Michel-Dimitri Calvocoressi, born in 1877, was a French multilingual musician, musicologist, writer and critic, who flourished in Paris during the first 15 years of the twentieth century, later moving to England, where he worked as a cryptographer during the First World War. In this book, an autobiography in all but name, he writes of his part in arranging and promoting the first Paris seasons of Diaghilev's Ballets Russes, his work as a critic, and his friendships with some of the most important composers of the time, including Ravel, Schmitt, Duparc, Grieg, Caplet, d'Indy, Satie, and Vaughan Williams.