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This is a reflection on what, in my opinion, constitute the elements of a high-quality composer biography. It is based on having read and reviewed over 300 such biographic articles on Wikipedia. It is intended to provide a set of markers against which an editor can judge how well, or how completely, an article about a composer covers its subject. For richly-documented composers, like Ludwig van Beethoven or Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, the full material may cover multiple articles; however, the main article on the subject should touch all of the important bases.
I am a firm believer that biographic articles are essentially stories; they have plot elements needing development, beginnings, middles, and ends. Things that are important in the subject's life need to be introduced properly at the appropriate time, and developed when they become important. For example, for someone who is unhappily married and has an affair, we should probably know when s/he met the paramour, even if it is well before the affair. Family details are sometimes omitted from biographies; basic facts should be included: when a spouse was met, when they married, how many children. (If these actors are important to the music, that relationship should obviously be developed.)
Examples of high-quality biographies
These are all linked to specific versions of the article.
Life history
Provide a chronological description of the subject's life. It is important to note that all individual's lives may not neatly fall into these sorts of categories. Family circumstances (or talent) may cause someone to begin his career while still in his teens, or earlier, in the case of child prodigies; a musical career may also not begin until someone is of a mature age.
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Early life
This period should include a discussion of the subject's life until roughly the end of secondary school (or possibly college-level) education.
- a discussion of the subject's family environment (including notable and influential family and household members)
- early musical exposure and influence
- when subject learned and/or began to compose, play instruments, sing
- what sort of education the subject had, even if it isn't musical
- anyone notable s/he may have met, or studied with
- any important life-forming experiences (e.g. death of parent, meeting future spouse)
- when the subject starts getting paid for musical activity or compositions
Early career
This period should include a discussion of how the subject establishes him/herself following education, and runs until the subject has settled in some relatively stable situation, probably at an age in the late 20s to early 30s.
- all notable jobs, including first musical job/commission/publication/public performance
- any notable private performances
- any notable travel (e.g. to other places for further studies)
- public attention and critical reception (appropriate to the period)
- notable compositions written and/or premiered, reception of same, notable performers, dedicatees, and commissioners of same
- notable correspondence and professional (i.e. musical) relationships formed or developed
- signs of stylistic development and maturity
Mature career
This period should describe the bulk of the subject's mature adult life.
- periods of lengthy stability
- upheavals and incidents of importance
- any notable private performances
- any notable travel (e.g. to other places for further studies)
- public attention and critical reception (appropriate to the period)
- notable compositions written and/or premiered, reception of same, notable performers, dedicatees, and commissioners of same
- notable correspondence and professional (i.e. musical) relationships formed or developed
- signs of stylistic development and change over time
- introduction or mention of others who acknowledge subject's influence
- important family/personal situation changes
Later life
This period should cover the decline of the subject's career, and his/her death and burial.
- late compositions
- indications of reputation and enduring popularity while alive (e.g. honors received in later years)
- medical conditions leading to death (should be introduced at appropriate time)
- proximate cause and circumstances of death
- discussions of controversy over cause of death, burial, etc
- reaction of others to death
- burial location(s)
- funeral details (if it was notably large)
- contemporaneous monuments erected
Music
This section should discuss the subject's music, musical style, and summarize public and critical reception over time. It should include a complete list of the subject's works, or a pointer to a "List of compositions by" article, and a short (less than about 30) list of notable works. It should include a written summary of roughly how many of what types of works the subject wrote. If a composer's works were catalogued, those catalogs should be described (so that someone can understand the numbering system), and one or more used to produce the composition list.
- types of music written
- stylistic influences on the composer
- stylistic influences by the composer on others
- public reception of the subject's work over time
- critical reception of the subject's work over time
- when and why subject's music may have fallen out of favor, and/or revived (by whom?)
- notable recordings by the subject (including e.g. piano rolls)
- notable recordings of works by the subject, especially for rarely-recorded subjects.
- notable history of subject's manuscripts or limited printings (see e.g. the history of some of Franz Schubert's manuscripts)
- notable history of first performances after subject's death
Editors wishing to go the extra mile should also introduce music samples (either score extracts, or recorded media clips, or both) that illustrate musical traits. This work is difficult without experience in computer-based music notation editing or audio editing experience, but doing so will likely improve the reader's experience, especially if the writing is already of a relatively high quality.
Posthumous reception, or Memorials and commemorations, pop culture references
Many composers who have been dead at least 50 years have had memorials erected, parks named, museums opened, and had important (multiple of 50) anniversaries of birth and/or death marked. A description of a modest number of notable things would be appropriate; they should probably be limited to places that were important in the subject's life. (In some extreme cases, the subject may actually merit a whole separate article.) As a rule, this material (as with other trivia, like pop culture references), should not be presented as a list.
One strategy for dealing with this material is to place all material about the subject after his death in a separate section or sections, entitled "Posthumous reception", or possibly "Reception". This then provides a nore narrative framework for these sorts of elements.
Images and sound
Articles about composers should have sound samples of the composer's music. If the composer made recordings of some sort (e.g. as conductor or performer on an instrument), samples of those should be acquired, if possible. The main article should contain a representative sampling of his work; if there are many samples (as there are for Beethoven), editorial consensus should reduce the number to a manageable few, and sprinkle them throughout the article. Care should be taken to properly label the media; do not just use the media file names, and make sure performers are properly credited.
An article should contain images, of as high a quality as possible, of the subject, and of people and places important in his life. There should be sufficient images that a typical screen view of the article contains at least part of a "side box" (either an image, a music sample box, or a quotation box) to break the flow of paragraphs.
For subjects where likenesses are unlikely to be available (either due to copyright, or due to the likelihood that none were made during the subject's lifetime), the article's lead image should not be that of another person. It is acceptable to have no lead image, and then place images of other people (e.g. a composer's patron), or places they worked or lived. Period renditions are always appropriate, although photographs of surviving places are also acceptable. Manuscript pages (especially nicely illuminated images) are another possibility.
MOS compliance
Articles should comply with Wikipedia's style guidelines, especially biographic guidelines and living person guidelines.
Common problems
Referencing and citations
It is Wikipedia policy, and the consensus within the Composers project that articles are required to have references; any unreferenced material is subject to be deleted or questioned by any other editor (including drive-by editors who may choose to force the issue).
It is Composers project consensus that inline citations are not generally required. However, it is important to note that Wikipedia-wide Good Article and Feature Article standards require articles to be "fully" cited. This means that an article intended to go through these processes must have all facts cited, at least at the paragraph level.
The Composers project consensus is more pragmatic.
- All quotations must be cited, at the end of the sentence containing the quotation
- Any kind of peacock assertions about greatest, first, most, etc. must be cited (but may still be challenged by other editors on other grounds)
- Any "controversial" fact should be cited
For example, it was at one time asserted in Jan Ladislav Dussek that he may have been one of Catherine the Great's lovers. There are no facts in evidence to support this; it is (at this writing) at best a supposition, and should be characterized as such, until evidence from reliable sources is produced. (At the time I wrote this, the article stated that he was "one of her favorites".)
Sources
If the subject has had a single published biography written about him, it should be among the sources consulted. This is especially true for any subject where there really appears to be only one such biography; failure to show that it's been consulted may provoke reviewer commentary, especially on a factually gappy article. As a rule, using some reasonably recent version of Grove (including the online version, for those with access to it) as a source is always acceptable. Articles about subjects for whom multiple biographies or musical analyses exist provide the editor with options. Dedicated works should be used if available, but this does not preclude also referencing Grove or other more encyclopedic works.
Foreign-language sources should be used only to include things that do not appear to be reasonably available in English; see WP:NONENG.
Special considerations
Poorly-documented figures
Some subjects, notably those dating earlier than about 1700, are very poorly documented. Where gaps in knowledge are known to exist (according to published research), they should be characterized. These articles can be extended by discussing more of what is known about the sources of knowledge (e.g. church records, specific manuscripts or old libraries containing references to the subject or his work).
Modern (living and recently-dead) figures may keep their private life private (or try to); evidence of this privacy should be given to fill gaps.
Promotional biographies
Many biographies of composers born after about 1950 are essentially promotional in nature; they typically contain brief early-life biographies, and then proceed to list professional accomplishments, giving short shrift to personal details as well as critical and popular appreciation. This is not necessarily a problem; as long as notability is established, these articles can stand. However, the article should not be immune to criticism for lacking these elements.
Self-publication and publications by biased observers
Some composers either write their own autobiography (e.g. Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov), or have family members write biographies (e.g. Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky was biographied by his younger brother Modest). These works can be problematic, and interference with source materials by family members and close confidants is not unheard of (see the Alma Problem and Anton Schindler). These sources, while valuable for certain types of information, must be used with care; see WP:SELFPUB for guidance, and treat any sources that have the appearance of promotional interest (including difficult-to-locate sources provided by other editors) in the subject with healthy skepticism.
Other talents
Multi-talented people can be difficult to cover well. Someone who was known primarily as a performer (e.g. Anton Rubinstein), but also composed, should be covered in a way that reflects that for which they are best known. However, all aspects of their talent should be covered in a way that is appropriate to that talent. In the case of people who composed, some coverage needs to given to all aspects of their composing; if this weighs down the main article, consider writing a separate "Music of" article. Composers who also performed (e.g. Beethoven and Jan Ladislav Dussek) should have some performances characterized, and include brief descriptions of their playing style.
For people who did notable writing, a Bibliography section should be included in the article. (If the publication list is long enough, it should be in the "List of works by" article, as with long lists of musical compositions.)
Dividing large articles
Important composers, especially those of the classical and romantic periods, are often richly documented, and a great deal can be written about them. The volume of information that can be presented is likely to exceed Wikipedia's guidelines, and should be divided into appropriate "sub" articles. There are a variety of ways this can be achieved, but some rules of thumb appy.
- Avoid unnecessary duplication. Some will be required by the need to summarize in the main article, but the summary should be significantly shorter than the article being summarized.
- Choose subjects that might be usable in another context. For example, Musical analysis of Mozart's string quartets could be referenced both in the main Mozart article where it discusses musicology, as well as in individual string quartet articles, and in Chamber music of Mozart.