Motif: Music - Novels about Music & Musicians

Submitted by admin on Thu, 05/07/2009 - 4:56pm

Provided by the staff at the West University Branch Library.

Madison Smartt Bell. Anything Goes
A year in the life of 20-year-old Jesse Melungeon, guitar player with a Nashville-based country/rock band.
Willa Cather. Lucy Gayheart
At the turn of the century, a young piano student moves to Chicago, where she finds a city teeming with life, romance and music.  
 
Frank Conroy. Body & Soul: A Novel
A lonely piano prodigy rises from poverty to the concert stage. Set in New York City during the 1940s.   
Janice Galloway. Clara: A Novel
A fictional account of the passionate love story of Clara and Robert Schumann, with an emphasis on Clara’s lesser known, but still considerable, gifts of musical genius.
Oscar Hijuelos. The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love
Two Cuban bothers move to New York City and become mambo stars, eventually appearing with Desi Arnaz on the I Love Lucy show.
 
Madeleine L’Engle. The Small Rain
The coming of age of Katherine Forrester, a devoted student of the piano. L’Engle’s first novel.
Madeleine L’Engle. A Severed Wasp
A sequel to The Small Rain, set many years later when Katherine Forrester has retired from her life as a concert pianist.
Neal Pollack. Never Mind the Pollacks
A rock critic’s off-the-wall adventures with Elvis, Bob Dylan, Bruce Springstein and Kurt Cobain, among others.
Annie Proulx. Accordion Crimes
The many lives of a small green accordion made in Italy and brought to the United States in 1890.  
 
Mark Salzman. The Soloist
A cello teacher who was once a musical prodigy finds his life changing when he becomes a juror in a murder trial.
Vikram Seth. An Equal Music
The troubled love between two gifted musicians traveling the European classical music circuit.  
Edgardo Vega. No Matter How Much You Promise to Cook or Pay the Rent, You Blew it Cauze Bill Bailey Ain’t Never Coming Home Again
A daughter struggles to bring her father back to the world of jazz.