The Pillow Book of Sei Shōnagon is a fascinating, detailed account of Japanese court life in the closing years of the 10th century. Written by a lady of the court at the height of Heian culture, this book enthrals with its lively gossip, witty observations and subtle impressions. Lady Shōnagon was an erstwhile rival of Lady Murasaki, whose novel, The Tale of Genji, fictionalized the elite world Lady Shōnagon so eloquently relates.

By the time Mozart turned 20 he was already one of the most skilled composers of his day. His output included not only symphonies and concertos but piano pieces, serenades, arias, operas, and smaller species of musical theater, songs, and church music. Symphony No. 40 in G Minor forms the centerpiece of the "final trilogy".

Of the many remarkable violinist-composers Italy produced during the Baroque era, the most remarkable of all was Antonio Vivaldi. An artist of astonishing vigor and productivity (he wrote more than 450 concertos, 40 operas, and many solo, chamber, and vocal works over the course of his career), Vivaldi was one of the most innovative and influential musicians of his day.

More than any other composer, Franz Joseph Haydn deserves to be called the father of music's "Classical" style. As he came of age in the mid-18th century, musical thinking was in the midst of profound changes. The compositional forms and procedures of the Baroque era began to seem old-fashioned and composers sought fresh modes of musical expression.

Gerard Schwarz shows how no artist expressed the ideals of nineteenth-century Romanticism better than Richard Wagner. With his great operas, or "music dramas", as he preferred to call them, Wagner created epic works relating stories derived from old European myths and medieval romances. Wagner was, in many respects, the dominating cultural figure in the second half of the nineteenth century. His ideas provoked more admiration, scorn, and astonishment than any other artist of the era.