Main content

Music

  • Author:
    Flea
    Summary:

    The iconic bassist and co-founder of the Red Hot Chili Peppers tells his fascinating origin story, complete with all the dizzying highs and the gutter lows you'd want from an LA street rat turned world famous rock star. In Acid for the Children, Flea takes readers on a deeply personal and revealing tour of his formative years, spanning from Australia to the New York City suburbs to, finally, Los Angeles. Through hilarious anecdotes, poetical meditations, and occasional flights of fantasy, Flea deftly chronicles the experiences that forged him as an artist, a musician, and a young man. His dreamy, jazz-inflected prose makes the Los Angeles of the 1970s and 80s come to gritty, glorious life, including the potential for fun, danger, mayhem, or inspiration that lurked around every corner. It is here that young Flea, looking to escape a turbulent home, found family in a community of musicians, artists, and junkies who also lived on the fringe. He spent most of his time partying and committing petty crimes. But it was in music where he found a higher meaning, a place to channel his frustration, loneliness, and love. This left him open to the life-changing moment when he and his best friend, soul brother, and partner-in-mischief came up with the idea to start their own band, which became the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Acid for the Children is the debut of a stunning new literary voice, whose prose is as witty, entertaining, and wildly unpredictable as the author himself. It's a tenderly evocative coming-of-age story and a raucous love letter to the power of music and creativity from one of the most renowned musicians of our time.

  • Author:
    Manton, Jo
    Summary:

    "All music", said Johann Sebastian Bach, "should have no other end and aim than the glory of God and the soul's refreshment; where this is not remembered there is no true music." At twenty three, in 1708, he accepted an invitation to the court of Weimar. This straightforward biography interprets Bach the man, his boyhood, his two marriages and his many children, and explains his contribution to music. His triumphs and sorrows, the progressive blindness which engulfed him before his death and the shadow cast by the idiocy of one son are honestly told. Of interest primarily to teen aged music students.

  • Author:
    Kubernik, Harvey
    Summary:

    The first major rock music festival and the precursor to Woodstock, the Monterey International Pop Festival was an unprecedented gathering of pop, soul, jazz, and folk artists who took the stage one luminous weekend during the "Summer of Love." On the 16th, 17th, and 18th of June, 1967, the sleepy California coastal community of Monterey played host to the now-legendary concert. In its aftermath, the world of popular culture was transformed forever. The '60s were now upon us with a soundtrack, a style, and a political and social sensibility all its own. A Perfect Haze is the official history of this glorious festival. With the endorsement and support of producer Lou Adler and the Monterey International Pop Festival Foundation, the sights and sounds of the festival come to life in this extravagant compilation of photography, memorabilia, and first-hand accounts by musicians, fans, crew members, and others who attended the concert. To read its pages is to step back in time to the moment of rock's big bang, when Jimi Hendrix, the Who, Otis Redding, Ravi Shankar, Janis Joplin, the Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, the Byrds, Buffalo Springfield, and dozens more set the stage on fire-both metaphorically and, in one iconic instance, literally! Dozens of musicians and others associated with the festival have been interviewed exclusively for the book, including Pete Townshend, Roger Daltrey, Bob Weir, Ravi Shankar, D. A. Pennebaker, Andrew Loog Oldham, Steve Cropper, Booker T. Jones, and Al Kooper, as well as members of Jefferson Airplane, the Association, Moby Grape, and Canned Heat. A Perfect Haze is packed with hundreds of photographs taken both in front of the stage and behind the scenes, including works by such notable artists as Henry Diltz, Elaine Mayes, and Nurit Wilde. Festival programs, posters, advertisements, album covers, and other ephemera-most of which has never been seen before-are also included, provided by Lou Adler, the festival's nonprofit foundation, collectors, participants, and fans who attended the event. Even more than Woodstock, the Monterey International Pop Festival was the epicenter of a youthquake whose aftershocks continue to reverberate throughout our 21st-century culture. A Perfect Haze evokes this magic event in all its kaleidoscopic glory.

  • Author:
    King, Carole
    Summary:

    She created the soundtrack of our lives. Now, at last, she tells the stories behind the music. Here is the long-awaited memoir from one of the world's most acclaimed musical talents--Carole King.

  • Author:
    Battery Radio
    Summary:

    A centuries-old caroling tradition takes place during Christmas and New Year's in a small Newfoundland outport. The carols and their tunes have been handed down through the ages in the community's oral tradition, and there is no written transcription of the melodies or their origins. For generations villagers have walked from house to house, entered darkened kitchens after midnight, and sung the carols as occupants listened in the darkness. The documentary begins with the demise of the old tradition -- or so it was thought, until the tradition was discovered to still exist in another tiny community 200 miles distant. The program tracks down the village carolers and follows them on their rounds one winter's night.

  • Author:
    Burkholder, J. Peter, Grout, Donald Jay, Palisca, Claude V.
    Summary:

    Building on his monumental revision of the Seventh Edition, PeterBurkholder has refined an inspired narrative for a new generation ofstudents, placing people at the center of the story.The narrative of A History of Western Music naturally focuses on the musical works, styles, genres, and ideas that have proven most influential, enduring, and significant—but it also encompasses a wide range of music, from religious to secular, from serious to humorous, from art music to popular music, and from Europe to the Americas. With a six-part structure emphasizing the music's reception and continued influence, Burkholder's narrative establishes a social and historical context for each repertoire to reveal its legacy and its significance today.

  • Author:
    Murray, Jason
    Summary:

    In this narrative history and memoir, journalist, musician, and Monctonian Jason Murray follows the rise of the band that put the Maritimes on the map.Eric's Trip was a band defined as much by its DIY ethos as its low-fi, discordant music. The four-piece formed in an early-'90s Moncton basement and in a few short years, went from recording themselves on a four-track and selling cassettes at local record stores to signing on Seattle's Sub Pop records, opening for Sonic Youth, and touring internationally. Twenty years after the band's breakup (1996), A Distorted Revolution is the ultimate nostalgia trip. Through personal recollections, interviews with band members and others integral to the early 90s scene, this highly anticipated book offers a rare glimpse inside the band's formation, success, and ultimate unravelling. Includes over 20 images.

  • Author:
    Wenner, Jann S.
    Summary:

    For the past fifty years, Rolling Stone has been a leading voice in journalism, cultural criticism, and-above all-music. This landmark book documents the magazine's rise to prominence as the voice of rock and roll and a leading showcase for era-defining photography. From the 1960s to the present day, the book offers a decade-by-decade exploration of American music and history. Interviews with rock legends-Bob Dylan, Mick Jagger, Kurt Cobain, Bruce Springsteen, and more-appear alongside iconic photographs by Baron Wolman, Annie Leibovitz, Mark Seliger, and other leading image-makers. With feature articles, excerpts, and exposEs by such quintessential writers as Hunter S. Thompson, Matt Taibbi, and David Harris, this book is an irresistible and essential keepsake of the magazine that has defined American music for generations of readers.

  • Author:
    Greenburg, Zack O'Malley
    Summary:

    Tells the story of hip-hop's three most dynamic stars and their rise to fame: Diddy, Dr. Dre, and Jay-Z and examines the entrepreneurial genius of the first musician tycoons that largely helped to create a global multibillion-dollar industry.

  • Author:
    Brown, Craig
    Summary:

    A distinctive portrait of the Fab Four by one of the sharpest and wittiest writers of our time "If you want to know what it was like to live those extraordinary Beatles years in real time, read this book." —Alan Johnson, The Spectator Though fifty years have passed since the breakup of the Beatles, the fab four continue to occupy an utterly unique place in popular culture. Their influence extends far beyond music and into realms as diverse as fashion and fine art, sexual politics and religion. When they appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show in 1964, fresh off the plane from England, they provoked an epidemic of hoarse-throated fandom that continues to this day. Who better, then, to capture the Beatles phenomenon than Craig Brown—the inimitable author of Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret and master chronicler of the foibles and foppishness of British high society? This wide-ranging portrait of the four lads from Liverpool rivals the unique spectacle of the band itself by delving into a vast catalog of heretofore unexamined lore. When actress Eleanor Bron touched down at Heathrow with the Beatles, she thought that a flock of starlings had alighted on the roof of the terminal—only to discover that the birds were in fact young women screaming at the top of their lungs. One journalist, mistaken for Paul McCartney as he trailed the band in his car, found himself nearly crushed to death as fans climbed atop the vehicle and pressed their bodies against the windshield. Or what about the Baptist preacher who claimed that the Beatles synchronized their songs with the rhythm of an infant's heartbeat so as to induce a hypnotic state in listeners? And just how many people have employed the services of a Canadian dentist who bought John Lennon's tooth at auction, extracted its DNA, and now offers paternity tests to those hoping to sue his estate? 150 Glimpses of the Beatles is, above all, a distinctively kaleidoscopic examination of the Beatles' effect on the world around them and the world they helped bring into being. Part anthropology and part memoir, and enriched by the recollections of everyone from Tom Hanks to Bruce Springsteen, this audiobook is a humorous, elegiac, and at times madcap take on the Beatles' role in the making of the sixties and of music as we know it. A Macmillan Audio production from Farrar, Straus and Giroux

  • Author:
    Cole, Clay, Hinckley, David
    Summary:

    There was a small sliver of time between Be-Bop and Hip-Hop, when a new generation of teenagers created rock 'n' roll. Clay Cole was one of those teenagers he was the host of his own Saturday night, pop music television show. Clay Cole's SH-BOOM! is the pop culture chronicle of that exciting time, 1953-1968, when teenagers created their own music, from swing bands and pop to rhythm and blues, cover records, a cappella, rockabilly, folk-rock, and girl groups; from the British Invasion to the creation of the American Boy Band. He was first to introduce Chubby Checker performing the "Twist;" the first to present the Rolling Stones, Tony Orlando, Dionne Warwick, Neil Diamond, Bobby Vinton, the Rascals, Ronettes, Four Seasons, Dion, and dozens more; the first to introduce music video clips, discotheque, go-go girls and young unknown standup comedians Richard Pryor, George Carlin, and Fannie Flagg to a teenage television audience.

  • Author:
    Crouse, Richard
    Summary:

    In the middle of the conservative 1950s, rock and roll hit popular culture like an explosion—a Big Bang, Baby! And the fallout from that explosion is still electrifying music fans today. Popular music expert Richard Crouse has ventured deep into the far reaches of rock history to bring together this dynamic collection of facts and oddities. Big Bang, Baby will entertain and enlighten music fans of all eras and will challenge even experienced rock trivia junkies.

Pages

Subscribe to RSS - Music