GOOD MORNING AMERICA BOOK CLUB PICK! • Ray McMillian is a Black classical musician on the rise—undeterred by the pressure and prejudice of the classical music world—when a shocking theft sends him on a desperate quest to recover his great-great-grandfather’s heirloom violin on the eve of the most prestigious musical competition in the world. “I loved The Violin Conspiracy for exactly the same reasons I loved The Queen’s Gambit: a surprising, beautifully rendered underdog hero I cared about deeply and a fascinating, cutthroat world I knew nothing about—in this case, classical music.” —Chris Bohjalian, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Flight Attendant and Hour of the Witch Growing up Black in rural North Carolina, Ray McMillian’s life is already mapped out. But Ray has a gift and a dream—he’s determined to become a world-class professional violinist, and nothing will stand in his way. Not his mother, who wants him to stop making such a racket; not the fact that he can’t afford a violin suitable to his talents; not even the racism inherent in the world of classical music. When he discovers that his beat-up, family fiddle is actually a priceless Stradivarius, all his dreams suddenly seem within reach, and together, Ray and his violin take the world by storm. But on the eve of the renowned and cutthroat Tchaikovsky Competition—the Olympics of classical music—the violin is stolen, a ransom note for five million dollars left in its place. Without it, Ray feels like he's lost a piece of himself. As the competition approaches, Ray must not only reclaim his precious violin, but prove to himself—and the world—that no matter the outcome, there has always been a truly great musician within him.

Original title: La sonate áa Bridgetower.

Many Pathways for Discovery is a manual for metadata practitioners learning music cataloging for the first time, as well as a ready reference tool for more experienced practitioners. It is intended to serve as a companion guide to general music cataloging instruction, focusing on what has traditionally been considered the more advanced skillset of “subject analysis.” It provides guidance for answering the “W-questions” about music content: What is it? (genre/form); What is it for, or, How is it performed? (medium of performance); Who is it by and Who is it for? (demographic aspects); When was it created? (chronological aspects); Where was it created? (geographic aspects) This book is primarily geared toward a metadata environment based on MARC 21 encoding and on vocabularies developed by the Library of Congress, namely, the Medium of Performance Thesaurus for Music (LCMPT), the Genre/Form Terms for Library and Archival Materials (LCGFT), and the Demographic Group Terms (LCDGT). Comparisons to legacy practices involving Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH) are included. Additional chapters address encoding of faceted descriptors in Linked Data environments, and on discovery possibilities for end users. A bibliography of foundational and supplemental resources is provided.

Richard Strauss is an outlier in the context of twentieth century music. Some consider him a composer of the late romantic period, while others declare him a traitor of modernity for his role in National Socialism. Despite the controversy surrounding him, Strauss's works--even beyond his most well-known operas Elektra and Rosenkavalier--are present in the repertories of concert halls worldwide and continue to enjoy large audiences. The details of the composer's life, however, remain shrouded in mystery and gossip. Laurenz Lütteken's Strauss presents a fresh approach to understanding this elusive composer's life and works. Dispensing with stereotypes and sensationalism, it reveals Strauss to be a sensitive intellectual and representative of modernity, with all light and shade of the turn of the twentieth century.

Identifies almost two hundred forty composers whose works are most important to an understanding of classical music, with essays on sixty of the most significant. Presented in chronological order for the Medieval, Renaissance, and Elizabethan ages, the age of the Baroque, the age of Classicism, the Romantic age, and the age of Modernism.