A Briefe Introduction to the Skill of Song by William Bathe

’...Kevin C. Karnes's new critical edition of Bathe's two treatises provides a welcome addition to Ashgate's new series 'Music Theory in Britain, 1500-1700: Critical Editions'... it is in Karnes's thorough explications of Bathe's writing, and in his correction of Bathe's errors - both in the Introduction and in the notes to the edition itself, in which at times he virtually provides translations - that he makes perhaps his most valuable editorial contribution to the volume, one that will make future research relating to Bathe considerably easier... the texts of the two treatises themselves are reproduced meticulously...and therefore provide an accurate and reliable reading of Bathe's work. The inclusion of Karnes's thoughtful and perceptive commentary and notes on Bathe's pitch system...and his explanation of the numerical method for composing two-part canons, makes interpretation of Bathe's contribution to late sixteenth-century British theory considerably less onerous than it has been until now.' Music and Letters