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1983., J.M. Dent Call No: 780.92 B789b Availability:1 of 1 At Your Library Series Title: Master musicians series.
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2020., Penguin Books Call No: Bio B414a Availability:1 of 1 At Your Library Summary Note: The iconic image of Beethoven is of him as a lone genius: hair wild, fists clenched, and brow furrowed. Beethoven may well have shaped the music of the future, but he was also a product of his time, influenced by the people, politics, and culture around him. Oxford scholar Laura Tunbridge offers an alternative history of Beethoven's career, placing his music in contexts that shed light on why particular pieces are valued more than others, and what this tells us about his larger-than-life reputation. Each chapter focuses on a period of his life, a piece of music, and a revealing theme, from family to friends, from heroism to liberty. We discover, along the way, Beethoven's unusual marketing strategies, his ambitious concert programming, and how specific performers and instruments influenced his works. This book offers new ways to understand Beethoven and why his music continues to be valued today.
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c2012., Princeton University Press Call No: Bio S152p Availability:1 of 1 At Your Library Series Title: Bard Music Festival series.Summary Note: Camille Saint-Saëns--perhaps the foremost French musical figure of the late nineteenth century and a composer who wrote in nearly every musical genre, from opera and the symphony to film music--is now being rediscovered after a century of modernism overshadowed his earlier importance. In a wide-ranging and trenchant series of essays, articles, and documents, Camille Saint-Saëns and His World deconstructs the multiple realities behind the man and his music. Topics range from intimate glimpses of the private and playful Saint-Saëns, to the composer's interest in astronomy and republican politics, his performances of Mozart and Rameau over eight decades, and his extensive travels around the world. This collection also analyzes the role he played in various musical societies and his complicated relationship with such composers as Liszt, Massenet, Wagner, and Ravel. Featuring the best contemporary scholarship on this crucial, formative period in French music, Camille Saint-Saëns and His World restores the composer to his vital role as innovator and curator of Western music [Publisher description]
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2001., Nan A. Talese/Doubleday Call No: Bio B632s Edition: 1st ed. Availability:1 of 1 At Your Library
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2010., General, Knopf Call No: 782.1 S698 Edition: 1st ed. Availability:1 of 1 At Your Library Summary Note: Stephen Sondheim has won seven Tonys, an Academy Award, seven Grammys, a Pulitzer Prize and the Kennedy Center Honors. His lyrics have become synonymous with musical theater and popular culture, and here Sondheim has not only collected his lyrics for the first time, he is giving readers a rare personal look into his life as well as his remarkable productions. Along with the lyrics for all of his musicals from 1954 to 1981--including West Side Story, Company, Follies, A Little Night Music and Sweeney Todd--Sondheim treats us to never-before-published songs cut or discarded from each show. He discusses his relationship with his mentor, Oscar Hammerstein II, and his collaborations with extraordinary talents from Leonard Bernstein to Angela Lansbury. The anecdotes--filled with pointed observations and intimate details--transport us back to a time when theater was a major pillar of American culture. Best of all, Sondheim offers unparalleled insights into songwriting.--From publisher description.
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By Arden, Jann2020., Adult, Random House Canada Call No: Bio A676i Availability:1 of 1 At Your Library Summary Note: Jann Arden--bestselling author, recording artist and late-blooming TV star--is back with this funny, heartfelt and fierce memoir on becoming a woman of a certain age. The power, gravity and freedom she's found at fifty-seven are superpowers she believes all of us can unleash. Digging deep into her strengths, her failures and her losses, Jann Arden brings us an inspiring account of how she has surprised herself, in her fifties, by at last becoming completely her own person. Like many women, it took Jann a long time to realize that trying to be pleasing and likeable and beautiful in the eyes of others was a loser's game. Letting it rip, and damning the consequences, is not only liberating, it's a hell of a lot of fun: "Being the age I am--that so many women are--is just the best time of my life." Jann weaves her own story together with tales of her mother, grandmother, and great grandmother, and the father she came close to hating, to show her younger self--and all of us--that fear and avoidance is no way to live. "What I'm thinking about now aren't all the ways I can try to hang on to my youth or all the seconds ticking by in some kind of morbid countdown to death," she writes, "but rather how I keep becoming someone I always hoped I could be. If I'm lucky one day a very old face will look back at me from the mirror, a face I once shied away from. I will love that old woman ferociously, because she has finally figured out how to live a life of purpose--not in spite of but because of all her mistakes and failures.
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-- On a wire.2021., Drawn & Quarterly Call No: GN Bio G678l Edition: First Edition. Availability:1 of 1 At Your Library Summary Note: Bio-comic of Leonard Cohen's life. Leonard Cohen opens in Los Angeles on the last night of the man's life in 2016. Alone in his final hours, the beloved writer and musician ponders his existence in a series of flashbacks that reveal the ups and downs of a storied career. A young Cohen traded in the promise of steady employment in his family's upscale Montreal garment business for the unlikely path of a literary poet. His life took another sharp turn when, already in his 30s, he recorded his first album to widespread international acclaim. Along the way he encountered a who's who of musical luminaries, including Lou Reed, Nico, Janis Joplin, and Joni Mitchell. And then there's Phil Spector, the notorious music impresario who held a gun to Cohen's head during a coke-fueled, all-night-long recording session.
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2020., Simon & Schuster Canada Call No: Bio C678l Edition: Simon & Schuster Canada edition. Availability:1 of 1 At Your Library Summary Note: The extraordinary life of one of the world's greatest music and literary icons, in the words of those who knew him best. Poet, novelist, singer-songwriter, artist, prophet, icon—there has never been a figure like Leonard Cohen. He was a true giant in contemporary western culture, entertaining and inspiring people everywhere with his work. From his groundbreaking and bestselling novels, The Favourite Game and Beautiful Losers, to timeless songs such as “Suzanne,” “Dance Me to the End of Love,” and “Hallelujah,” Cohen is a cherished artist. His death in 2016 was felt around the world by the many fans and followers who would miss his warmth, humour, intellect, and piercing insights. Leonard Cohen, Untold Stories chronicles the full breadth of his extraordinary life. The first of three volumes—The Early Years—follows him from his boyhood in Montreal to university, and his burgeoning literary career to the world of music, culminating with his first international tour in 1970. Through the voices of those who knew him best—family and friends, colleagues and contemporaries, rivals, business partners, and his many lovers—the book probes deeply into both Cohen’s public and private life. It also paints a portrait of an era, the social, cultural, and political revolutions that shook the 1960s. In this revealing and entertaining first volume, bestselling author and biographer Michael Posner draws on hundreds of interviews to reach beyond the Cohen of myth and reveal the unique, complex, and compelling figure of the real man.
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-- McGarrigle family album.2015., Random House Canada Call No: QWF Bio M145m Availability:1 of 1 At Your Library Summary Note: The McGarrigles are known around the world for their touching, insightful songs about love, loss and family. But where and how does a family so rich in musical luminaries take root? In Mountain City Girls, Anna and Jane recount their childhood in Montreal and the Laurentian Mountains, and go further back to their ancestors' early days in Canada, and their parents' courtship and marriage. A vivid snapshot of coming-of-age in the 1950s, the book recounts the sisters' school days and rebellious teenage antics, and their beginnings as musicians. It takes us through the vibrant folk music circuit of the 1960s in Montreal and New York City, and the burgeoning social movements of San Francisco, and ultimately leads to the formation of the folk music duo Kate and Anna McGarrigle, revealing the genesis behind some of their beloved songs and following their early days recording and performing. The book also reads as a tribute to Kate, who passed away in 2010, with insights into her character and creative development. Inspiringly, it speaks to the important (sometimes lifesaving) role of sisters, and is a deeply moving testament to the profound importance of family.
