Modern Western musical thought tends to represent music as a thing--a pattern, a structure, even an organism--than as a human practice. Music, Encounter, Togetherness focusses on music as something people do, as a mode of encounter between individuals and cultures, and as an agent of interpersonal and social togetherness. It presents music as a utopian dimension of everyday life.

Acknowledgements List of illustrations Introduction 1: Socialities of music 1.1 A zone of magic 1.2 Webs of listening 1.3 Beyond participation 2: Performing togetherness 2.1 A readiness for human company 2.2 Networks of musicking 2.3 Musicking on paper 3: Dynamics of encounter 3.1 Rationalising music 3.2 Music and relational being 3.3 Dehumanising music 3.4 Hearing the call of others 4: Between Lucknow and London 4.1 Beyond suspicion 4.2 The dancing girl 4.3 Listening across cultures 4.4 The nabobina 5: Java comes to Paris 5.1 Anxieties of influence 5.2 Turning heads 5.3 Taking your memories home 5.4 Gongs in the Erard 5.5 How Debussy heard the gamelan 6: Music and modernisation in China 6.1 Visions of modernity 6.2 People's musicians 6.3 A national music 6.4 The future is China 6.5 Modernity with Chinese characteristics 7: Music in a cosmopolitan world 7.1 Shanghai then and now 7.2 Everyday cosmopolitanism 7.3 Mobilising music 8: Transcultural musicking 8.1 Imagining a new Australia 8.2 Beyond style 8.3 Virtual worlds 9: Other classics 9.1 Period remix 9.2 Modes of musical sensemaking 9.3 Vienna through the looking glass 9.4 Listening against the grain Afterword: On certainty References

Advance praise for Music, Encounter, Togetherness "Nicholas Cook's scholarship has long been distinguished by a wide-ranging erudition that has grown from a remarkable command of the literature in music studies and in many other disciplines in the humanities and social sciences. Music, Encounter, Togetherness not only underscores that distinction, but it also raises it to the level of a Lebenswerk. This book is Cook at his finest, and it contains ideas, some from earlier research, others quite new, that represent his finest endeavors in the interdisciplinary intellectual spheres in which he works. --Philip V. Bohlman, author of World Music: A Very Short Introduction Praise for Music: A Very Short Introduction (second edition, 2021) "A magnificent achievement: I can't think of anyone in world musicology who could have done it better." --Roger Parker, Professor of Music (Emeritus), King's College London Praise for Music as Creative Practice (2018) "Cook's discussion of many interrelated topics, with a vast range of ideas overlapping and reinforcing each other, is virtuoso writing...As in all his writing, [he] goes a very long way in this book to clarify these issues, along with many other intriguing musicological concepts, and to stimulate debate in a most lucid and informative manner." --Sinan Carter Savaskan, Notes Praise for Beyond the Score (2013) "There is no doubting the stunning array of diverse sources, the remarkable interdisciplinary scope, and the lucidity of expression with which Nicholas Cook has long been associated, in what could be considered his magnum opus." --Giles Hooper, Music Analysis Praise for Music, Imagination, and Culture (1990) "It will be essential reading for everybody." --Raymond Monelle, Music Analysis "A fascinating, learned, provocative book...It will start a debate amongst musical theorists which will continue over many years." --Anthony Storr "I want to urge anyone interested in musical aesthetics to read it. The book is written with passion, with intelligence, and with deep understanding of music." --Peter Kivy, Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism

Nicholas Cook is 1684 Professor Emeritus at the University of Cambridge. He previously taught at Royal Holloway (University of London) and at the Universities of Southampton, Sydney, and Hong Kong. His recent books include Beyond the Score: Music as Performance (2013), Music as Creative Practice (2018), and Music: Why it Matters (2023), while in 2021 his Music: A Very Short Introduction (originally published in 1998 and translated into sixteen languages) appeared in a completely rewritten second edition. A former British Academy/Wolfson Research Professor, he was elected Fellow of the British Academy in 2001 and holds a Doctorate of Humane Letters from the University of Chicago.

Selling point: Develops a relational approach to music, placing people at its heart Selling point: Offers a holistic understanding of the role of improvisation, performance, and textuality in music Selling point: Presents approaches applicable across a range of musical cultures and across the 'esthetic' versus 'applied' divide