American Musical Traditions, Volumes 1-5.

edited by Jeff Todd Titon and Bob Carlin. Schirmer Reference/Gale Group/Thompson Learning (300 Park Ave. S., New York, NY 10010), published in collaboration with Smithsonian Folkways Recordings, 2001. 1,064 pp. in five volumes, $450 for five-volume set.

Consisting of five volumes and covering six topic areas: Native American Music, African American Music, British Isles Music, European American Music, Latino American Music and Asian American Music, this scholarly and professionally produced set of hard-back volumes is a deep source of sociologically related musical information about some of the peoples who have contributed to American culture. This is a new addition to an extensive collection of excellent ethnomusicological materials generated under the auspices of the Smithsonian Institution.

The first thing to be said of this set is that it is about folk music and nothing else. Beethoven and Copland are never mentioned. Neither is jazz. If you wish to know if Japanese Americans still perform Kabuki theater in the new world, you won't find it here. Likewise, there is no printed music in these volumes, not even transcriptions. Anything that smacks of classical culture, no matter whose, is omitted here.

Editors Jeff Todd Titon and Bob Carlin generally exclude popular culture as well, focusing primarily on surviving examples of old folk music, although there are exceptions: Tejano, break dancing and rap are included and presented as contemporary manifestations of old folk traditions.

That having been said, this is an excellent reference set. There is a wealth of information in these five volumes put together by expert scholars. On the other hand, there is a lesser amount than meets the eye. All five volumes contain the same general introduction, the complete five-volume table of contents, the same glossary and a complete index, all of which amounts to almost half of the pages in the volumes. The material could have been bound in one large volume if these duplications had been eliminated.

As the make-up of America keeps changing in ways no one could have expected 100 years ago, there is a need for more ethnographical information, particularly that relates to the cultures of native Americans and recent immigrants. This is a set that should be in every public school library and perhaps in every music classroom. Still, the subject matter of these volumes should not replace more traditional musical study. It would be a shame if the study of ethnological information were to replace the learning of the rudiments of music reading and writing--musical literacy. There is a lot of study of words here, much less of music. I would have liked to see some notated musical examples from time to time. Bartok set the example of an ethnomusicologist who transcribed every nuance of a folk performance and then developed a composition style based on those transcriptions. In other words, he combined a thorough musical literacy with a deep appreciation and respect for ethnic music. We must never forget that this combination is possible and desirable, and we must never permit musical illiteracy to take over our music educational system. Reviewed by Robert Ehle, Greeley, Colorado.