At a time when Boston was described as "the musical Athens of America," the violinist and composer Charles Martin Loeffler (1861-1935) flourished as one of that city's most distinguished and artistic figures. Ellen Knight presents the first biography of this gifted and enigmatic man who, even though he and his art always stood apart, helped define the course of American music.Now a focus of resurgent interest, Loeffler's eclectic compositions, when first heard, were extolled as refined, iridescent, and exquisitely crafted but were also attacked as decadent. Knight traces the French symbolist sources of Loeffler's highly personal compositional style and brings to life his secluded and deeply troubled life - episodes of which he worked vigorously to obscure.From Loeffler's own writings come many revealing and previously unknown anecdotes, often involving the most eminent artistic figures of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. His most prominent friends and colleagues included Isabella Stewart Gardner, John Singer Sargent, Gabriel Faure, Vincent D'Indy, Leopold Stokowski, and George Gershwin. Loeffler's story illuminates other histories - of Boston, Paris, and Berlin; of decadence, symbolism, and fin-de-siecle art; of the Boston Symphony Orchestra and the city's "golden legendary years" in music.This lively and intriguing biography will appeal to those interested in Boston history, cultural history, and music in general. Read Less