This Routledge Television Guidebook on Television Music provides a comprehensive overview of the engagement between music and television since the inception of network television broadcasting in the United States in the late 1940s. In this book, Norma Coates presents a "how-to" guide, providing examples and case studies of many approaches to making sense of how music functions on television. Music plays many roles on television--it can function as a soundtrack, comment on the narrative, or be part of the narrative itself. Music can be foundational to a genre and industrial structure like music television, or it can be the organizing principle for a type of program such as the televised singing contest. Music can provide content in the form of band or individual performances across a range of television genres. With case studies of popular shows like American Idol and Glee , this Television Guidebook aims to help students explore and understand how music contributes to television style, narrative, genre, and history.