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The Thematic Catalogue of the Music Works of Johann Pachelbel.

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The Thematic Catalogue of the Music Works of Johann Pachelbel. By Jean M. Perreault. Edited by Donna K. Fitch. Foreword by Christoph Wolff. Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press. [viii, 411p. ISBN 0-8108-4970-4. $80.] Illustrations, appendices, bibliography.

The challenges confronting an author compiling a thematic catalog of any composer are daunting. To establish bibliographic control over any musical corpus, questions of authenticity and the location of both manuscripts and early printed editions must be explored. Such were the challenges facing Jean M. Perreault in compiling the first catalog of the instrumental and vocal works of Johann Pachelbel. Perreault has made a valuable contribution for any-one wishing to explore German instrumental or vocal music from the generation immediately preceding Johann Sebastian Bach. The present catalog is not perfect, but it is an important contribution. As Christoph Wolff points out in his brief "Foreword," "When it comes to musicians prior to the generation of Bach and Handel, we are not blessed with serviceable catalogs that help us to gain an overview, let alone bibliographic control, of the output of quite a number of major musicians" (p. [ix]). The present work was largely completed prior to the author's sudden death in 2001. Donna K. Fitch, Perreault's stepdaughter and a former colleague at the University of Alabama at Huntsville, did the final editing for publication.

The finished catalog includes a total of 528...

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