Publications

In 1973 the first edition of Das Blasmusik-Lexikon, commissioned by the Bund Deutscher Blasmusikverbände, brought attention to the important sociopolitical and cultural role of wind music in society: from the Baroque period to avant-garde of our day, all the great composers have created masterpieces for wind instruments, from marches to symphonies, from light entertainment to dance music. In the succeeding decades four more editions of the lexicon appeared, each one expanded and revised. The lexicon is now an essential volume in public and research libraries. Its author, musicologist Wolfgang Suppan (1933–2015), served on the executive committee of the Bund Deutscher Blasmusikverbände from 1965 to 1997. With the fourth edition, his son Armin, a conductor and pedagogue highly active with wind music ensembles, joined as contributor. For several reasons, including the development of wind music in the last two decades, the fifth edition is newly conceived in its entirety. To bring the edition in line with international standards, each entry now consists of three parts, with a biographical section followed by works and literature.