaica. By Anne M. Galvin. Nashville, TN: Vanderbilt University Press, 2014. [xii, 224 p. ISBN-13 9780826519788, $55 (hbk.); 9780826519801, price varies (ebk.).]
  • St. Anne in Renaissance Music: Devotion and Politics. By Michael Alan Anderson. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014. [xvii, 345 p. ISBN-13 9781107056244, $99 (hbk.); 9781107297104, $125 (ebk.); 9781139907408, $125 (ebk.); 9781139911252, $125 (ebk.); 9781139922999, price varies (ebk.).]
  • Survival Songs: Conchita Piquer’s Coplas and Franco’s Regime of Terror. By Stephanie Sieburth. (Toronto Iberic.) Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2014. [xiii, 257 p. ISBN-13 9781442644731, $45 (hbk.); 9781442661448, price varies (ebk.).]
  • A Tear in the Curtain: The Musical Diplomacy of Erzsébet Szonyi, Musician, Composer, Teacher of Teachers. By Jerry-Louis Jaccard. New York: Peter Lang, 2014. [xxix, 320 p. ISBN-13 9781433124464, $94.95 (hbk.); 9781453912027, price varies (ebk.).]
  • Tre essays om Richard Wagner: Politik, mytologi og musik: Wagner 200 aar. By Sylvester Roepstorff. Copenhagen: Gadeuniversitetet, 2013. [137 p. ISBN-13 9788799417629. €25.]
  • Turbo-Folk Music and Cultural Representations of National Identity in Former Yugoslavia. By Uros Cvoro. (Ashgate Popular and Folk Music Series.) Farnham, Surrey, UK: Ashgate, 2014. [209 p. ISBN-13 9781472420367, $109.95 (hbk.); 9781472420374, price varies (ebk.).]
  • Violins of Hope: Violins of the Holocaust, Instruments of Hope and Liberation in Mankind’s Darkest Hour. By James A. Grymes. New York: Harper Perennial, 2014. [319 p. ISBN-13 9780062246837, $15.99 (pbk.).]
  • Viva V.E.R.D.I.: Music from the Risorgimento to the Unification of Italy. Edited by Roberto Illiano. (Studies on Italian Music History, 8.) Turnhout: Brepols, 2013. [xii, 396 p. ISBN-13 9782503550183, $160.]
  • Wagner’s Visions: Poetry, Politics, and the Psyche in the Operas through “Die Walküre.” By Katherine R. Syer. (Eastman Studies in Music, 115.) Rochester, NY: University of Rochester Press, 2014. [x, 256 p. ISBN-13 9781580464826, $80 (hbk.); 9781580468695, price varies (ebk.).]