The Rest Is Noise

In this sweeping and dramatic narrative, Alex Ross, music critic of The New Yorker, weaves through the events of the twentieth century and its music - from Vienna before the First World War to Paris in the twenties from Hitler's Germany and Stalin's Russia to downtown New York in the sixties and seventies, from Berlin to Beijing today. Taking readers into the labyrynth of modern style, Ross draws revelatory connections between the century's most influential composers and the wider culture. The Rest Is Noise is an astonishing history of the twentieth century as told through its music.