First published in 2011, this text provides citations to the core Holst literature. The volume is intended for students and researchers, as well as those seeking an introduction to Holst. The inclusion of materials for the non- specialist seems entirely appropriate as Holst devoted much of his career to teaching amateur musicians. The contents of this book presents a selective, annotated list of essential materials published through the end of 2009, although a very few exceptions were made for a limited number of post-2009 print and web resources.

Based upon and containing many of Holst's own personal letters, diaries and notebook entries, this study provides an intimate portrait of this larger-than-life personality. Many of Holst's innermost thoughts regarding musical composition, performance and music education are disclosed here. In addition, there is a significant amount of information concerning Holst's work ethics at all six of his places of employment. It also provides a view of the composer from this side of the Atlantic, shedding considerable light on Holst's plans and activities regarding his three American visits that is not found in the other biographies. A significant number of chapters are devoted to Holst's 1932 semester-long lectureship at Harvard University. The appendices include examples of Holst's manuscripts, thumbnail sketches of persons associated with his career, and (unique to this text) a chronological listing of his compositions.

Extensively revised with new material, the book also includes a study of Imogen Hoist's music and a chronological list of her works, revealing her as a composer of tremendous talent, whose music deserves to be much more familiar.

"To the economist and ballet enthusiast John Maynard Keynes he was potentially the most brilliant man he'd ever met; to Dame Ninette de Valois he was the greatest ballet conductor and advisor this country has ever had; to the composer Denis ApIvor he was the greatest, mostr lovable, and most entertaining personality of the musical world; whilst to the dance critic Clement Crisp he was quite simply a musician of genius. Yet sixty years after his ... death Constant Lambert is little known today. As a composer he is remembered for his jazz-inspired The Rio Grande but little more, and for a man who ... devoted the graeter part of his life to the establishment of English ballet his work is largely unrecognized today. [This book] looks not only at his music but at his journalism, his talks for the BBC, his championing of jazz (in particular, Duke Ellington), and, more privately - his longstanding affair with Margot Fonteyn. ..."--Book jacket.

Imogen Holst (1907-1984(, the only child of Gustav Holst, was a composer and arranger of folksongs, writer on music, conductor, and administrator. She also acted as music assistant to Benjamin Britten, of whom she became a friend and close associate. She subsequently continued as Artistic Director of the Aldeburgh Festival until 1977, when she retired to devote more time to preparing a thematic catalogue of her father's music.