Historian Eric A. Gordon, author of the first biography of Marc Blitzstein (1989),1 recalled his editor's remark that “[t]here will never be another biography of Blitzstein, so write what you feel needs to be there.”2 This advice led to a 605-page tome, a massive effort that brought much-needed recognition to a significant but neglected American composer who is perhaps still best known for three dramatic works: The Cradle Will Rock (1937), which has received renewed attention with numerous restagings over the last few decades and with the film Cradle Will Rock directed by Tim Robbins (1999); Regina (1949), based on Lillian Hellman's The Little Foxes and called by the New York Times “one of the best operas by an American” (quoted p. 469); and his brilliant adaptation of Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht's Die Dreigroschenoper (1954), warmly praised by Brecht, Lotte Lenya, Virgil Thomson, and Arthur Berger (pp....

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