Podcast

Some musical ideas do not disappear because they were wrong. Sometimes they disappear because the books went out of print. Because the language changed. Because the instruments changed. Because the composers were forgotten. Because the music was placed in a box, on a shelf, in an archive — waiting for someone to open it again.

The Musical Archeologist

This is The Musical Archeologist: forgotten ideas from music’s past. I’m Craig Dabelstein — conductor, musician, and owner of Maxime’s Music. In this series, we’ll explore old writings on music: books on wind bands, military music, instruments, performances, emotions, education, and the strange, persistent human need to make organised sound meaningful.

In this episode of The Musical Archeologist, Craig Dabelstein returns to Hermann Eichborn’s On the History of Instrumental Music to ask a different kind of question: not only what the book tells us, but what its sources leave out.

Eichborn’s world is full of town musicians, court trumpeters, guild players, military bandsmen, civic appointments, and official musical privileges. It is a fascinating history of music inside institutions — but it is also, almost entirely, a male and official world.

This episode explores the people institutional music history often forgets: women, amateurs, domestic musicians, informal teachers, servants, children, street performers, and others whose musical lives did not always leave paperwork behind.

The forgotten idea is simple but important: music history is not only made by the people institutions remember. It is also made by the people institutions forget.

The Musical Archeologist: Forgotten Ideas from Music’s Past

Written and presented by Craig Dabelstein

Music composed by Jeffrey A. Young

This episode is based on ideas arising from Hermann Eichborn’s On the History of Instrumental Music, translated by Craig Dabelstein and published by Maxime’s Music.

Buy the book: https://books.by/maximes-music

Podcast webpage: https://craigdabelstein.com/podcast/