The title of Alex Ross’ The Rest is Noise: Listening to the Twentieth Century is a play on Hamlet’s last words. “Rest” for the Prince of Denmark was “silence.” However, Shakespeare doesn’t suffer from the image problem modern “classical” music does. The Bard’s plays can be transferred into contemporary settings, but this music is marginalized primarily because it is less than two centuries old. Beethoven was the ultimate head banger, but that didn’t prevent his music from being performed during his lifetime. What Mr. Ross does in his comprehensive, accessible, and entertaining book is prove that despite being ignored by music directors and arts administrators preoccupied with their subscriber base rather than programming, socialite board members maintaining the status quo, and the mainstream media – this music is very relevant.

It is worth mentioning what The Rest is Noise never attempts being. This is not a BS “cult of the personality” biography or history written by a so-called expert that does nothing but add classical music’s reputation for elitism and freakishness. As in his reviews and blog, The New Yorker’s chief music critic never lectures on or dumbs down his subject. Mr. Ross doesn’t suggest how or what to listen for in Jean Sibelius’s Fifth Symphony or Alban Berg’s opera Lulu. He writes for familiar, novice, and potential listeners. The omission of a discography deserves a standing ovation because it gives readers total freedom locating or downloading performances. While the New York Philharmonic is chastised for its treatment of their celebrated triumvirate of composer/conductor music directors Gustav Mahler, Leonard Bernstein, and Pierre Boulez, major cultural institutions are never condemned outright. In no way is The Rest is Noise a Music Appreciation 101 or Classical Music for Dummies primer.

So rather than going for the expected, Mr. Ross explains how modern classical music (dating from Richard Wagner’s operas written in the 1860’s) is an integral part of western culture. He doesn’t make this sentence sound as pretentious as it reads because history is on the music’s side. Even when this music is noisy like that of Charles Ives, it is worth knowing because it captures time in sound. What makes The Rest is Noise stand out among other classical music studies is Mr. Ross’ sharp analyses of how the outside world influences a composer’s inner life.

The book begins with the scandalous 1905 premiere of Richard Strauss’ operatic adaptation of Oscar Wilde’s Salome and ends with an appreciation of John Adams’ 1987 Nixon in China (which the Metropolitan Opera is finally scheduling during its 2010-2011 season). Mr. Ross goes on to present other examples of hard-won twentieth century creativity. The better-known ones make for interesting reading: Igor Stravinsky, whose 1913 Rite of Spring foreshadows World War I, lived his long life in Europe and the United States and formed a prolific collaboration with another Russian èmirgè, choreographer George Balanchine. Dmitri Shostakovich wrote the autobiography the KGB never decoded in his Fourth Symphony and string quartets. Despite his limited access to the west, Shostakovich became great friends with the reticent Sir Benjamin Britten; Mr. Ross points out surprising similarities in their diverse styles. War wasn’t only the form of displacement: Aaron Copland, best known for the Fanfare for the Common Man, fell out of favor with critics and audiences alike when he experimented with the 12-tone music scale created by Arnold Schoenberg. Schoenberg fled Austria the Nazis to teach and compose in California where he lived not far from his rival…Igor Stravinsky, who too experimented with the 12-tone scale.

Thus, The Rest is Noise: Listening to the Twentieth Century makes a strong case that classical music continues thriving in its own forms (e.g., opera, symphony, string quartet), in venues of all kinds. This music occassionally fuses with eastern instrumentation and continues influencing jazz, American musical theatre, and film soundtracks (Jonny Greenwood’s score for There Will Be Blood is far from first ignored by Academy Awards). Alex Ross has done a virtuoso job synthesizing material spanning decades, personalities, and location. He has written the ultimate “Program Notes” that deserve to be read rather than left under one’s seat.