Customer Reviews

Greene's Biographical Encyclopedia of Composers: A Music Lover's Treasury of the Lives and Musical Achievements of Over 2,400 Important Composers From the Ancient Greeks to the Present Day

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When Greene's Encyclopedia was published, I had already been wanting something like this for years: a biographical dictionary that would include the full range of composers, down to the little-known ones; and that would treat each composer at the appropriate length, neither a 15-page treatise nor a 15-line teaser.

When Greene's book appeared, I was stunned to see the volume I had imagined, and it even has an extra element of interest: it is arranged chronologically, so that you can see how composers are grouped by era. This arrangement requires the extra step of using an index at the beginning, but that is a minor inconvenience. Greene's articles are just the right length, with the right mix of scholarship and the author's personal style. At over 1300 pages of small print, it covers almost every composer you'll likely encounter: 2400 total. In short, this is the ideal one-volume source for information about composers.

I assumed the music world would acclaim this book and it would become a standard. Strangely, though, I never saw it reviewed or even mentioned in print. Then, at some point, it went out of print. Too bad the used copies are so expensive-- pick it up if you don't mind the price. Someone please reprint Greene!