# Readable Biographies s of Composers?



## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

Before I became a Music-Wallah, on Christmas Eve 2011 when I brought my violin home, I was a bookworm. And now, next to listening to music, and playing music, I most enjoy reading about the lives of composers.
Can anyone recommend a good 'Life', about any of them, really, though Baroque is my first love.
Thank you in advance...
Oh, and btw, sorry about the extra s in the title; very sloppy in an ex-English teacher.


----------



## moody (Nov 5, 2011)

Ingenue said:


> Before I became a Music-Wallah, on Christmas Eve 2011 when I brought my violin home, I was a bookworm. And now, next to listening to music, and playing music, I most enjoy reading about the lives of composers.
> Can anyone recommend a good 'Life', about any of them, really, though Baroque is my first love.
> Thank you in advance...
> Oh, and btw, sorry about the extra s in the title; very sloppy in an ex-English teacher.


The classic thing to get hold of is A.L.Bacharach's "Lives Of the Great Composers".


----------



## Ukko (Jun 4, 2010)

There is a bio of Beethoven that uses his correspondence as its base. Quite readable - and I don't remember the details. It's around here _somewhere_.


----------



## TinyTim (Feb 16, 2013)

_Beethoven_ Edmund Morris (Harper Collins, 2005) ISBN-13 978-0-06-075974-2


----------



## Lunasong (Mar 15, 2011)

For me the definitive volume is _The Lives and Times of the Great Composers_ by Michael Steen.
I learned more about European history by reading this book than I ever did in my American schooling.


----------



## Hausmusik (May 13, 2012)

Swafford's Brahms bio is a good one.


----------



## Novelette (Dec 12, 2012)

Alan Walker's Liszt biography: all three volumes. It is the definitive account of Liszt's life.


----------



## ptr (Jan 22, 2013)

Anything written by the venerable *H. C. Robbins Landon*, whether it is Händel, Haydn, Mozart or Ludwig van or their period, all I've read by him is a joy!
Maynard Solomon's composer portraits are "interesting" but a bit to speculative for my taste but quite fun to read anyway, should perhaps not be the first thing you read about a composer. If You're on to Bach, Malcolm Boyd's JSB (Oxford Composer Companion) and Christoph Wolff's JSB "The Learned Musician" are both essential reading

/ptr


----------



## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

Thanks for all these suggestions, good people. 
Re Michael Steen, my husband ('Taggart') has got his book 'Enchantress of Nations, about Pauline Viardot ('Soprano, Muse & Lover'), out of our local library. I'm reading it & it's fab. He's so witty, such a master of fascinating detail.*

(Michael Steen, I mean, though my husband is similarly gifted!)


----------



## TinyTim (Feb 16, 2013)

ptr said:


> Anything written by the venerable *H. C. Robbins Landon*, whether it is Händel, Haydn, Mozart or Ludwig van or their period, all I've read by him is a joy! /ptr


Thanks for this helpful plug for Robbins Landon. I'm reading his slim volume on Haydn's symphonies published as a BBC Music Guide years ago. I understand that he later wrote a five-volume work on Haydn, which is not in print and unavailable on the used book market.


----------



## Taggart (Feb 14, 2013)

True - not exactly unavailable just very expensive:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/?ie=UTF8&keywords=haydn+chronicle+and+works&tag=googhydr-21&index=stripbooks&hvadid=8294850849&hvpos=1t1&hvexid=&hvnetw=s&hvrand=1892554661525515875&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=b&ref=pd_sl_lcej4vaij_b


----------

