General Reference category: 6721 books

The author describes in this book the era of the German and European music existence between 1880 and 1935. She is the daughter of the founders, Hermann and Louise Wolff. She describes the activities of her parents based upon letters of her parents and correspondences with artists. The agency developed...

Collins Shorts – insight in an instant. There’s more to classical music than Beethoven’s Fifth, but where to start? Gareth Malone, the charismatic TV choirmaster, gives you some easy tips on how to appreciate a whole new world of music. Collins Shorts are a fresh look at the ebook short, with...

Stephen Sondheim is widely regarded as the most important composer and lyricist of musical theater in the second half of the 20th century. Celebrating his 80th birthday, this new edition of Sondheim on Music finds him in these guided interviews expounding in great depth and detail on his craft. As...

Meyer makes a valuable statement on aesthetics, criteria for assessing great works of music, compositional practices and theories of the present day, and predictions of the future of Western culture. His postlude, written for the book's twenty-fifth anniversary, looks back at his thoughts on the direction of music in 1967.

Ghost Behind The Sun, Tav Falco's sprawling study of Memphis, begins with the Civil War massacre at Fort Pillow, the Yellow Fever epidemic of 1878 and the grisly murders of the Harp Brothers. Falco traces these legends of Reconstruction-era Memphis to an equally brutal twentieth century underworld –...

This guide explains the most useful aspects of theory in clear, nontechnical language. Areas covered include scales (major, minor, modal, synthetic), chord formation, chord progression, melody, song forms, useful devices, (ostinato, mirrors, hocket, etc.), and instrumentation. It contains over 100 musical examples.

“The great composer does not set to work because he is inspired, but becomes inspired because he is working.” –Ernest Newman   In Seventeen Famous Operas, renowned musicologist and music critic Ernest Newman goes beyond simply retelling the plots of the operas he has chosen to feature in this...

Do you want to know when Duke Ellington was king of The Cotton Club? Have you ever wondered how old Miles Davis was when he got his first trumpet? From birth dates to gig dates and from recordings to television specials, Leonard Feather and Ira Gitler have left no stone unturned in their quest for...

If you are serious about your band promotion, you need to leverage the power of Soundcloud. Lots of bands are struggling to grow their music business because they just don't know where to find their fans!  I feel your pain. In this book I will walk you through a complete marketing plan...

Jerome Kern (1885-1945) is considered one of the most versatile and influential of all American theatre and film composers. His pioneer work in developing a truly American musical sound inspired many of the great songwriters of the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s, and his songs include dozens of beloved standards...

From its infancy, television networks and studios explore others avenues to increase their revenues. Conveniently enough, several film studios and production companies—MGM, MTM, Columbia/Screen Gems, Talent Associates, Warner Brothers—had their own record label divisions. The obvious benefit was...

The history of American theater would not have developed nor impacted the sound of music today without the composers, directors, and choreographers of incidental and dance music. From the earliest immigrant composers to mainstream maestros and film composers, their successes and sorrows mirrored the...

You can hear it in the hottest clubs in New York, the hippest rooms in New Orleans, Chicago, and San Francisco, and in top concert halls around the world. It's a joyous sound that echoes the past. It's Old World meets New World. It's secular and sacred. It's traditional and experimental. It's played...

When Hank Williams died on New Year's Day 1953 at the age of twenty-nine, his passing appeared to bring an abrupt end to a saga of rags-to-riches success and anguished self-destruction. As it turned out, however, an equally gripping story was only just beginning, as Williams's meteoric rise to stardom,...