MUSIC

Press, Volume XCV, Issue 28257, 20 April 1957, Page 3

MUSIC

The Music Lover’s Pocket Book. Compiled by Harry Dexter and Raymond Tobin. Evans Brothers. 160 pp.

This handy little book deals, in concise form, with a multitude of facts to which the average musician, listener and concert-goer will often want to refer. The compilers have chosen their material so carefully and skilfully that the pocket volume is really a comprehensive survey of music and musicians in miniature.

Included in the many different aspects covered are The World’s Great Symphonies and Concertos (with opus numbers and dates), Famous Orchestras, Overtures, Tone-poems and Variations, the Story of the Keyboard and details of instruments of every kind, Famous Signature Tunes, Chamber Music. Military and Brass Bands, Opera, Ballet, Oratorio. Film Music, Choirs, Colleges of Music and Musical Periodicals. The 16 Thumbnail Lives of Contemporary British Composers contain recommended recordings of each composer’s works. Many curious and interesting facts appear in its pages. Paul Wittgenstein, an Austrian pianist, who lost an arm in World War I, commissioned from Ravel and Richard Strauss piano works for the left hand. Does the reader know that Alban Berg in his opera. “Wozzeck,” introduces a military band, an out-of-tune piano, and an accordian? Or that Rolf Liebermann (born 1910) has written a Concerto for Jazz Band and Symphony Orchestra? There is a list of Artists in Double Harness, while Points that Confuse distinguishes between Puccini and PiCcini, concertina and concertino. the “Leonora” overtures and other ambiguous or confusing names and titles. The later sections deal with various technical terms and information which the music-lover would be most likely to seek. The reader will find the answers to most of his musical questions contained in this well-planned, compact volume. As the compilers have said in the preface, they have of necessity had to be selective, but have included music which “has gained enduring fame or high popularity.” Nevertheless. this admirable little book will fully serve the purpose for which it was written —“to be a handy reference book dealing with music, its raw materials, and the men who composed it.”