Definitive biography and critical study of the great 18th-century composer features full-chapter treatments of Rameau's operas and ballets as well as his chamber music, cantatas and motets, and minor works.

British musicologist and literary scholar Cuthbert Girdlestone (1895-1975) was educated at Cambridge and the Sorbonne and taught French at King's College in Newcastle from 1926 to 1960.American musicologist and historian Philip Gossett translated Rameau's Treatise on Harmony. He recently retired from his post as Robert W. Reneker Distinguished Service Professor of Music at the University of Chicago.