作者亞曆山大·伊瓦什金為大提琴傢，是傳主多年的好友與閤作者，首演過不少施尼特凱的大提琴作品。

這本傳記是他在作者去世前兩年完成的，根據傳主口授的記錄而成。為傳主生前認可的權威版本。

目前此書正在翻譯中。

豆瓣上的早年生平介紹就是根據此書編寫www.douban.com/group/topic/1091263/

這裏也有一段翻譯介紹：

紀錄片《古爾德的俄羅斯之旅》簡介及評論www.douban.com/subject/1783062/

Amazon.com

The story of Soviet composer Alfred Schnittke is one that will give pause even to the gods of irony. The descendent of German and Jewish inhabitants of what was once the German Volga S.S.R. in the Soviet Union, he received his first musical training as a young boy in Soviet-occupied Vienna. Baptized as a Roman Catholic at age 48 (although he had strong Russian Orthodox tendencies), this son of dedicated Communists employed a musical idiom almost as varied as his background. One of the most interesting aspects of Alexander Ivashkin's lucid account of the composer's life is his long struggle in the face of the hostility shown by the apparatchiks that ran the Soviet composer's union, a hostility that made it impossible for Schnittke to attend many performances of his works when they required a travel permit outside Soviet territory. Fortunately, as the regime approached collapse, the difficulties experienced by Schnittke and his fellow Soviet artists during the decades of Soviet rule abated. This entry in Phaidon's 20th-Century Composers series offers a well-written account of the essential aspects of Schnittke's life and work.