Publications

The Composer’s Landscape; The Pianist as Explorer–
Interpreting the Scores of Eight Masters
(Amadeus Press)

Derived from a popular series of lecture-recitals presented by the author over the past several years, The Composer’s Landscape features eight insightful essays on the piano repertoire. Each chapter focuses on a single composer: Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Schumann, Brahms, Chopin, and Mendelssohn. Montparker uses landscape as a metaphor for the score, whether it be a well-tended garden of Mozart or the thorny thickets on a Schumann page: the topographical peaks and valleys, the circuitous melodic lines, the thoroughfares where all the voices convene, and so on. The discussions include thoughtful suggestions for navigating these landscapes, which differ so greatly from one composer to the next, taking note of the essential technical and interpretive elements, as well as the challenges for the “explorer pianist.”

As an actively performing pianist, lecturer, teacher, music journalist, and author of six other books on music, Montparker has the experience and understanding to guide readers through these issues while elucidating the finer points. Woven into her text are excerpts from her interviews with world-renowned pianists, from Alfred Brendel to André Watts, conducted during her many years as senior editor of Clavier magazine. The book also includes images from original autograph manuscripts and a CD of Montparker performing selections by composers featured in the book.

Audio book available from Audible Books

Also available in Japanese
(Yamaha Music Media Corporation)

A Pianist’s Journal in Venice
(Text and Watercolors by Carol Montparker)

A Pianist’s Journal in Venice is a fanciful departure from the essays and stories of pianist Carol Montparker’s other books. This latest book is, first, a celebration of the beautiful city from the pianist’s personal experience: a kind of musical travel journal, from the tintinnabulation of church-bells to the song of the merlo nero, from Bach played on old church organs, to the ubiquitous strains of Vivaldi; and finally, to Chopin’s own paean to Venice, the Barcarolle. The book is also an exploration of how three modes of expression: music, painting, and writing, coalesce into one inspired attempt to capture the magical atmosphere of Venice. Last, there is the fantasy-within-the-journal, an imaginative and mysterious rêverie in an ancient rose-colored palazzo.

A Pianist’s Landscape (Amadeus Press)

These intensely personal and perceptive essays explore the author’s life as a pianist practicing, performing, teaching and writing but they could be the thoughts and reflections of any artist. They recount the challenges, rewards and joys of her experiences in her chosen profession.

One of the chief delights of A Pianist’s Landscape is that it is so engagingly well written: it opens things up to the lay reader without the slightest hint of awkwardness or pretension. Montparker talks about what musicians think, how they interact, their foibles, joys and fears, with the ease of someone talking about what’s growing in her garden. The writing is direct, the expression of thoughts and feelings remarkably concrete. And yet there is great finesse as well. As an avid watercolorist, Montparker naturally knows that much can be suggested by a small gesture. She paints a picture of her own domestic life, surrounded by objets d’art and serenaded by avian songsters, that immediately invites the reader to share in her pleasure.
TED LIBBEY, The Washington Post

A Pianist’s Homecoming: Chronicle II

Carol Montparker’s newly published sequel to the well-loved book, Anatomy of a New York Debut Recital, that became a little classic, and an essential part of music libraries in universities and conservatories. One pianist’s compelling personal accounts in diary-form of the emotional roller-coaster of preparation and performance– the sheer exhilaration to the anxieties, told with humor and surprising candor, have proven to be universal, according to the overwhelming number of responses from students to renowned artists over the years.

The late great pianist Glenn Gould called the first Chronicle “the most un-put-downable piece of music journalism I have come across in many years.”
So here it is 35 years later, another, even more probing Chronicle, written by the same pianist/author, and former Senior Editor of Clavier magazine, who returned to the same recital hall at Carnegie Hall in New York City for a Special Birthday Celebration concert.

Polly and the Piano (Amadeus Press)

A children’s book by Carol Montparker about love, The Love between a Pianist and her Dog, and their Love of Music.

This beautiful story of a concert pianist and Polly, her constant companion, describes their preparation for a concert at Carnegie Hall. Together they accomplish a memorable and extraordinary concert.

In page after page of affectionate text and spontaneous watercolors, the author, pianist Carol Montparker, depicts their work and their play. The story is a musical fairy tale that will charm both adults and children, with a special gift to readers of a CD of the piano recital! * (Just as Polly heard it being practiced and performed– and drawn from live performances by Ms. Montparker).

Ariadne’s Thread, A Collection of Contemporary Women’s Journals
(Harper Colophon Books)

This fascinating anthology is the only collection of diaries and journals by contemporary women. It includes both well-known women writers in various fields and many who are completely unknown and whose writing is appearing in print for the first time. The entries range from the most deeply personal and inward-looking reflections and meditations to laconic accounts of everyday life.

Among the entries included are excerpts from Montparker’s The Anatomy of a New York Debut: A Chronicle.