These shorter writings, edited by Slonimsky??'s daughter, are an excellent introduction to the classical repertoire. The chapters contain both biographical sketches and each composer??'s most important works.

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750) : musical fountainhead — George Frideric Handel (1685-1759) : the magnificent — Franz Joseph Haydn (1732-1809) : a genius of perfection in music — Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791) : the supreme — Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827) : the fervent genius — The felicitous Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847) — The paradoxical Richard Wagner (1813-1883) — Johannes Brahms (1833-1897) : the third B of music — Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840-1893) : poet of cheerful melancholy — Presenting the great Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov (1844-1908) — Gustav Mahler (1860-1911) : musical Prometheus — Claude Debussy (1862-1918) : poet of musical impressions — Richard Strauss (1864-1949) : Richard the Second — Arnold Schoenberg (1874-1951) : a musical prophet — Maurice Ravel (1875-1937) : poet of simplicity — Bâela Bartâok (1881-1945) : modern Janus — Igor Stravinsky (1882-1971) : perennial revolutionary — Sergei Prokofiev (1891-1953) : his signature, SRG PRKFV — Dmitri Shostakovich (1906-1975) : besieged nationalist.