Joan Peyser (June 12, 1930 – April 24, 2011) was an American musicologist and writer, particularly known for her writing on 20th-century music and for her biographies of George Gershwin, Pierre Boulez and Leonard Bernstein.
[1] Born Joan Gilbert in Manhattan,[2] Peyser began studying piano when she was 5 and gave her first recital at the age of 13 in New York's Town Hall.
When she enrolled at the High School of Music and Art in Manhattan, she continued to study piano and took up the viola as well.
The Biltzstein article brought her to the attention of Delacorte Press, who gave her a contract for her first book, The New Music: the Sense behind the Sound, published in 1971.
In addition to her books and scholarly articles, she was editor of The Musical Quarterly from 1977 to 1984 and a regular contributor to The New York Times, Commentary, Vogue, and Opera News.