Chamber Music


Book Description

Chamber Music: A Listener's Guide brings together acclaimed program annotator James Keller's essays on the essential chamber-music repertoire. Written to be meaningful to non-professional music-lovers while also providing enrichment for chamber-music professionals, these notes offer generous historical background for 193 works by 56 composers from the 18th century to the present.







A Listener's Guide to Free Improvisation


Book Description

In the first book of its kind, John Corbett's A Listener's Guide to Free Improvisation provides a how-to manual for the most extreme example of spontaneous improvising: music with no pre-planned material at all. Drawing on over three decades of writing about, presenting, playing, teaching, and studying freely improvised music, Corbett offers an enriching set of tools that show any curious listener how to really listen, and he encourages them to enjoy the human impulse-- found all around the world-- to make up music on the spot.




Guide to Chamber Music


Book Description

Authoritative guide presents 231 of the most frequently performed pieces by 55 composers. A must for music lovers and musicians alike. "No lover of chamber music should be without this Guide." — John Barkham Reviews.




The NPR Curious Listener's Guide to World Music


Book Description

Discover world music--for illumination, enlightenment, and inspiration. Like few other musical forms, world music encompasses hundreds of different traditions and cultures, many intoxicating moods, and a richly diverse catalogue of music and musicians. THE MUSICIANS, including: Paco de Lucia, King Sunny Ade, Ravi Shankar, The Gipsy Kings, Tito Puente, Bob Marley, Beny Moré, The Chieftains, Wu Man, Sheila Chandra, and Miriam Makeba THE STYLES, including: African reggae, Indonesian gamelan, Brazilian bossa nova, Hindu Carnatic, Chinese opera, Russian folk, Nordic fiddle and ballad, Argentine tango, Parisian bal-musette, Spanish flamenco, Greek rembetika, and Trinidad calypso




The NPR Curious Listener's Guide to American Folk Music


Book Description

A comprehensive listener's guide to American folk music provides a concise history of the musical genre and its most important performers, along with an A-to-Z glossary of terms, information on stylistic variations, helpful resources, and a listing of dozens of essential folk music CDs.







New Sounds


Book Description

All kinds of modern music from minimalism to electronic jazz are described and discographies of each are provided.




Electronic Music


Book Description




The NPR Curious Listener's Guide to Popular Standards


Book Description

Every major singer from Frank Sinatra to Christina Aguilera. Every major composer from Irving Berlin to Stephen Sondheim. Every major song from a century of favorites. Every major musician and lyricist. Every major styling from blues, jazz, and country to folk, big band, and rock and roll The most recorded songs of all time. A guide to understanding the "standard" lingo. The evolution of popular music from Tin Pan Alley to contemporary musical theater, and more.