Schoenberg

"Lucid... Sachs's book is a succinct guide to Schoenberg's life and work, one designed in part to make the composer's music accessible to a wider audience. Much of the book's appeal lies in that implicit promise to help find the beauty hidden in what can seem, to the uninitiated, a writhing mass of noise." -- Christopher Carroll - Harper's

"[An] elegant and judicious book" -- Rupert Christiansen

"[A]n immensely valuable source for anyone desiring an accessible overview of this endlessly controversial and chronically misunderstood giant of 20th-century music." -- John Adams - The New York Times Book Review

"[A] concentrated meditation... It may be recommended for anybody with an interest in the work of the Viennese-American composer Arnold Schoenberg-and perhaps especially to those who have never quite been able to "crack" his music... Despite his postwar decades in California, Schoenberg-with his rattles and shimmers, his craggy melodies and pervasive angst-never quite escaped the nightmares of what was then a crabbed and bloody Old World... Mr. Sachs's fine study should inspire a fresh understanding of his life and work." -- Tim Page - The Wall Street Journal

"Few authors have written more memorably on music than Harvey Sachs." -- Simon Williams, author of Wagner and the Romantic Hero