Dwight's Journal of Music (1852–1881) was one of the most respected and influential such periodicals in the country in the mid-19th century. John Sullivan Dwight created the Journal, and published it in Boston, Massachusetts. Among the early writers was Alexander Wheelock Thayer, who would become one of the first major music historians in the country. Other contributors have included John Knowles Paine, William F. Apthorp, W. S. B. Mathews and C. H. Brittan. All issues are now rather rare and sought. 

Contents include: On slave music, negro spirituals, and the songs of the freedmen; The Flower Queen as an Antidote to Slavery; On the Status of Freedman and their Need to Learn to Live in Freedom; Negro as a Natural Musician; On Cheap Musical Literature Branded as "Negro Melodies, Scottish Polkas, and other like trash;" American Musical Students Studying Abroad; Ancient Church Music; The Chorals of Johann Sebastian Bach; Beethoven and Associated Literature; Music among the Blind; Memoir Dr. Crotch; Dead Heads of the New York Opera; Extremes in Music; Manners in Concert Rooms; Mozart's Requiem [series]; A Moravian Christmas; Monster Programmes in Tennessee; Musical Plagiarism; etc. etc. 

Dwight, S. John. Dwights's Journal of Music, A Paper of Art and Literature. John S. Dwight, Editor. Vols. IX. and X. Boston. Printed by Edward L. Balch. 1857. 208pp. + 206pp.

A good + copy, bound in half leather, generally solid, with generally bright pages and light foxing.