Books about music

[mercia]

What books about music, of any description, do forumites recommend ?

[teamsaint]

interesting. I wonder what other classical music guide books anyone here might recommend. It might need a new thread I guess.

a great idea Mercs.
Please do start it .
Xmas is coming up too......

[ardcarp]

If anyone wants a decent one volume guide to classical music then they should by the "Oxford Companion to Music" (preferably in Percy Grove rather than modern Latham edition).

I must leap to the defence of Alison Latham who did a fine job with the new Oxford Companion. Did you mean Percy Scholes? Yes, he did a good job too, but one cannot halt the course of music history in 1936!

I'm not sure either edition was ever intended to be read as a continuous text (except maybe by Brain of Britain contenders with an autistic tendency) because surely it is a reference book. It's more than a dictionary, but less of a learned tome (or should I say tomes) than MGG or Grove. As such, it succeeds very well IMO, and my copy is well-thumbed.

[french frank]

And surely best is to pop down to your local library for a membership card (if you haven't already got one) and have 24-hour access to the (regularly updated Grove and Oxford Dictionary.

It depends whether you want the pleasure of browsing through a book by your fireside or whether you want a reference tool to answer specific queries as they crop up.

[Apparently, the CFM book was the best-selling book on classical music of 2012. Is that a threat to the availability of deeper scholarship or good news?]

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

I must leap to the defence of Alison Latham who did a fine job with the new Oxford Companion. Did you mean Percy Scholes? Yes, he did a good job too, but one cannot halt the course of music history in 1936!

I'm not sure either edition was ever intended to be read as a continuous text (except maybe by Brain of Britain contenders with an autistic tendency) because surely it is a reference book. It's more than a dictionary, but less of a learned tome (or should I say tomes) than MGG or Grove. As such, it succeeds very well IMO, and my copy is well-thumbed.

There's also the Oxford Dictionary of Music which makes an excellent companion:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Oxford-Dictionary-Music-Paperback-Reference/dp/0199578540/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1382187890&sr=1-1&keywords=oxford+dictionary+of+music

(Incidentally, anyone wanting to know what ideas about Music where around in 1936 can get Scholes' version for cheaper-than-chips figures:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/offer-listing/0193113066/ref=dp_olp_used?ie=UTF8&condition=used

[french frank]

Should have said that by 24-hour I meant that it would be online free of charge - including the Oxford Dictionary.

[Anna]

I too have the Oxford Dictionary of Music (not the latest, mine is the revised edition by Michael Kennedy, bought secondhand) I found it very useful, especially when I was doing the AA quiz! And that's the only musical reference book I have, except years ago the Rough Guide to Classical Music (!)

[ardcarp]

I like the idea of this new thread. I have just been staring at my dusty shelf of books about music, and realising that most are probably out-dated. Times change, and scholarship progresses (and here's the cynic at work) by overturning previous tenets (e.g. Monteverdi didn't space out his choirs...they all huddled together on the floor of San Marco). I think the once popular Opera as Drama by Joseph Kerman is still a good read, but best of all are the slim BBC Music Guides (eg Hyatt-King on Mozart Chamber Music, Robbins Landon on Haydn Symphonies, Denis Arnold on Monteverdi Madrigals..the titles are legion). I still dip into these, and I wish something similar were available today.

[teamsaint]

And surely best is to pop down to your local library for a membership card (if you haven't already got one) and have 24-hour access to the (regularly updated Grove and Oxford Dictionary.

It depends whether you want the pleasure of browsing through a book by your fireside or whether you want a reference tool to answer specific queries as they crop up.

[Apparently, the CFM book was the best-selling book on classical music of 2012. Is that a threat to the availability of deeper scholarship or good news?]

Wiltshire Library seemed to have Grove available to members online until recently, but i can't seem to find it listed now.

[johnb]

Wiltshire Library seemed to have Grove available to members online until recently, but i can't seem to find it listed now.

If your library participates all you need to do is go to the website and enter your Library Card Barcode.

http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/public/;jsessionid=CD58FF3ECC90D55B045564BB82CC4847

[mercia]

the slim BBC Music Guides

yes, I used to have a few of those, but can only find Strauss Tone Poems (Michael Kennedy) on my shelf now. A recent secondhand acquisition has been Antony Hopkins's The Dent Concertgoer's Companion.

[teamsaint]

If your library participates all you need to do is go to the website and enter your Library Card Barcode.

http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/pub...5564BB82CC4847

I think they may have dropped it, but i'm not sure.

Thanks. I'll pop in and ask.

[Petrushka]

What an excellent idea for a thread or maybe even a(nother) sub-forum.

The only reference book I've had on music is A Dictionary of Composers and Their Music which has been well used over the years. It gives dates of compositions but I'd really like one that gives dates of first performances if one exists. My edition ends in 1976.

Another invaluable book is Anatomy of the Orchestra by Norman del Mar. I urge anyone on the forum who's never read this to get hold of a copy as it is brilliant.

My shelves of music books are mostly composer biographies (Newman 's Wagner, de la Grange's and Mitchell's Mahler, Wilson's Shostakovich and the like) together with the odd few picked up at book fairs ( My Life in Music by Sir Henry Wood for instance). Conductor biographies too, Richard Osborne on Karajan, Michael Kennedy on Boult and Barbirolli, Simon Mundy on Haitink.

[Thropplenoggin]

I'd love a recommendation for a good Mozart biography. I'm currently eyeing 1791: Mozart's Last Year by H.C.Robbins Landon. All of £0.01 on the Mighty Water Snake Which Meandereth Through Ye Vasty Rainforest site.

[Petrushka]

I'd love a recommendation for a good Mozart biography. I'm currently eyeing 1791: Mozart's Last Year by H.C.Robbins Landon. All of £0.01 on the Mighty Water Snake Which Meandereth Through Ye Vasty Rainforest site.

I have that and read the account of Mozart's final hours exactly 200 years later on December 5 1991. Also try Mozart: The Golden Years by the same author.