"Containing the names and brief biographical sketches of only American composers, musicians, singers, teachers, and writers. Coverage is limited to those individuals who were born in the United States, or who came to America and lived and worked here for an extended period of time"--Jacket.

"The stimulus this handsomely produced volume will provide to research and teaching may well surpass that offered by Dr. Southern's earlier studies. This major accomplishment belongs in the libraries of all individuals and institutions interested in any aspect of American music." Ethnomusiciology

Contains nearly 1000 pages of precise and accessible information on all musical subjects.

Each of the 300 entries lists major works, and most include a personal statment of musical philosophy provided by the composer.

Although American women have written many of our most memorable popular songs, their contributions have received little recognition. The first biographical dictionary devoted to American women songwriters, this work profiles 181 well-known and little-known women who have written popular and motion picture songs, musicals, country, blues, jazz, folk, gospel, and hymns. Many African-American and contemporary songwriter/performers such as Madonna, Janet Jackson, and Mariah Carey are included. This volume provides hard-to-find biographical and career information across the broad spectrum of indigenous American popular song. A history of women's contribution to the creation of American popular song emerges through these profiles. Grattan takes pains to profile the famous, the unsung, and those who persevered through sheer tenacity and against all odds. The dictionary is divided into ten music categories and profiles are alphabetically arranged within each category. An introduction to each chapter gives an historical overview of women's contributions to that form of music. Each profile consists of an up-to-date biographical essay on private life, career as both songwriter and, in many cases, performer, most famous songs, and sources of further information. Entries are cross-referenced. Lyrics from a number of the best-known songs by women songwriters are included. A bibliography and song index will aid the researcher.

Between 1918 and 1926, the widely read music magazine, Musical America, published 414 short biographies of prominent American musicians born between ca. 1860 and 1900. This biographical dictionary collects those articles into a convenient and richly detailed source of information on the composers, teachers, scholars, and performers who were active at the time American music was coming of age.