A guide to the all-time must-have jazz recordings by a maven of the genre.Possibly the twentieth century’s greatest musical innovation, jazz is now more popular than it has been for the past fifty years. But with the plethora of new recordings and the phenomenon in jazz of the same standards being recorded seemingly by almost every artist and band or trio, it’s very hard to know where to start or to improve a CD collection.The Essential Jazz Recordings provides a t...

The Adirondack region of New York State is, in many respects, America’s cauldron of conservation. It was there, more than a century ago, that wanton exploitation of forests first aroused concern about human impact on the environment. It was there that Americans first began to set aside lands proclaimed as "forever wild." The establishment of the Adirondack Park created an immense landscape of 6 million acres composed of a mixture of public and private lands in nearly equal proportion. This...

At a time when Yemen has been ravaged by a decade of war and subject to myriad political and military interventions, the essays in this collection serve as a timely reminder of the need for grounded anthropological study in even the harshest of circumstances. From tribesmen to refugees, revolutionaries to farmers, state workers to charity workers, intellectuals to the unemployed and the destitute, we learn of the everyday political languages through which people in the country live their l...

Douglass Maybury finds favor with a wealthy Senator, and before too long is betrothed to the fair Flora May Scarlett, that millionaire’s daughter, whom he reveres in the highest degree.Written by Linn Boyd Porter (1851-1916) and published in 1893 under the the pseudonym of “Albert Ross.”Transcribed and edited by Jeffrey Merrow from the G. W. Dillingham printed edition. 33 Chapters, 343 pages, 92,000 words,Chapters:I. — The Poor Girl and the Rich One.II...

The Pen & Cape Society, in conjunction with Local Hero Press, is proud to present The Good Fight, an anthology of superhero fiction from some of the best authors working in the genre. Collected within this volume are stories by Scott Bachmann, Frank Byrns, Marion Harmon, Warren Hately, Drew Hayes, Ian Thomas Healy, Hydrargentium, Michael Ivan Lowell, T. Mike McCurley, Landon Porter, R. J. Ross, Cheyanne Young, and Jim...

Ted Gioia's History of Jazz has been universally hailed as a classic--acclaimed by jazz critics and fans around the world. Now Gioia brings his magnificent work completely up-to-date, drawing on the latest research and revisiting virtually every aspect of the music, past and present. Gioia tells the story of jazz as it had never been told before, in a book that brilliantly portrays the legendary jazz players, the breakthrough styles, and the world in which it evolved. Here are the...

The Penguin Guide to Jazz Recordings is firmly established as the world's leading guide to recorded jazz, a mine of fascinating information and a source of insightful - often wittily trenchant - criticism. This is something rather different: Brian Morton (who taught American history at UEA) has picked out the 1000 best recordings that all jazz fans should have and shows how they tell the history of the music and with it the history of the twentieth century. He has completely revis...

Some samples: 1) Rock goddesses have kids, too. Pat Benatar was a major 1980s rock star and continues to play today. Her songs such as "Heartbreaker" are on Guitar Hero, and lots of children—and adults—rock out to them, including her two daughters, Haley and Hana. Of course, kids can ask embarrassing questions, and Haley and Hana sometimes ask their mom this question about the Spandex pants she used to wear on stage: "How did you get into those pants?" 2) What if you were in a plane, a sto...

A music journalist offers a lively history of modern jazz through its formative and most vital decades—from Charlie Parker to John Coltrane.In Giant Steps, Kenny Mathieson examines the most important figures in the creation of modern jazz, detailing the emergence and evolution of bebop through the likes of Dizzy Gillespie, Fats Navarro, Bud Powell, Thelonious Monk and Miles Davis. Using this as its starting point, Mathieson then delves into the developments...

'It is the most singular of sounds, yet among the most ubiquitous. It is the sound of isolation that has sold itself to millions.'Miles Davis's Kind of Blue is the best selling piece of music in the history of jazz, and for many listeners among the most haunting in all of twentieth-century music. It is also, notoriously, the only jazz album many people own. Recorded in 1959 (in nine miraculous hours), there has been nothing like it since. Its atmosphere - slow, da...

Have you ever been carried away by a piece of classical music? In this funny, evocative, personal eBook, previously published as ‘Music for the People: The Pleasures and Pitfalls of Classical Music’, Gareth takes us on a journey of musical discovery that explains and entertains in equal measure.Have you ever been carried away by a piece of classical music? The sad song of a single violin might make us cry, but the idea of finding out more about classical music can often be intimida...

“In this book I hope to reach a new audience with the positive message of America’s greatest music, to show how great musicians demonstrate on the bandstand a mutual respect and trust that can alter your outlook on the world and enrich every aspect of your life–from individual creativity and personal relationships to conducting business and understanding what it means to be American in the most modern sense.”–Wynton MarsalisIn this beautiful book, the Pulitzer Prize-winning ...