Claudio Giovanni Antonio Monteverdi (1567-1643) was an Italian composer who, in addition to being the first great operatic writer, reflected in his works, especially the madrigals, the change in style from late Renaissance to early baroque. Claudio...

Letters from Renaissance composers are extraordinarily rare. We are therefore very fortunate to have over 125 extant letters written by the most important composer at the transition from the Renaissance to the baroque, Claudio Monteverdi (1567-1643). The vast majority of these letters were...

Claudio Monteverdi. Vespro della Beata Vergine: Vespers (1610). Performing score edited by Jeffrey Kurtzman. (Oxford Choral Works.) Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, c1999. [Introd., p. v-vi; vocal and instrumental requirements and ranges, p. vii-ix; editorial principles, p. ix-xi; facsims., p. xii-xiv; score,...

Today is Saturday, Feb. 24, the 55th day of 2007. There are 310 days left in the year.Today's Highlight in History:On Feb. 24, 1868, the U.S. House of Representatives impeached President Andrew Johnson following his attempted dismissal of Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton; Johnson...

William Bolcom wasn’t what I expected. Thank goodness.I was a nervous 23-year-old, freshly arrived in Ann Arbor from Canada, excited and more than a little intimidated to be accepted into the prestigious graduate program in musical composition at the University of Michigan.Bolcom was to be...