Dr David Irving's book Colonial Counterpoint: Music in Early Modern Manila has been nominated as one of eighteen "Books of the Year" for 2010 by BBC History Magazine. The magazine says of this list: "We've assembled a panel of leading historians and writers to select their favourite reads of 2010. Their choices are testament to the quality and variety of history books that have hit the shelves in the past year."

The historian Felipe Fernández-Armesto has nominated Colonial Counterpoint, writing:

"By a whisker, in a great year for history books, I nominate Colonial Counterpoint: Music in Early Modern Manila by DRM Irving (OUP) because it inspires the excitement of a new departure in historical tradition and the awareness of new possibilities for the future. Never before has a writer done such a perfect job of making music a subject of cultural history and writing about it intelligibly for every kind of readership. I've struggled unsuccessfully to get music into my own classes and books; DRM Irving has found the right idiom as if by magic. And, by the way, he has made a fundamental contribution to the study of early modern empires and of the Filipino past."