Showing titles in History & Criticism

No longer dismissed as relics of the hippie era, a new generation has lionized the Dead for creating a culture that paved the way for social networking, free music swapping, and the uncompromising anticorporate attitude of indie rock. Now, fifty years after the band first began changing rock 'n' roll both sonically and psychically, So Many Roads paints the most vivid portrait yet of the Grateful Dead, one of the most enduring institutions in American music and culture.

Martin Schleske, einer der großen Geigenbauer der Gegenwart, liest die besten Passagen aus seinem Buch und gewährt einen akustischen Einblick in seine international renommierte Werkstatt. Dabei zeigt er, wie für ihn die Kunst des Geigenbaus ein Gleichnis für persönliche Entwicklung und für das Streben nach dem richtigen Platz im Leben ist. Und wer schon immer wissen wollte, wie eine Schleske-Geige tönt: Der Geiger Alban Beikircher, Solist u. a. bei den Münchner Symphonikern, bringt sie in diesem Hörbuch zum Klingen.

One of rock music's most fascinating personalities, Neil Young has persistently charted his own career, ignoring pop fashions, creating innovative music ranging from folk classics like "Heart of Gold" to rock-and-roll anthems like "Down By the River". Don't Be Denied charts Neil Young's formative years, from his high school days in Winnipeg, Manitoba, through his adventures in Toronto's Yorkville district to his ultimate successes with Buffalo Springfield, Crazy Horse, Crosby Stills Nash and Young, and as a solo performer.

A modern take on a classical icon: this “luminous book” (Susan Orlean, New York Times bestselling author of The Library Book) tells the story of when, where, and how Chopin composed his most famous work, uncovering many surprises along the way and showing how his innovative music still...

Explores the visionary, mystical, and ecstatic traditions that influenced the music of the 1960s Examines the visionary, spiritual, and mystical influences on the Grateful Dead, the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan, Van Morrison, the Incredible String Band, the Left Banke, Lou Reed and...

Bloomsbury presents Plunderphonics by Matthew Blackwell, read by Sam Rushton. Featuring interviews with John Oswald, Negativland, and others and drawing on a wealth of research on copyright and intellectual property, Plunderphonics explores the impact of a genre that made illegality a point of...

Guthrie kept moving throughout his life, making friends, soaking up influences, and writing about his experiences. Along the way, he produced more than 3,000 songs, as well as fiction, journalism, poetry, and visual art, that gave voice to the distressed and dispossessed. In this insightful audiobook, Will Kaufman examines the artist’s career through a unique perspective: the role of time and place in Guthrie’s artistic evolution.

From Oscar Wilde to Ziggy Stardust, from Liberace to Lou Reed and T Rex to Roxy Music, here is the flamboyant decadence, the androgyny, and the sheer unadulterated fun of the early '70s - in an incredible rock history that tells it like it was.

Whether you are a fan of hip-hop, or you are just curious about it, you will not have to look further after finding Eric Reese's The History of Hip Hop. This concise but in-depth audiobook explores all the distinguishing traits of what is not only a genre of music but a lifestyle. Reese traces the history of hip-hop from its beginnings in the 1970s and reveals how it changed in the next decades until it became a worldwide phenomenon. The author gives attention to the influence of hip-hop at every level, including art and fashion.

A whimsical guide to the conduct of a romance interwoven with the history of classical music, which is, surprisingly, not as nice as you might think.... The history of classical music is littered with murder, sado-masochism, adultery, bigamy, fraud, riches, poverty, nervous breakdowns, bizarre habits, gluttony and terrible, terrible toilet humour (Mozart was the prime exponent of the latter).

Critical Mass is a treasure trove of sparkling, spiky prose and a fascinating portrait of our lives and cultural times over the past decades. In an age where a great deal of back scratching and softball pitching pass for criticism, James Wolcott’s fearless essays and reviews offer a bracing taste of the real critical thing.

This audiobook profiles the hottest rock 'n roll women, spanning the 1960s to current times - from Janis Joplin, Suzi Quatro and Chrissie Hynde to Courtney Love and Pink. With perceptive biographies and in-depth music critiques, author Alison Stieven-Taylor gives an up-close and personal look at the experiences, adventures, and musical passions of these extraordinary and talented women whose wild vocals and on-stage antics have made them rock 'n roll legends.

In 1981, David Bowie and Queen both happened to be in Switzerland: They met and made "Under Pressure." Recorded on a lark, the song broke the path for subsequent pop anthems. In Under Pressure, Max Brzezinski tells the classic track's story, charting the relationship between pop music, collective politics, and dominant institutions of state, corporations, and civil society. Brzezinski shows that, like all great pop anthems, "Under Pressure" harnesses collective sentiments in order to model new ways of thinking and acting.

2025 ASSOCIATION FOR RECORDED SOUND COLLECTIONS AWARDS CERTIFICATE OF MERIT * AUDIOFILE MAGAZINE EARPHONES AWARD The audiobook edition of How Women Made Music: A Revolutionary History brings listeners closer than ever to their creative heroes. Featuring rare interview excerpts with Nina Simone...

You know his work—Show Boat, Oklahoma!, Carousel, The King and I. But you don't really know Oscar Hammerstein II, the man who, more than anyone else, invented the American musical. Among the most commercially successful artists of his time, he was a fighter for social justice who constantly prodded his audiences to be better than they were.

Equal parts music criticism, cultural and comedy history, autobiography, and comic meditation on nostalgia, television, consumerism, childhood, technology, and food, The Weird Accordion to Al does justice to a musical legend and comic genius, the extent of whose remarkable achievements are only now being fully understood and appreciated.

When Bruce Springsteen went back on the road in 1984, he opened every show by shouting out, "one, two, one, two, three, four," followed by the droning synth chords of "Born in the U.S.A." Max Weinberg hit his drums with a two-fisted physicality that cut through the swelling chords. With a rolled-up red kerchief around his head and heavy black boots under his faded jeans, Springsteen looked like the character of the song, and from the very first line ("Born down in a dead man's town") he sang with the throat-scraping desperation of a man with his back against the wall.

We all know the Boxer. The fighter who remembers every glove but still remains. That grisly, bruised American allegory who somehow gets up more times than he’s knocked down. This is the fight that nearly broke The National. The one that allowed them to become champions.

Bloomsbury presents Revolution: Prince, the Band, the Era by James Campion, read by Kenneth Medford. Revolution is a detailed exploration into the era of Prince’s most prolific and groundbreaking music made with considerable inspiration and performed by a unique cadre of musicians he gathered...

Have you ever had a dream? Something you wanted so bad you just couldn’t let it go? For a group of kids in Harlem in the Eighties, their dreams would change pop music forever. Teddy Riley, Timmy Gatling, and Aaron Hall form a group called Guy that would fuse hip-hop and R&B and launch a new sound.