Stephen Walsh is Emeritus Professor of Music at Cardiff University and the author of a number of books on music including Musorgsky and His Circle and the prizewinning, two-volume biography of Igor Stravinsky. He served for many years as deputy music critic for The Observer and writes reviews for a variety of publications. He lives in Herefordshire, England.
“Outstanding.”—Booklist (starred)
“[Debussy] shines a welcome light on the composer, his music, and
his times.”—Library Journal
“Perceptive and authoritative. . . . A sensuous portrait of an
iconic composer. . . . A richly detailed life of a modernist
master.”—Kirkus (starred)
“Stephen Walsh has followed his magnificent, two-volume Stravinsky
biography with this smaller but no less brilliant gem of a book on
Debussy. Combining psychological perspicacity about his subject’s
life with deep insight into his music, Walsh has made me not only
better understand the composer—he has also made me want to
re-listen to and re-reflect upon every piece that Debussy ever
wrote.”—Harvey Sachs, author of Toscanini: Musician of
Conscience
“Stephen Walsh’s Debussy: A Painter in Sound articulates with
skill, taste and flashes of humor the evolution of an artistic
giant who preferred to leave things ‘half said.’ It is impeccably
researched and intellectually engrossing—a thorough and important
study of the composer who forever changed the direction of music in
our time.”—Stuart Isacoff, author of When the World Stopped to
Listen: Van Cliburn’s Cold War Triumph and Its Aftermath
“In Debussy Stephen Walsh has produced a wonderfully detailed
biography of a truly ground-breaking composer. This book should be
of interest to any Debussy enthusiast.”—John Powell, author of Why
You Love Music and How Music Works
“Compelling. . . . Finely tuned. . . . [Walsh] employs a
delightfully fluent prose to carry the general reader
along.”—Kathryn Hughes, The Guardian
“[A] wonderfully warm, wise and witty book about the greatest
French composer of the modern era. As a comprehensive and
integrated survey of Debussy’s life and work, it could hardly be
bettered.”--Rupert Christiansen, Literary Review
“Walsh is one of our most insightful writers on music, and his
judgment always illuminates what it touches. . . . Published to
mark the centenary of the composer’s death, Debussy: A Painter
in Sound concentrates on what truly matters.”—Philip Hensher,
The Spectator
“An enjoyable and impressive achievement. . . . Lively yet learned.
. . . Walsh depicts Debussy’s Paris with the same verve and
scholarship that he applies to the man.”—The Economist
“A beautifully written study, mercifully free of academic jargon. .
. . [Debussy is] a genuine intellectual biography. . . . It’s a
tricky thing to bring off, but Walsh is certainly the right man for
the job. . . . He gets as close as anyone to catching in words the
peculiar quality of Debussy’s harmony. . . . [Walsh] combines
delicacy of perception, refinement of expression and quiet
persistence, in a way not so far from the great composer
himself.”—Ivan Hewett, The Daily Telegraph
“Excellent. . . . [a] lucid and elegant introduction to the French
revolutionary.”—Michael Henderson, The Times (UK)
“[An] excellent new biography. . . . [This] fascinating study will
help to win [Debussy] new admirers. . . . Walsh is a superb guide
to this music.”—Ian Thomson, The Observer
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