Annapurna Devi: An Unheard Melody


Book Description

Baba Allauddin Khan's daughter, Pandit Ravi Shankar's first wife, Ustad Ali Akbar Khan's sister, representative of Maihar-Senia gharana - Annapurna Devi has an illustrious lineage. And she is a star in her own right - she is the only female surbahar player in the country. Yet, Annapurna's life is shrouded in mystery. Though she is a true guru to her hishyas, to others she is an eccentric recluse or simply too strong-minded. This first authorised biography offers a glimpse into her life, not to reveal or to shock, but to set the record straight - her turbulent years with Ravi Shankar, the death of her only son, her single-minded pursuit of music and a life in seclusion. Drawing on interviews with Annapurna Devi and her family members, admirers, critics and students, Swapan Kumar Bondyopadhyay offers an absorbing portrait of a brilliant individual, who shuns public erformances devoting her time instead to her music, her students and to keeping her father's legacy alive.




Unheard Melodies


Book Description




Melodies Unheard


Book Description

In these essays, acclaimed poet and critic Anthony Hecht explores the ways in which poetry can be read and the many pleasures it affords. Ranging from Shakespeare's sonnets to Eliot, Frost, and Simic, Melodies Unheard offers profound insight into poetic form, meter, rhyme, and meaning--into the mysteries of poetry itself. Anthony Hecht's vast knowledge of literature and his gift for mesmerizing argument are both amply present in Melodies Unheard. Whether defending the sestina against accusations of boredom and dolefulness or examining the structure of Shakespeare's sonnets or unraveling some of the complexity of Moby-Dick, these essays are models of civility, candor, and grace. I know of no other poet, certainly none of Anthony Hecht's stature, who sheds as much light on the intricacies and hidden designs of poems and who does it with such style.--Mark Strand Anthony Hecht declares himself 'a poet first and only secondarily a critic, ' but Melodies Unheard proves again that he is a master in both trades. His discourse on such subjects as rhyme, the sestina, and 'the music of forms' is both scholarly and delightful; his articles on individual poets are finely done; and best of al




Water / Music


Book Description

"Exploring and delineating the space between nature and culture, the poems of this collection anchor themselves in the timely and the timeless. Rich and diverse in their formal intricacy, they move with ease from narrative to meditation, from close physical observation to the haunts of memory, and from lyric sorrow to the pleasure of living in the world. The book's fifty-three poems are divided into five parts"--




The Cambridge Companion to Music and Romanticism


Book Description

A stimulating new approach to understanding the relationship between music and culture in the long nineteenth century.




The Music Room


Book Description

When Namita is ten, her mother takes her to Dhondutai, a respected Mumbai music teacher from the great Jaipur Gharana. Dhondutai has dedicated herself to music and her antecedents are rich. She is the only remaining student of the legendary Alladiya Khan, the founder of the gharana and of its most famous singer, the tempestuous songbird, Kesarbai Kerkar. Namita begins to learn singing from Dhondutai, at first reluctantly and then, as the years pass, with growing passion. Dhondutai sees in her a second Kesar, but does Namita have the dedication to give herself up completely to music—or will there always be too many late nights and cigarettes? Beautifully written, full of anecdotes, gossip and legend, The Music Room is perhaps the most intimate book to be written about Indian classical music yet.




A Musical Offering


Book Description

A lyrical celebration of storytelling, of childhood, and of the transformative power of music. Tracing a circular course that echoes Bach’s Goldberg Variations , Luis Sagasti’s second book to appear in English takes the guise of a musical scheherazade, recounting story after story, vibrating to celestial harmonies. From the music born of the sun to the music sent into space on the Voyager mission, from Rothko to rock music, from the composers of the concentration camps to a weeping room for Argentinian conscripts in the Falklands, A Musical Offering traverses the shifting sands of fiction and history.




Roots, Radicals and Rockers


Book Description

SHORTLISTED FOR THE PENDERYN MUSIC BOOK PRIZERoots, Radicals & Rockers: How Skiffle Changed the World is the first book to explore this phenomenon in depth - a meticulously researched and joyous account that explains how skiffle sparked a revolution that shaped pop music as we have come to know it. It's a story of jazz pilgrims and blues blowers, Teddy Boys and beatnik girls, coffee-bar bohemians and refugees from the McCarthyite witch-hunts. Billy traces how the guitar came to the forefront of music in the UK and led directly to the British Invasion of the US charts in the 1960s.Emerging from the trad-jazz clubs of the early '50s, skiffle was adopted by kids who growing up during the dreary, post-war rationing years. These were Britain's first teenagers, looking for a music of their own in a pop culture dominated by crooners and mediated by a stuffy BBC. Lonnie Donegan hit the charts in 1956 with a version of 'Rock Island Line' and soon sales of guitars rocketed from 5,000 to 250,000 a year. Like punk rock that would flourish two decades later, skiffle was a do-it-yourself music. All you needed were three guitar chords and you could form a group, with mates playing tea-chest bass and washboard as a rhythm section.




The Ways Children Learn Music


Book Description

How do children learn music? And how can music teachers help children to become independent and self-sufficient musical thinkers? Author Eric Bluestine sheds light on these issues in music education.




King of Ragtime


Book Description

A stunning, rhythmic picture book biography of African American composer Scott Joplin, whose ragtime music paved the way for jazz. There was something special about Scott Joplin… This quiet kid could make a piano laugh out loud. Scott, the son of a man who had been enslaved, became a king—the King of Ragtime. This celebration of Scott Joplin, whose ragtime compositions paved the way for jazz, will captivate audiences and put a beat in their step, and the kaleidoscope-like illustrations will draw young readers in again and again.