Scores to Settle

This title includes 366 miniature true tales spanning five centuries of classical music. ""Scores to Settle"" brings classical music to life through stories about the struggle to create and perform it. Following ""Grace Notes for a Year"", Norman Gilliland's popular earlier book of musical anecdotes, ""Scores to Settle"" brings together 366 brief true stories ranging from the inspirational to the burlesque, all of them illuminating the musical experience for composers, musicians, and listeners. Among the hundreds of musicians discussed in ""Scores to Settle"" are: Robert and Clara Schumann, Grieg, Mozart, Rossini, Sousa, Haydn, Johann Strauss, Isaac Stern, Yo-Yo Ma, Liszt, Beethoven, Bizet, Mendelssohn, Paganini, Piazzolla, Bach, Debussy, Schoenberg, Berlioz, Ives, Handel, Khachaturian, Prokofiev, Shostakovich, Horowitz, Ravel, Karajan, Wagner, Stravinsky, Casals, Verdi, Tchaikovsky, Gershwin, Elgar, Webern, Richard Strauss, Saint-Saens, Lloyd Webber, Menotti, Weill, Bruckner, Mahler, Dvorak, Te Kanawa, Brahms, Perlman, Salerno-Sonnenberg, Leinsdorf, Solti, Sullivan, Toscanini, Rachmaninoff, Joplin, Chopin, and Paderewski.

"Gilliland has done it again: This second installment of his wondrous compilation of anecdotes, both hilarious and richly informative, from the annals of music history. Musicians of all stripes-composers, conductors, divas, and divos, violinists, pianists, and bass trombonists-parade through the 366-pages (one for each day of the year, plus Leap Day) of this hefty tome. Some are so outrageously comical that you'll be ricocheting with laughter for days to come; others are so fascinatingly strange that you'll think the author made it all up. Hooray for humor and wit in music!"--Gunther Schuller, "I really enjoyed reading this book. There are many wonderful anecdotes that give great insight into these composers and many of the events that shaped their lives and compositions. I highly recommend this book and wish its readers many enjoyable hours."--Edo de Waart

Norman Gilliland has hosted classical music radio broadcasts since 1977. He is the creator of the radio feature Grace Notes, which airs daily on many public radio stations nationwide. He is the author of a historical novel, Sand Mansions, and lives in Middleton, Wisconsin.