The Virgin Encyclopedia of 50s Music

Colin Larkin has the best credentials for the compiler of a music reference book - he loves the music. In 1989 with twenty years' experience in music and publishing, and unhappy that popular music has not been deemed worthy of serious reference, he set about creating an equivalent to the Grove Dictionary Of Music. The Encyclopedia Of Popular Music from which this Encyclopedia is derived was first published in 1992, following three years of intensive research. The original database has trebled in size and now includes over 8 million words, the biggest of its kind in the world. Everyday of every year the database in updated and expanded.