Much has been written about Leonard Bernstein, a musician of extraordinary talent who was legendary for his passionate love of life and many relationships.
Much has been written about Leonard Bernstein, a musician of extraordinary talent who was legendary for his passionate love of life and many relationships.
Born in New Orleans before migrating to Chicago, Mahalia Jackson (1911-72) is undoubtedly the most widely known black gospel singer, having achieved fame among African American communities in the 1940s then finding a wide audience among non-black U.
Born in New Orleans before migrating to Chicago, Mahalia Jackson (1911-72) is undoubtedly the most widely known black gospel singer, having achieved fame among African American communities in the 1940s then finding a wide audience among non-black U.
Born into a poor Virginian family, John Treville Latouche (1914-56), in his short life, made a profound mark on America's musical theater as a lyricist, book writer, and librettist.
Born into a poor Virginian family, John Treville Latouche (1914-56), in his short life, made a profound mark on America's musical theater as a lyricist, book writer, and librettist.
Gioachino Rossini's The Barber of Seville surveys the opera's fascinating performance history, mapping out the myriad changes that have affected the work since its premiere, exploring many of the personalities responsible for those alterations, and taking into account the range of reactions that these changes have prompted in spectators and critics from the nineteenth century to the present.
Gioachino Rossini's The Barber of Seville surveys the opera's fascinating performance history, mapping out the myriad changes that have affected the work since its premiere, exploring many of the personalities responsible for those alterations, and taking into account the range of reactions that these changes have prompted in spectators and critics from the nineteenth century to the present.
Camille Saint-Saens is a memorable figure not only for his successes as a composer of choral and orchestral works, and the eternally popular opera Samson et Dalila, but also because he was a keen observer of the musical culture in which he lived.
Of all the styles of jazz to emerge in the twentieth century, none is more passionate, more exhilaratingly up-tempo, or more steeped in an outsider tradition than Gypsy Jazz.
Josephine Lang (1815-80) was one of the most gifted, respected, prolific, and widely published song composers of the nineteenth century, yet her life and works have remained virtually unknown.
In this penetrating study, Russell Stinson explores how four of the greatest composers of the nineteenth century--Felix Mendelssohn, Robert Schumann, Franz Liszt, and Johannes Brahms--responded to the model of Bach's organ music.
During the years preceding the composition of Tristan and Isolde, Wagner's aesthetics underwent a momentous turnaround, principally as a result of his discovery of Schopenhauer.
Charles Mingus was one of the most innovative jazz musicians of the 20th Century, and ranks with Ives and Ellington as one of America's greatest composers.
Although he died in a tragic car accident at twenty-five, Clifford Brown is widely considered one of the most important figures in the history of jazz, a trumpet player who ranks with Louis Armstrong, Dizzy Gillespie, and Miles Davis, and a leading influence on contemporary jazz musicians.
George Schuyler, a renowned and controversial black journalist of the Harlem Renaissance, and Josephine Cogdell, a blond, blue-eyed Texas heiress and granddaughter of slave owners, believed that intermarriage would "e;invigorate"e; the races, thereby producing extraordinary offspring.
Music in Chopin's Warsaw examines the rich musical environment of Fryderyk Chopin's youth--largely unknown to the English-speaking world--and places Chopin's early works in the context of this milieu.
This book is the first biography of 20th-century pianist Rudolf Serkin, providing a narrative of Serkin's life with emphasis on his European roots and the impact of his move to America.
Gene Lees is probably the best jazz essayist in America today, and the book that consolidated his reputation was Singers and the Song, which appeared in 1987.
Of all the major jazz artists, Thelonious Monk was one of the most original musical thinkers--nonconformist, idiosyncratic, imaginative, eccentric--in a word, unique.
A freewheeling blend of continental European folk music and the songs, tunes, and dances of Anglo and Celtic immigrants, polkabilly has enthralled American musicians and dancers since the mid-19th century.
Renowned today as a prominent African-American in Music Theater and the Arts community, composer, conductor, and violinist Will Marion Cook was a key figure in the development of American music from the 1890s to the 1920s.
Why would Gustav Mahler (1860-1911), modernist titan and so-called prophet of the New Music, commit himself time and again to the venerable sonata-allegro form of Mozart and Beethoven?
In 1950, as Arnold Schoenberg anticipated the publication of a collection of 15 of his most important writings, Style and Idea, he was already at work on a second volume to be called Program Notes.
He was the Wicked Wilson Pickett, the legendary soul man whose forty-plus hits included "e;In the Midnight Hour,"e; "e;634-5789,"e; "e;Land of 1000 Dances,"e; "e;Mustang Sally,"e; and "e;Don't Let the Green Grass Fool You.
He was the Wicked Wilson Pickett, the legendary soul man whose forty-plus hits included "e;In the Midnight Hour,"e; "e;634-5789,"e; "e;Land of 1000 Dances,"e; "e;Mustang Sally,"e; and "e;Don't Let the Green Grass Fool You.
