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“The book is well researched and worthy of its subject. Especially exemplary is the brief prologue, which offers an overview of all American music of that time. . . . Recommended”—Choice
The definitive biography of a major American composer and musical leader
In many ways, this is the story of the birth of the American style in classical music. George Whitefield Chadwick (1854–1931) was one of the most significant and influential American composers at the turn of the twentieth century and a leading light of the Boston cultural scene. Bill F. Faucett offers a detailed exploration of Chadwick’s life and art utilizing archival material only recently made available. These crucial primary sources, including letters, diaries, and memoirs, enable a deeper and more nuanced understanding of Chadwick’s music and aesthetic perspective, and provide a clearer lens through which to view his life, career, and times. The book traces Chadwick’s story from his earliest musical education to his surging career in Boston’s nascent musical culture of the 1880s, to his fruitful middle years, and finally to his later life and towering legacy. In addition to bringing newfound appreciation of Chadwick’s life, Faucett’s book offers penetrating examinations of his major compositions and a vivid re-creation of Boston’s rich and influential musical and cultural scene.
Click here for TABLE OF CONTENTS
Reviews:
“This biography on George Whitefield Chadwick is well-researched and well-presented… an interesting, well-rounded look at the life of this great composer and insight into the musical culture of that time period.”—bookbargainsandpreviews.com
Endorsements:
“Bill Faucett brings to his engagingly readable biography of Chadwick both thorough research and the keen insight cultivated over years of involvement with the composer and his music. Basing his work on a rich accumulation of documentary resources, he offers a detailed, three-dimensional picture of the man, framed within the larger history of his time. Dr. Faucett weaves his perceptive analyses of Chadwick’s music inseparably into the composer’s life story.”—Douglass Seaton, The Florida State University
“Drawing on recently uncovered source materials and an impressive knowledge of contemporary context, Bill Faucett s biography of George Whitefield Chadwick provides the most comprehensive study to date of the
life of this important American composer.”—E. Douglas Bomberger, Elizabethtown College
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BILL F. FAUCETT is a widely respected Chadwick scholar and the former classical music critic and columnist at the Palm Beach Post and American Record Guide. He is currently an arts administrator at Tampa’s Straz Center for the Performing Arts.
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