Now available from Amadeus Press...

256 pp, 11 b/w photos, 6 x 9", hardcover

ISBN: 1-57467-007-7

$29.95, plus shipping and handling

Publication Date: June 1996

Available from Amadeus Press, LLC, 512 Newark Pompton Turnpike, Pompton Plains, NJ 07444 Telephone: (973) 835-6375, (800) 321-3408. http://www.amadeuspress.com/ and email at publicity@amadeuspress.com

One of the seminal figures in post-war music and the most powerful figure in the contemporary French music scene, Grammy Award–winner Pierre Boulez is widely known to American audiences as star conductor of the New York Philharmonic, the Cleveland Orchestra, and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra (where he was recently named principal guest conductor).

These candid interviews give us vintage Boulez—jhis bold views, enigmatic wit, practical wisdom, and uncompromising beliefs. Here the eminent composer, who has been called both “the wild man of the avant-garde” and “the last true maestro” (New York Times), talks about being one of the world’s most controversial conductors and daring programmers of musical taste. Boulez tells how and why he chose his battles and lays out his vision of the conductor’s mission. He tells what he learned—and didn’t learn—jfrom other conductors, and how he feels about the composers who comprise his repertoire, including Webern, Berg, Schoenberg, Stravinsky, Messiaen (with whom he studied), and of course, Boulez himself.

Marking Boulez’s 70th birthday year, this first translation into English of the original text, published in France in 1989, includes a completely updated and expanded list of concerts conducted by Boulez from the beginning of his career in the late 1950s through 1995, as well as a current discography, both by noted Boulez scholar Paul Griffiths.