About the Author Lawrence O. Koch is a jazz musician and music critic. He has written over 100 compositions, including several for symphony orchestra and jazz ensemble, and is the recipient of the Schuylkill Lifetime Achievement Award for the Field of Jazz. A former faculty member at Moravian College, he currently heads his own music institution, the Braun School, in Pottsville, Pennsylvania.

The author holds a B.S. degree in music education from West Chester University of Pennsylvania, and has been active as a practicing jazz musician (piano and alto sax) and music critic/analyst. During the 1970s, many of his jazz analyses were published by Rutgers University in the Journal of Jazz Studies and Annual Review of Jazz Studies, and he was commissioned to do the major article on jazz piano for the New Grove Dictionary of Jazz.