The Vivaldi Compendium will serve as the most reliable and up-to-date source of quick reference on the composer Antonio Vivaldi and his music. This takes the form of a dictionary listing persons, places, musical works and many other topics connected with Vivaldi; its alphabetically arranged entries are copiously cross-referenced so as to guide the reader towards related topics. The Vivaldi Compendium also provides a gateway to further reading. This is achieved via an extensive bibliography, to which reference is made in most of the dictionary entries. These two sections are complemented by an article-length biography of the composer and a carefully organized list of his works.
Knowledge about Vivaldi and his music is still advancing at an incredible rate — many discoveries occurred while the book was in preparation — and every effort has been made to ensure that The Vivaldi Compendium represents the latest in Vivaldi research, drawing on the author's close involvement with Vivaldi and Venetian music over four decades.
MICHAEL TALBOT is Emeritus Professor of Music at the University of Liverpool and a Fellow of the British Academy. He is known internationally for his studies of late-baroque Italian music, which include recent books on Vivaldi's chamber cantatas [2003] and the same composer's fugal writing [2007].
