This work replaces both the single-volume Oxford Companion to Music first published in 1938 (1970), and the subsequent two-volume New Oxford Companion to Music,... » 

This work replaces both the single-volume Oxford Companion to Music first published in 1938 (1970), and the subsequent two-volume New Oxford Companion to Music, published in 1983. It has a more concentrated focus on the Western classical tradition and contains hundreds of new entries. «