Composers category: 3267 books

Witold Lutosławski is widely regarded as one of the foremost composers of the post-war era and one of the truly great musicians of the 20th century. Charles Bodman Rae's examination of Lutosławski 's life and work draws on wide-ranging and meticulous research, including hours of recorded conversation...

The esteemed American composer and unabashed diarist Ned Rorem provides a fascinating, brazenly intimate first-person account of his life and career during one of the most extraordinary decades of the twentieth century Ned Rorem is often considered an American treasure, one of the greatest...

Shortly before his death, Percy Grainger (1882-1961) lodged over twenty unpublished sketches in his Australian Museum. Self-Portrait of Percy Grainger draws exclusively from these sketches, revealing for the first time an illuminating portrait of the composer's life. With such titles as "The...

One of the most successful songwriters and composers of the last 25 years, Steve Dorff has penned over 20 Top 10 hits for pop and country artists around the world, including Barbra Streisand, Celine Dion, Blake Shelton, Smokey Robinson, Kenny Rogers, Ray Charles, Anne Murray, Whitney Houston, George...

John Cage was one of America's most renowned composers from the 1940s until his death in 1992. But he was also a much-admired writer and artist, and a uniquely attractive personality able to present his ideas engagingly wherever he went. As an interview subject he was a consummate professional. The...

In 2010, the composer Gustav Mahler celebrates his one hundred fiftieth birthday. In Mahler Re-Composed, linguist George Cummins shares a collection of six interrelated essays that provide a fresh perspective on difficult questions familiar to Mahler lovers. Cummins, a teacher of Russian and Czech...

First published in 1978 The Ordeal of Ivor Gurney is a moving and extraordinary account of a tragic genius penned by the composer Michael Hurd. Born in Gloucester in 1890 Ivor Gurney began writing songs and poems in his teens, taking his inspiration from the Severn Valley countryside where he grew...

How do you bring a forgotten silent film back to life? What are the techniques behind writing a successful film score? How do you work with and inspire choreographers? Carl Davis’s fascinating story gives an insight into the prolific composing and conducting career of one of the world’s most celebrated...

A tortured genius, a sensitive soul, and a great composer burdened by the weight of his private desires, Tchaikovsky’s life is explored in full by the incomparable John Suchet. Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky is one of the most successful composers that Russia has ever produced, but his path to...

Possessed by Music is the fascinating story of the Russian composer Alexander Konstantinovich Glazunov (1865-1936). He was born into a wealthy publishing family, with very musical parents: his mother was a fine pianist and his father played the violin. The young Glazunov demonstrated a number of talents,...

John Duffey’s Bluegrass Life: Featuring The Country Gentlemen, Seldom Scene and Washington, D.C. with a Foreword by Tom Gray is the definitive biography of one of bluegrass music’s most important artists of the genre. Through his work as a founding member of these two pioneering bands, John Duffey...

In addition to his activities as conductor, administrator, educator, composer, and organist, Sir Ernest MacMillan (1893-1973) found time to write more than one hundred essays and lectures on music. Always ready to use his enormous prestige to further the causes of music, MacMillan took every opportunity...

Conversations with Igor Stravinsky is the first of the celebrated series of conversation books in which Stravinsky, prompted by Robert Craft, reviewed his long and remarkable life. The composer brings the Imperial Russia of his childhood vividly into focus, at the same time scanning what were at the...

A lifelong study of the music of Johann Hasse by conductor David Wilson has culminated in his superb new book, The Dresden Manuscripts: Unearthing an 18th Century Musical Genius. Hasse’s music achieved great popularity during his lifetime, only to be overshadowed later in history by other composers,...