ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book provides the chronological overview of the preoccupation with early music, which clarifies the significance and content-value of certain events, and the time frame needed for certain issues to develop. It uncovers the evolving meaning of terms and references used in the process of the early music revival, and shows that ‘historical performance’ was, for a long time, only one aspect of this preoccupation. The book is concerned with the crucial difference between the revival of musical compositions and the search for historical performance practices is noted, along with how terminology could be misleading if this prevailing disparity is ignored. It shows, matter-of-fact, literal interpretations outnumber expressive ones by far, even beyond the period examined and well into the 1980s.
