A guide to the opera with Musical Examples from the Score by Lawrence Gilman who was a U.S. author and music critic. He studied art at Collins Street Classical School in Hartford, Connecticut under William M. Chase. He also taught himself music in theory and practice on several instruments, including organ and piano. From 1896 to 1898, he worked for the New York Herald, then from 1901 to 1913 as a music critic for Harper's Weekly, where he advanced to the position of managing editor. From 1915 to 1923, he worked as a critic in multiple arts for the North American Review, and for the Herald Tribune from 1925 on. On August 1, 1904, he married Elizabeth Wright Walter, with whom he had one child, Betty Elizabeth Lawrence Gilman in 1905.