Schubert (Master Musicians)

Celebrating its 100th anniversary, this extraordinary series continues to amaze and captivate its readers with detailed insight into the lives and work of music's geniuses. Unlike other composer biographies that focus narrowly on the music, this series explores the personal history of each composer and the social context surrounding the music. In a precise, engaging, and authoritative manner, each volume combines a vivid portrait of the master musicians' inspirations, influences, life experiences, even their weaknesses, with an accessible discussion of their work-all in roughly 300 pages. Further, each volume offers superb reference material, including a detailed life and times chronology, a complete list of works, a personalia glossary highlighting the important people in the composer's life, and a select bibliography. Under the supervision of music expert and series general editor Stanley Sadie, Master Musicians will certainly proceed to delight music scholars, serious musicians, and all music lovers for another hundred years.
When this much acclaimed biography on Schubert was published ten years ago, it was welcomed as `a model of critical biography ... an essential vade mecum for all Schubertians'. In the intervening years, however, Schubert's public image has changed considerably, making it necessary to revise thoroughly the main text of the book as well as the four detailed appendices which serve as a useful reference section. Its aim remains the same: to provide a readable, authoritative, and reliable guide to Schubert's life and works for the student, the musician, and the general reader.

The most remarkable composer of song literature in the history of Western music, Franz Schubert sometimes gets overlooked in favor of his more bombastic contemporaries. 1997 marks the bicentennial of his birth; record companies and concert programmers, who love such pegs, have accordingly scheduled loads of Schubert for the year. You can find some useful insights into the composer and his work with this biography, a slightly expanded version of the essay written for the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians. Also helpful is the detailed chronicle of his music, arranged by type and date of composition.