Joel Lester is Professor Emeritus at the CUNY Graduate Center and The City College of New York. A scholar, violinist, and administrator, he was also Dean of Mannes College of Music from 1996 until 2011. He is the author of Bach's Solo Works for Solo Violin (OUP, 1999), Compositional Theory in the Eighteenth Century, and Analytic Approaches to 20th-Century Music.
This book demonstrates Joel Lester's predilection for detailed motivic, harmonic, rhythmic, textural and registral analyses. It shows beautifully how the patterns revealed by analysis contribute to larger narratives and enable Brahms to re-imagine classical formal structures. And, his frequent asides to the performer and listener reflect his many years of experience as a violinist and performance coach. -- Jack Boss, University of Oregon This volume is about the sheer sound of Brahms's music. It's written by a consummate musician reveling in the beauty of every detail and marveling at how each gesture influences performance and analytical decisions. -- Heather Platt, Professor of Music History, Ball State University