Eric Clarke is Heather Professor of Music at the University of Oxford. Nicholas Cook is Professor of Music at Cambridge University. Daniel Leech-Wilkinson is Professor of Music at King's College London. John Rink is Professor of Music at Royal Holloway, University of London.

• Introduction Eric Clarke, Nicholas Cook, Daniel Leech-Wilkinson and John Rink; Personal takes: learning to live with recording Susan Tomes; A short take in praise of long takes Peter Hill; 1. Performing for (and against) the microphone Donald Greig; Personal takes: producing a credible voice Mike Howlett; 'It could have happened': the evolution of music construction Steve Savage; 2. Recording practices and the role of the producer Andrew Blake; Personal takes: still small voices Jonathan Freeman-Attwood; Broadening horizons: 'performance' in the studio Michael Haas; 3. Getting sounds: the art of sound engineering Albin Zak; Personal takes: limitations and creativity in recording and performance Martyn Ware; Records and recordings in post-punk England, 1978–80 Richard Witts; 4. The politics of the recording studio Louise Meintjes; Personal take: from Lanza to Lassus Tully Potter; 5. From wind-up to iPod: techno-cultures of listening Arild Bergh and Tia DeNora; Personal take: a matter of circumstance: on experiencing recordings Martin Elste; 6. Selling sounds: recordings and the music business David Patmore; Personal take: revisiting concert life in mid-century: the survival of acetate discs Lewis Foreman; 7. The development of recording technologies George Brock-Nannestad; Personal takes: raiders of the lost archive Roger Beardsley; The original cast recording of West Side Story Nigel Simeone; 8. The recorded document: interpretation and discography Simon Trezise; Personal takes: one man's approach to remastering Ted Kendall; Technology, the studio, music Nick Mason; Reminder: a recording is not a performance Roger Heaton; 9. Methods for analysing recordings Nicholas Cook; 10. Recordings and histories of performance style Daniel Leech-Wilkinson; Personal take: recreating history: a clarinettist's perspective Colin Lawson; 11. Going critical. Writing about recordings Simon Frith; Personal take: something in the air Chris Watson; 12. Afterword: from reproduction to representation to remediation Georgina Born; Global bibliography; Global discography.

'… the contributors (some 35 of them, counting the editors) form a lively company of writers and have the agreeable art of expressing opinions without seeming opinionated.' Gramophone