The Rough Guide to Classical Music

This expanded and updated third edition of The Rough Guide to Classical Music is a unique handbook, spanning a thousand years of music from Gregorian chant to works by contemporaries such as Judith Weir and Wolfgang Rihm. 

Contains:

• Concise biographical sketches of more than 200 composers, explaining their social and musical contexts.
• Informative summaries of the major compositions in all genres, from solo instrumental pieces to operas with casts of hundreds.
• Incisive reviews of hundreds of CDs, selecting the best of the latest recordings and the pick of the reissues.
• Lively articles on such topics as sonata form, the concerto, atonality and film music.
• More than 150 picture, including some rarely seen archive photos.