Allan Kozinn (born July 28, 1954)[1] is an American journalist, music critic, and teacher.
Kozinn received bachelor's degrees in music and journalism from Syracuse University in 1976.[2] He began freelancing as a critic and music feature writer for The New York Times in 1977, and joined the paper's staff in 1991.[3] Before joining the Times, he was a contributing editor to High Fidelity and Keynote magazines, and a frequent contributor to Guitar Player, Keyboard, Pulse and other publications. He was also the first music critic for The New York Observer.
Kozinn has written a number of books, including Guitar: The History, the Music, the Players (1984), Mischa Elman and the Romantic Style (1990), The Beatles (1995), Classical Music: A Critic's Guide to the 100 Most Important Recordings (2004), Got That Something: How the Beatles' I Want to Hold Your Hand Changed Everything (2014) and Spoleto 40 - Spoleto Festival USA 40 Years (2016). In 2014, Kozinn began working with researcher Adrian Sinclair on The McCartney Legacy, a multi-volume biography of Paul McCartney. Volume 1 was published in December 2022.[4]
Kozinn joined the faculty of New York University in 2004, where he taught courses in music criticism, Baroque music literature and the Beatles through 2014. He also taught a course in the history of musical interpretation at the Juilliard School.
In September 2012, The New York Times reassigned Kozinn from his former duties as a classical music critic to general cultural reporting, which caused controversy at the time.[5] In December 2014, Kozinn left the Times, as part of a round of layoffs and buyouts at the newspaper.[6] He moved to Portland, Maine, in 2015, and was the classical music critic at the Portland Press Herald from 2015 to 2020,[7] and a freelance critic for the Times, The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post.
Kozinn is married to the writer Paula Brochu.[8] The couple resides in Portland, Maine.