BOOK REVIEW - "CLASSICAL MUSIC: THE 50 GREATEST COMPOSERS AND THEIR 1,000 GREATEST WORKS" BY PHIL G. GOULDING

 My favorite genres of music are Classical and Symphonic Rock. Do I consider myself an expert on who's the best? Not even close. I like what I like and will give what I don't like a couple of times. There are certain eras I prefer to others: Baroque isn't my cup of tea, I love a lot of the romantic era, and sometimes I think the principal instrument in 20th Century music is fingernails on the chalk board.

That being said, I picked up "Classical Music: The 50th Greatest Composers and Their 1,000 Greatest Works" by Phil Goulding, wondering how much disagreement we'll have. While there are disagreements, I find myself agreeing more.

Goulding started this book as a challenge by his wife At that point, I probably knew more than he did. His approach to ranking the artists was sound, using how many pages of music by the composers as a guide. 

He starts off with a few lists about the performers, including his ranking, the composer's century of birth, and their home country. He goes through his list with a short biography of the composer, focused on their compositions. He then provides a starter list (5 items), a top ten (as you'd expect, 10), and a Master's list. There are a couple where Goulding's Master's list is the same as the top ten; others have enough that he recommends a library.

You don't have to open the book to know his top 10: it's on the outside back cover. The top 10 is: 

1. Johann Sebastian Bach
2. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
3. Ludwig van Beethoven
4. Richard Wagner
5. Franz Joseph Haydn
6. Johannes Brahms
7. Franz Schubert
8. Robert Schumann
9. George Frideric Handel
10. Peter Ilyitch Tchaikovsky

Actually, I have few arguments. I wouldn't have Schumann on my list: I've tried listening to him on occassion and remain unimpressed compared to the others. Plus, with two of my three favorite composers ranked 11th and 12th - Mendelssohn and Dvorak respectively; Beethoven is my other favorite - Schumann would find him slipping to the teens on my list. Having read the book, I doubt I'd get much argument at that point: Goulding commented that if someone wanted to rearrange the order of the top 3, he'd see nothing wrong with that.

He ranks a pair of my favorites further down - Bruckner at 25 and Rimski-Korsakov at 42. Three others are missing from his list: Correlli, Franz Berwald, and Carl Phillip Emannuel Bach, but overall, I think his ranking is more objective while I won't at all claim my rankings are subjective. 

The book is concluded with a section on the orchestra and its instruments and arrangement and a 42 page discography.

If you are interested in learning more about classical music and its composers, I very hightly recommend this book. 

BOOK REVIEW - "THE ROUGH GUIDE TO CLASSICAL MUSIC: AN A-Z OF COMPOSERS, KEY WORKS, AND TOP RECORDINGS," EDITED BY JOE STAINES

I've heard of series like "Complete Idiot's" and "...for Dummies," but this is my first encounter with "Rough Guides." Joe Staines is listed as the editor of this book, and as co-authors with Jonathan Buckley, Phillip Clark, Andrew Dickson, Kate Hopkins, Stephen Johnson, Nick Kimberley, and Gavin Thomas.

This book gives you an introduction to many classical composers, identifies what is considered as their key works, and providing you with a list of recordings, making this a good guide if you want to enlarge your collection of classical music. 

Note I said this is "a good guide." Considering that three of my ten favorite symponies are not considered "key works" (i.e. the Lobesang and Reformation symphonies by Felix Mendelssohn, and the Singulaire Symphone of Franz Berwald), or that one composer I like is not mentioned (again, Berwald), I'm being fair when I call it "a good guide." After all, this is not meant to be exhaustive, and I've recently looked at another book where Berwald is again omitted from the list. 

I've read some reviews that are critical of this, but I do not agree with the criticisms. In spite of my disappointments, I think this book achieves its goals, and I would recommend it to someone who wants to learn more about classical music.