Harrison Gradwell Slater combines the versatile careers of musicologist, pianist and novelist. Of his three books on Mozart, the last is the mystery novel, NightMusic (the product of seven years of research and writing), which opens the world of Mozart’s life and music to a worldwide audience.

For his first book, Slater (the author’s pen name since 1995) traveled to fifty-five cities in nine European countries and completed his exhaustive research over three years with correspondence to archives throughout Europe, always posing previously unresolved questions about Mozart Gedenkstaetten -- the sumptuous palaces, concert halls and salons in which Mozart performed, the houses and taverns in which he lodged, and the churches and public edifices that he visited. The resulting comprehensive reference book, In Mozart’s Footsteps, has been called “an amazing feat of scholarship” by the pianist, Alfred Brendel, while Nicholas Slonimsky described it as “absorbing in its brilliance.”

NightMusic was voted "Rising Star of 2003" by nine publishing houses, was on the Barnes and Noble bestseller list for mystery trade paperback for numerous weeks, and has been optioned for a film. Click here for reviews.

Scholarly articles by Slater (a.k.a. Harrison James Wignall) have appeared in the journals Mozart-Jahrbuch, Opera Quarterly and Mozart Studien, among others. Some of his recent discoveries include previously unknown Mozart documents and manuscripts that have shed light on key issues of recent Mozart research. He has also written entries for the latest editions of The New Grove and Die Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart, and The New Grove Dictionary of Opera, and has published articles in Perspectives of New Music, Indiana Theory Review and the Nuova rivista musicale italiana.

A pianist, he studied with Anthony di Bonaventura and for many years with Paul Doguereau, the noted French pianist who was a pupil of Ravel, Marguerite Long and Paderewski.

Slater studied music and languages at Brandeis, Boston University, Ludwig-Maximilians University in Munich and Harvard, and speaks, in addition to English, German, French and Italian. He was active as a music instructor in Boston, Munich, Milan, and Tokyo and worked at the Munich National Theater and La Scala in Milan as a ballet pianist, performing numerous concerts.

In 1995, he was awarded a Ph. D. in musicology from Brandeis University with a dissertation on Mozart’s opera, Mitridate. For over twenty years, he lived abroad, in Munich, Tokyo, and primarily Milan.

Presently, Slater has finished recordings featuring the music of Mozart and Chopin, and is completing the sequel to NightMusic, entitled Nocturne in C Sharp Minor (based on rediscovered diaries and Chopin manuscripts). His research and writing of the monograph, Mozart in Milan continues and includes, "Mozart and Sacred Music in the Ambrosian Capital" and "Mozart's Singers in Ascanio in Alba," articles which incorporate two handwritten diaries from 1771 found by Slater in archives in Milan. His present musicological work on the influence of the vocal nocturne on Chopin's piano music continues research contained in his Mozart-Jahrbuch article, "Mozart and the 'Duetto Notturno' Tradition" and in his entry, "Duetto notturno," in The New Grove.

He resides in a historic apartment in Back Bay, Boston that was the basis for the interiors in NightMusic, as well as in Milan, Italy, and Mount Holly, NJ.