Music of the Federal Era is an excellent overview of late 18th and early 19th century compositions by Benjamin Carr, Oliver Shaw, Raynor Taylor and others, performed on period instruments. The variety of styles represented on this disc reflects two kinds of music that existed quite separately: one centered in the cities, essentially European in origin, and the other in villages and the countryside. For while America found itself politically independent at the end of the Revolutionary War, culturally it was still largely dependent on Europe.

These composers began the process of shaping the sound of American music, and theirs is the first music written, arranged, performed and published in the brand new United States. The exhaustive liner notes by Richard Crawford and Cynthia Adams Hoover, both important scholars of American music, include a history of the era, bios of the composers, and an essay on the instruments and performance practices of the time, making this an ideal release for libraries and institutions as well as music lovers.