Includes a 30-page bibliographical essay, numerous illustrations, and a full-color pictorial biography of the composer.

    Blum has captured in great detail the little things that so often make a great teacher. I would strongly recommend this book to anyone with an interest in the Art of Interpretation."—Music Teacher"The volume belongs to an exceptional class of literature: it is to be welcomed as a significant contribution. In his Forward, Antony Hopkins in a most eloquent way makes us fully aware of our possible great loss had the subject material forming this book not been preserved for posterity...throughout the book one remains not only an absorbed reader, but very much an active participant."—Violoncello Society Newsletter"Now we have an authoritative guide to this great artist's approach to interpretation...a book which should be compulsory reading for every player, conductor and teacher."—Music Journal of the Incorporated Society of Musicians"Blum has elegantly combined precise music terminology with meticulous music examples to present lucid and revealing details of interpretation that can be quickly and easily grasped. Only superlatives apply to this book, and all serious musicians would find immense pleasure and musical profit from reading this work. Highly recommended at all levels."—Choice

    "Will no doubt become the standard lieder-resource for the English-speaking world..." - Choice

    He has thereby left a unique record whose importance cannot be overestimated. Each of the 137 poems is annotated for pronunciation, with a line-for-line translation into English by Winifred Radford, who also translated the text of the book.

    As well as describing the circumstances in which Ravel composed, the book explores new evidence to present radical views of the composer’s background and upbringing, his notorious failure in the Prix de Rome, his incisive and often combative character, his sexual preferences, and his long final illness. It also contains the most detailed account so far published of his hugely successful American tour of 1928. The world of Maurice Ravel—including friendships (and some fallings-out) with Debussy, Fauré, Diaghilev, Gershwin, and Toscanini—is deftly uncovered in this sensitive portrait.