For over a hundred years the artistic reputation of Frederic Chopin has suffered not only from the sentimental and romantic legends which surround his name but also from the distortions and misinterpretations of his works by performers. In this book, Alan Walker and ten leading composers, performers, and scholars offer detailed analyses of the works and present an honest historical portrait of their composer. The result is a comprehensive book giving a fresh view of Chopin as man and artist.

"Fascinating. . . . As engaging an explanation of how scientists study fossil bones as any I have ever read." --John R. Alden, Philadelphia Inquirer

In 1984 a team of paleoanthropologists on a dig in northern Kenya found something extraordinary: a nearly complete skeleton of Homo erectus, a creature that lived 1.5 million years ago and is widely thought to be the missing link between apes and humans. The remains belonged to a tall, rangy adolescent male. The researchers called him "Nariokotome boy."

In this immensely lively book, Alan Walker, one of the lead researchers, and his wife...

"If only I do not die here." After falling ill during a visit to Bayreuth, Franz Liszt uttered this melancholy refrain throughout his final days, which were spent in rented rooms in a house opposite Wahnfried, the home of his daughter Cosima and his deceased son-in-law Richard Wagner. Attended by incompetent doctors and ignored and treated coldly by his daughter, the great composer endured needless pain and indignity, according to a knowledgeable eyewitness. Lina Schmalhausen, his student, caregiver, and close companion, recorded in her diary a graphic description of her teacher's illness and...

This book takes a close look at family relationships at the end of the life cycle. Based on a representative sample of people aged 75 or more in a major British city, it investigates in depth what the caring relationship actually means to those elderly people and carers, mostly family members, who are involved on a day to day basis. An important book for health and welfare professionals involved in planning and providing services.

Hans von Bulow is a key figure in 19th century music whose career path was as broad as it was successful. Music history's first virtuoso orchestral conductor, Bulow created the model for the profession-both in musical brilliance and in domineering personality-which still holds forth today. He was an eminent and renowned concert pianist, a respected (and often feared) teacher and music critic, an influential editor of works by Bach, Mendelssohn, Chopin, and Beethoven, and a composer in a variety of musical genres. As a student and son-in-law of Franz Liszt, and estranged friend of Richard...