An Illustrated guide to composers of classical music

by Peter Gammond

Offers brief profiles of the lives and careers of classical composers and assesses their contributions to music

Genres: Music

Hardcover

Published January 1, 1980

About the author

Peter Gammond was a British music critic, writer, journalist, musician, poet, and artist.

Reviews

[Ian Laird · Rating 4 out of 5]

This well-produced guide is an excellent introduction to the lives and work of prominent classical composers.

They are all pretty much here - Beethoven, Bach and the other heavies, Brahms, Mozart, Handel, Mendelsohn - all the ones you expect, right up to Copland, George Gershwin and Michael Tippett. Sadly, Alan Hovharness did not make the cut, and it does seem a pity the man who created Mysterious Mountain (Symphony No 2) could not be included but there you are.

There are 120 or so well-written entries providing biographical information, outlining careers and travels (amazing how many were productive outside their own countries: Dvorak in the USA, Handel in England, Mendelsohn in England and Scotland). We have assessments of character and worth; a reference to ‘many striking contradictions in Beethoven’ and the influence of Felix Mendelsohn’s father, whose benevolent despotism, cultivating domestic virtues, ‘ended by hampering young Mendelsohn’s emotional development.' The piece on Ralph Vaughan Williams is a strong example of what is important about each subject:

A third powerful formative influence, besides folksong and literature, was the polyphonic church music of the Tudor period – which brought into being his most famous work, The Fantasia on a theme of Tallis.

And further, talking of his major works just prior to World War Two:

…central to his output were his symphonies, which cover an extraordinary variety of styles and, despite a tendency to thick colour and galumphing rhythm, include three indisputable masterpieces - the prophetically grim and violent Fourth, written in 1935, the gravely contemplative Fifth, which is cognate with Pilgrim’s Progress, and the restless Sixth, whose desolate Epilogue, drained of all emotion is one of the most remarkable pieces of music ever written.

I never tire of Vaughan Williams, Fantasia and The Lark Ascending.

Recommended.