Over the past two centuries Western culture has largely valorized a particular kind of "good" music—highly serious, wondrously deep, stylistically authentic, heroically created, and strikingly original—and, at the same time, has marginalized music that does not live up to those ideals.In Good Music, John J. Sheinbaum explores these traditional models for valuing music. By engaging examples such as Handel oratorios, Beethoven and Mahler symphonies, jazz improvisations, Bruc...

Billy Joel has sold over 150 million records, produced thirty-three Top-40 hits, received six Grammy Awards, and been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Fans celebrate him, critics deride him, and scholars have all but ignored him. This first-of-its-kind collection of essays offers close analysis and careful insight into the ways his work has impacted popular music during the last fifty years. Using diverse approaches, this volume serves as a model for how any scholar can approa...