Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians - Fifth edition

Supplementary tenth volume was published in 1961. Editing was started by Eric Blom and completed by Eric Stevens after Blom's death, according to the Publisher's Note at the beginning of that volume. It's not that easy to find complete sets of the fifth edition of the famous "Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians," particularly in the near fine edition we're selling this softcover version. Individual volumes, yes, but not the full nine volumes as originally published in 1954, with the 1961 supplemental volume. That's probably because they're still in use by those who own them. This is the last edition under the original title, but more to the point, the last edition of a size that was tenable to sit on the shelves of private purchasers while still functioning as a respected scholarly reference tool. It was so popular it went through five reprints, each of which included the supplement as a tenth volume though making note of its original supplementary status in its title. That is how things sit with this reprint released in 1973 After the fifth edition, "Grove's Dictionary," as it has always been popularly known, was so overwhelmingly revamped that calling the result a new edition wouldn't do. Instead, it gained a new title and became "The New Grove." It doubled in size-when it was published in 1980, it was 20 volumes long, with about one million words per volume. But it's not like there was anything actually wrong with the fifth edition. In fact, the current publishers, Oxford University Press, in its history of the dictionary, says, "Almost as a talisman, a hardbound copy of the 5th edition held a prominent place on a shelf [of the editorial offices for the new edition], its covers swollen by paste-ins of the countless changes clipped from the pages of its reprints." The fifth edition itself was a major expansion of previous editions which took advantage of a post-war boom in music scholarship, but its coverage was more limited in scope than that of "The New Grove," because that boom in scholarship continued between the two editions. Neither did Eric Blom, the editor of the fifth edition, ignore what was going on. With each reprint after the original 1954 release-1966, 1968, 1970, 1973, and 1975-he made revisions and corrections and additions, so that a reprint almost qualified as a new edition itself. The publishers also made a point of producing softcover releases that were as sturdy as they were attractive. They did their job well. Our volumes state upfront on their copyright pages that they were printed in 1973, yet we had such a hard time believing that, based on the evidence of our eyes upon the condition of the books on our shelves, that we kept looking for something telling us they had actually been printed much more recently. We couldn't find anything. We are listing this set as being in Near Fine condition, but that is an average of the condition of all ten volumes, not a statement that each of the ten is in identical shape. They're not, but neither do they vary much from it. The most important thing to know is that there are no marks or any other flaws to any of the pages, which are all quite bright, and each volume is still structurally sound, with tight bindings, though there is a little tugging on a couple of pages. Amazingly, there is no sign of fading or sun damage. Where things vary is that some volumes veer closer to "very good" territory because of minor flaws to the exteriors such as light soiling and minor creasing. At the same time, other volumes are in "fine" or even unread condition, with no apparent flaws at all. At first glance, it would seem someone bought this set, put them on their shelf, and forgot about them. At second glance it would seem that, no, they were used, but not so much that they can't keep on being profitably consulted for quite some time. Photos are forthcoming or available upon request. .…