Gustav Holst (1874–1934) is always worth visiting and revisiting. The musical experiences of his lifetime extended from the omnipresent parlor soirées and spa concerts of the Victorian era to the electronic recording, radio broadcasting, and sound motion pictures of the Great Depression. As a composer, Holst followed his own path. His compositional technique developed over the course of more than forty years during a time that witnessed traditional Romanticism being challenged, and sometimes overtaken, by a variety of twentieth-century “isms,” including Impressionism, Expressionism and Neoclassicism. Yet, Holst didn't particularly favor any one of these styles; he was an original. Whereas his earliest works were composed in the expected Romantic vein, over time his lifestyle and his music took on the influence of such diverse entities as the poetry of Walt Whitman, Sanskrit literature, English folk tunes, North African music, Greek mythology, and of course, astrology. When he adopted twentieth-century techniques, such as polytonality and mixed meters, he did so not to call attention to the fact that he was using them but simply for supportive purposes.

The present volume, while focusing on Holst's wind works, is holistic. The narrative takes into account the continuum and trajectory of the composer's life and works.

Holst's body of works can generally be divided into either three or four periods of creativity. His wind works appear in all of them. The self-contained first period, lasting until about 1905, would include all of his student compositions and those works composed shortly thereafter, when Holst was under the spell of the German romantic Richard Wagner. The early works for chamber winds were written during this period. The second period, lasting until about 1913, displays a more linear approach, embracement of the ancient modes, and includes works that either make use of folk tunes directly or display his ability to create folklike melodies. The military band suites fall into line here.