Jan Swafford is an award-winning composer whose music has been played around the US and abroad by ensembles including the symphony orchestras of St. Louis, Vermont, and Harrisburg, and by the Dutch Radio Orchestra. He is the author of Johannes Brahms: A Biography , which was a New York Times Notable Book, and Charles Ives: A Life with Music , a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award and winner of the PEN/Winship Award. He is also the author of The Vintage Guide to Classical Music . His writing and commentary on music has been featured on NPR and in Slate , the Guardian , Gramophone , and elsewhere. Swafford teaches music history, theory, and composition at the Boston… Conservatory.