Trouble for Trumpets


Book Description

Just as the Trumpets, summer creatures who live in a world of warmth and sunshine, prepare to hibernate, the Grumpets, winter creatures who live in the dark, frozen mountains of the north prepare to take over their land.




Farewell the Trumpets


Book Description

Farewell the Trumpets: An Imperial Retreat traces the momentous decline and fall of the greatest of empires - from Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee to the death of Winston Churchill in 1965. With characteristic balance, this masterpiece of narrative history describes the long retreat and final dissolution of the British Empire. The Pax Britannica Trilogy includes Heaven's Command: An Imperial Progress and Pax Britannica: The Climax of an Empire. Together these three works of history trace the dramatic rise and fall of the British Empire, from the accession of Queen Victoria in 1837 to the death of Winston Churchill in 1965. Jan Morris is also world-renowned for her collection of travel writing and reportage, spanning over five decades and including such titles as Venice, Coronation Everest, Hong Kong, Spain, A Writer's World and most recently, Contact! 'The British Empire is fortunate in having found in Morris a chronicler and memorialist who can do it justice. . . Morris writes with inspired gusto, firmly rooted in erudition, which carries the book into the realms of literature.' Sunday Telegraph 'One of our finest writers on Empire - alive to its glory, yet with a beady eye for the corruptions and failures which were at its heart, along with the dreams.' Observer




Battle


Book Description

"The perspective of 15 years, painstaking research, thousands of interviews, extensive analysis and evaluation, and the creative talent of John Toland [paint] the epic struggle on an immense canvas. . . . Toland writes with the authority of a man who was there. . . . He tastes the bitterness of defeat of those who surrendered and writes as if he had the benefit of the eyes and ears of soldiers and generals on the other side of the line. . . . If you could read only one book to understand generals and GIs and what their different wars were like this is the book."--Chicago Sunday Tribune "The author has devoted years to studying memoirs, interviewing veterans and consulting military documents, both German and American. He also has revisited the old battlefields in Belgium and Luxembourg. . . . Toland has told the whole story with dramatic realism. . . . It is a story of panic, terror and of high-hearted courage."--New York Times Book Review "For the first time in the growing literature of World War II, the inspiring story of the stubborn, lonely, dogged battle of the Americans locked in this tragic salient is told. . . . gripping . . . You cannot put it down once you start it."--San Francisco Chronicle




Voices of the Bulge


Book Description

The powerful German counteroffensive operation code-named “Wacht am Rhein” (Watch on the Rhine) launched in the early morning hours of December 16, 1944, would result in the greatest single extended land battle of World War II. To most Americans, the fierce series of battles fought from December 1944 through January 1945 is better known as the “Battle of the Bulge.” Almost one million soldiers would eventually take part in the fighting. Different from other histories of the Bulge, this book tells the story of this crucial campaign with first-person stories taken from the authors’ interviews of the American soldiers, both officers and enlisted personnel, who faced the massive German onslaught that threatened to turn the tide of battle in Western Europe and successfully repelled the attack with their courage and blood. Also included are stories from German veterans of the battles, including SS soldiers, who were interviewed by the authors.




The Damned Engineers


Book Description

The history of the 291st Engineer Combat Battalion in World War II, and in particular about its involvement in the Battle of the Bulge. The 291st was a small unit but it played a pivotal role in stemming the German counter-offensive in the Battle of the Bulge in 1944. This history is no mere accounting of events, causes, and results, but rather it conveys the real experiences of ordinary men who, when placed in extraordinary circumstances, displayed the courage and fortitude to get the job done. And, as Janice Holt Giles wrote, the 291st Engineers not only got the job done, but they "gave a damned good account of themselves."




When Trumpets Call


Book Description

A remarkable portrait of one of our most remarkable presidents, When Trumpets Call focuses on Theodore Roosevelt's life after the White House. TR had reveled in his power and used it to enlarge the scope of the office, expand government's role in economic affairs, and increase U.S. influence abroad. Only fifty when he left the White House, he would spend the rest of his life longing to return. Drawing from a wealth of new and previously unused sources, Patricia O'Toole, author of the highly acclaimed biography of Henry Adams and his friends, The Five of Hearts, conducts the first thorough investigation of the most eventful, most revealing decade of Roosevelt's life. When he left office in March 1909, Roosevelt went on safari, leaving the political stage to William Howard Taft, the friend he had selected to succeed him. Home from Africa and gravely disappointed in Taft, he could not resist challenging Taft for the Republican nomination in 1912. When Taft bested him, Roosevelt formed the Bull Moose Party and ran for president on a third ticket, a move that split the Republican vote and put Woodrow Wilson in the White House. In 1914, after the beginning of World War I, Roosevelt became the most vocal critic of Wilson's foreign policy, and two years later, hoping to oust Wilson, Roosevelt maneuvered behind the scenes in another failed bid for the Republican nomination. Turned down by Wilson in his request to raise troops and take them to France, TR helped his four sons realize their wish to serve, then pressured Washington to speed up the war effort. His youngest son was killed on Bastille Day, 1918. Theodore Roosevelt died six months later. His last written words were a reminder to himself to see the chairman of the Republican Party. Surprising, original, deeply moving, When Trumpets Call is a portrait framed by a deeply human question: What happens to a powerful man when he loses power? Most of all, it is an unforgettable close-up of Theodore Roosevelt as he struggled not only to recover power but also to maintain a much-needed sense of purpose. Through her perceptive treatment of his last decade, Patricia O'Toole shows why Theodore Roosevelt still enjoys the affection and esteem of Americans across the political spectrum.




Jazz Baby


Book Description

Baby and his family make some jazzy music.




A Dictionary for the Modern Trumpet Player


Book Description

Titles in Dictionaries for the Modern Musician series offer both the novice and the advanced artist key information designed to convey the field of study and performance for a major instrument or instrument class, as well as the workings of musicians in areas from conducting to composing. Unlike other encyclopedic works, contributions to this series focus primarily on the knowledge required by the contemporary musical student or performer. Each dictionary covers topics from instrument parts to playing technique and major works to key figures. A must-have for any musician’s personal library! Trumpeters today perform a vast repertoire of musical material spanning 500 years, much of it in a variety of styles and even on a number of related instruments. In A Dictionary for the Modern Trumpet Player, scholar and performer, Elisa Koehler has created a key reference work that addresses all of the instruments in the high brass family, providing ready answers to issues that trumpeters, conductors, and musicians commonly—and sometimes not so commonly—encounter. Drawing on a broad range of scholarly sources, A Dictionary for the Modern Trumpet Player includes entries on historic instruments like the cornetto, keyed bugle, and slide trumpet; jazz trumpet techniques; mutes and accessories; and ancient ancestors of the trumpet and related non-Western instruments. In addition to its concise and detailed definitions, this work includes biographies of prominent performers, teachers, instrument makers, and composers of trumpet solo and ensemble literature often omitted from other musical references. Carefully labeled illustrations illuminate the inner workings of various valve mechanisms, allowing readers to visualize the more technical points of high brass instruments. Appendixes include a time line of trumpet history, a survey of valve mechanisms, a list of prominent excerpts from the orchestral and operatic repertoire, and an extensive bibliography. From quick definitions of confusing terms in a musical score to an in-depth overview of trumpet history, A Dictionary for the Modern Trumpet Player is an ideal reference for students, professionals, and music lovers.




Trumpets from the Steep


Book Description

This last volume of Lady Diana Cooper's memoirs covers the years of the Second World War and its aftermath, when her husband Duff Cooper served as Minister of Information and then in various diplomat posts around the world. We accompany the Coopers on their travels from the Dorchester Hotel during the breathless days of the Blitz, to a happy sojourn farming in Sussex, to Singapore and Algiers and eventual retirement to France, all told with Diana's unique perspective and enchanting style.




Revelation


Book Description

The final book of the Bible, Revelation prophesies the ultimate judgement of mankind in a series of allegorical visions, grisly images and numerological predictions. According to these, empires will fall, the "Beast" will be destroyed and Christ will rule a new Jerusalem. With an introduction by Will Self.