Showing titles in History & Criticism

Contrary to popular belief, the roots of American country music do not lie solely on southern farms or in mountain hollows. Rather, much of this music recorded before World War II emerged from the bustling cities and towns of the Piedmont South. No group contributed more to the commercialization of early country music than southern factory workers.

In ten sharply drawn tales, Madison Smartt Bell expands his masterly, inventive, and deftly textured fictional landscape to portray a collection of America's dispossessed characters.

In It for the Long Run: A Musical Odyssey is Jim Rooney's kaleidoscopic firsthand account of more than five decades of success as a performer, concert promoter, songwriter, music publisher, engineer, and record producer. As witness to and participant in over half a century of music history, Rooney provides a sophisticated window into American vernacular music. Following his stint as a Hayloft Jamboree hillbilly singer in the mid-1950s, Rooney managed Cambridge's Club 47, a catalyst of the '60s folk music boom.

Wie man über den Tod des eigenen Kindes hinwegkommt (Tears in Heaven); wie die "Bravo" für eine Familienzusammenführung bei Abba sorgte (Knowing You, Knowing Me); und wie die Liebe an und für sich zum tödlichen Spiel werden kann (Suicide Blond)...

The national debate over popular music's effect on character is both furious and confused. Conservatives complain primarily about lyrics, appealing to public decency and safety. Liberals, swift to the defense of any self-expression, simultaneously celebrate rock's liberating ethos and deny its cultural influence.

It was a time when music fans copied and traded recordings without permission. An outraged music industry pushed Congress to pass anti-piracy legislation. Yes, that time is now; it was also the era of Napster in the 1990s, of cassette tapes in the 1970s, of reel-to-reel tapes in the 1950s, even the phonograph epoch of the 1930s. Piracy, it turns out, is as old as recorded music itself. In Democracy of Sound, Alex Sayf Cummings uncovers the little-known history of music piracy and its sweeping effects on the definition of copyright in the United States.

In his 1967 megahit "San Francisco," Scott McKenzie sang of "people in motion" coming from all across the country to San Francisco, the white-hot center of rock music and anti-war protests. At the same time, another large group of young Americans was also in motion, less eagerly, heading for the jungles of Vietnam.

Children of the Stone chronicles Ramzi's journey - from stone thrower to music student to school founder - and shows how through his love of music he created something lasting and beautiful in a land torn by violence and war. This is a story about the power of music, but also about freedom and conflict, determination and vision.

Reflecting on the Beach Boys’ long, fascinating history, this book tells the story behind 50 of the band’s greatest songs from the perspective of group members, collaborators, fellow musicians, and notable fans. The band's music is as influential now as it was 50 years ago, and this retelling of how the iconic rock group found itself in the annals of pop culture couldn't come at a better time.

Drawing on interviews with family members, managers, promoters, and the jazz musicians who worked with her, as well as contemporary newspaper articles and reviews, Late Life Jazz tells the unsung story of one of America's finest singers, Rosemary Clooney. Ken Crossland and Malcolm Macfarlane trace Rosemary's life from her hardscrabble beginnings in Maysville Kentucky, through her first performances singing with the Barney Rapp Band in Cincinnati, through her rise to pop stardom in the early 1950s.

Compelling from cover to cover, this is the story of one of the most recorded and beloved jazz trumpeters of all time. With unsparing honesty and a superb eye for detail, Clark Terry, born in 1920, takes us from his impoverished childhood in St. Louis, Missouri, where jazz could be heard everywhere, to the smoke-filled small clubs and carnivals across the Jim Crow South where he got his start, and on to worldwide acclaim.

Half-Cuban, half-Puerto Rican, Luis "DJ Disco Wiz" Cedeño is 100 percent Boogie Down Bronx. Born in the 60s, Wiz struggled in a turbulent and violent relationship with his alcoholic father while trying to protect his mother who was suffering from breast cancer. Raised in the 70s, Wiz learned the code of the streets while hustling with his crew, the East Side Boys.

Wie ein Stones-Konzert NENA zu einem Vorzeigesong der Neuen Deutschen Welle und der Friedensbewegung der 80er Jahre inspiriert.

Dieser Titel ist Teil des Pop-Splits "99 Luftballons - 21 Geschichten aus Deutschland."

Released in 1974, Sweet Home Alabama has become synonymous with Southern rock. From its opening guitar riff, it is instantly recognizable, a raucous, irreverent defense of a Deep South state and its segregationist governor against the jabs of Neil Young. But the roots of Lynyrd Skynyrd's best-selling anthem go much deeper than regional pride or resentment of a fellow rocker.

Neste audiolivro, o jornalista e crítico musical Irineu Franco Perpetuo conta a História da Música Clássica a partir da Idade Média, com seu cantochão. Depois, explica o que era a prática da polifonia, fala dos trovadores, da Ars Nova e da escola franco-flamenga.

Wie die US-Armee mit Rockmusik einen Dikator stürzte (Welcome To The Jungle); wie der Song eines Afrikaners das Leben der Kurden in der Türkei erleichterte (Yeke Yeke), und wie die RAF-Terroristin Ulrike Meinhof Marianne Faithful aus einer Depression holte (Broken English)...

Welches weltbekannte Mädchen nicht einmal einen Imbißstand unter ihrem Pseudonym aufmachen durfte (Girl from Ipanema); mit welchem Handbuch man einen Top-Ten-Hit schreibt (3 A.M. Eternal); und weshalb man von seiner eigenen kreativen Leistung am Ende oft nichts hat (Bitter Sweet Symphony)...

Paul McCartney and John Lennon described him as the Beatles' "favorite group," he won Grammy awards, wrote and recorded hit songs, and yet no figure in popular music is as much of a paradox, or as underrated, as Harry Nilsson. In this first ever full-length biography, Alyn Shipton traces Nilsson's life from his Brooklyn childhood to his Los Angeles adolescence and his gradual emergence as a uniquely talented singer-songwriter.

When Gustavo Dudamel, at the age of 28, ascended the podium at the Hollywood Bowl for his inaugural concert as conductor of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, he immediately captivated the hearts of his audience, just as he had the minds of music critics who designated him a modern-day Leonard Bernstein. In Changing Lives, the maestro's story becomes the entry point to an equally captivating subject: El Sistema, the music education program that nurtured his musical talent, first as a young violinist and then as a budding conductor under the mentorship of its founder, Jos Antonio Abreu.

This invaluable primer will introduce the uninitiated to the mysteries of opera and help more experienced fans to expand their understanding and deepen their appreciation of the art form.