The Bee Gee's journey from Fifties child act to musical institution is one of pop's most turbulent legends. Barry, Maurice and Robin Gibb somehow managed to survive changing musical fashions and bitter personal feuds to create musical partnership that has already lasted four times as long as The Beatles. Described by the authors as their objective tribute, this unflinching biography chronicles everything - the good, the bad... and the bushed-up. Youthful delinquency, disastrous marriages, bitter lawsuits, gay sex scandals, serious drug problems and the death of younger brother Andy have sometimes made the personal lives of the Brothers Gibb look as bleak as the low spots of a career that once reduced them to playing the Batley Variety Club. Yet every time the Bee Gees roller coaster seemed derailed for good, they recorded and went on to even greater triumphs. Today they are revered among pop music's all-time great performers, producers and songwriters. But the true story of their success and the high price they paid for it has never been fully revealed... until now. This new edition of The Ultimate Biography incorporates a complete listing of every song written or recorded by the Gibbs.

    . . . Heartfelt, passionate and slick.”— Kirkus, starred review

    His career has spanned more than half a century, his lyrics have become synonymous with musical theater and popular culture, and in Finishing the Hat—titled after perhaps his most autobiographical song, from Sunday in the Park with George—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 from each show, songs that were cut or discarded before seeing the light of day. He discusses his relationship with his mentor, Oscar Hammerstein II, and his collaborations with extraordinary talents such as Leonard Bernstein, Arthur Laurents, Ethel Merman, Richard Rodgers, Angela Lansbury, Harold Prince and a panoply of others. The anecdotes—filled with history, pointed observations and intimate details—transport us back to a time when theater was a major pillar of American culture. Best of all, Sondheim appraises his work and dissects his lyrics, as well as those of others, offering unparalleled insights into songwriting that will be studied by fans and aspiring songwriters for years to come. Accompanying Sondheim’s sparkling writing are behind-the-scenes photographs from each production, along with handwritten music and lyrics from the songwriter’s personal collection. Penetrating and surprising, poignant, funny and sometimes provocative, Finishing the Hat is not only an informative look at the art and craft of lyric writing, it is a history of the theater that belongs on the same literary shelf as Moss Hart’s Act One and Arthur Miller’s Timebends. It is also a book that will leave you humming the final bars of Merrily We Roll Along, while eagerly anticipating the next volume, which begins with the opening lines of Sunday in the Park with George.

    A role model for generations of writers and performers, Doc was renowned for his mastery of virtually every popular style, from the gutbucket rhythm and blues of “Lonely Avenue” to the symphonic soul of “Save the Last Dance for Me” to the pure pop of “Viva Las Vegas.” His songs-“This Magic Moment,” “A Teenager in Love,” “Hushabye,” “Little Sister,” “Turn Me Loose,” and many others-have been recorded by everyone from Ray Charles, Elvis Presley, and B. B. King to Bob Dylan, Led Zeppelin, and Bruce Springsteen, with sales exceeding $100 million. Doc was ready-made for literature. His collaborator Mort Shuman once described him as an “entire rollicking soul neighborhood rolled into one man.” Garrulous, profane, hilarious, and Rabelaisian, Doc was never inhibited about offering his opinions and his friendship. His confidants, collaborators, and discoveries included Duke Ellington, John Lennon, Dr. John, Jimmy Scott, Bette Midler, and Lou Reed. In the words of renowned producer Jerry Wexler, “If the music industry had a heart, it would be Doc Pomus.” Despite, or more likely because of, his successes, few acquaintances knew that this writer of jukebox hits led one of the most dramatic and unlikely lives of his time. Spanning extravagant wealth and desperate poverty, suburban domesticity and the depths of New York’s underworld, worldwide fame and near-total obscurity, enduring love and persistent loneliness, Doc’s story remains one of the great untold American lives. Its chapters comprise a back-room history of rock ’n’ roll, touching on more than a half-century of American popular music-from the blues Doc performed with Lester Young to his collaborations with the luminaries of New York’s punk scene, shot through with vivid portraits of virtually every major player. Lonely Avenue is the first biography of this American original, so elegantly rendered that it reads like a novel, and fortified by full, exclusive access to Doc Pomus’s family, friends, voluminous journals, and archives.

    By the time her life and artistry were cut tragically short by a heroin overdose, Joplin had become the stuff of rock–and–roll legend.Through the eyes of her family and closest friends , we see Janis as a young girl, already rebelling against injustice, racism, and hypocrisy in society. We follow Janis as she discovers her amazing talents in the Beat hangouts of Venice and North Beach–singing in coffeehouses, shooting speed to enhance her creativity, challenging the norms of straight society. Janis truly came into her own in the fantastic, psychedelic, acid–soaked world of Haight–Asbury. At the height of her fame, Janis's life is a whirlwind of public adoration and hard living. Laura Joplin shows us not only the public Janice who could drink Jim Morrison under the table and bean him with a bottle of booze when he got fresh; she shows us the private Janis, struggling to perfect her art, searching for the balance between love and stardom, battling to overcome her alcohol addiction and heroin use in a world where substance abuse was nearly universal.At the heart of Love, Janis is an astonishing series of letters by Janis herself that have never been previously published. In them she conveys as no one else could the wild ride from awkward small–town teenager to rock–and–roll queen. Love, Janis is the new life of Janis Joplin we have been waiting for–a celebration of the sixties' joyous experimentation and creativity, and a loving, compassionate examination of one of that era's greatest talents.

    His long, intimate piece on the tour, The Rolling Stones Discover America, captures the highs and lows of the grueling tour and has become a classic of rock ‘n’ roll journalism—one that the Maysles brothers studied to guide the editing of their film, Gimme Shelter.

    The Devil and Dr. Barnes traces the near-mythical journey of a man who was born into poverty, amassed a fortune through the promotion of a popular medicine, and acquired the premier private collection of works by such masters as Renoir, Matisse, Cézanne, and Picasso. Ostentatiously turning his back on the art establishment, Barnes challenged the aesthetic sensibilities of an uninitiated, often resistant and scoffing, American audience. In particular, he championed Matisse, Soutine, and Modigliani when they were obscure or in difficult straits. Analyzing what he saw as the formal relationships underlying all art, linking the old and the new, Barnes applied these principles in a rigorous course of study offered at his Merion foundation. Barnes's own mordant words, culled from the copious printed record, animate the narrative throughout, as do accounts of his associations with notables of the era--Gertrude and Leo Stein, Bertrand Russell, and John Dewey among them--many of whom he alienated with his appetite for passionate, public feuds. In this rounded portrait, Albert Barnes emerges as a complex, flawed man, who--blessed with an astute eye for greatness--has left us an incomparable treasure, gathered in one place and unforgettable to all who have seen it.

    If you don't live it, it won't come out of your horn." — Charlie Parker"What is jazz? The rhythm — the feeling." — Coleman Hawkins"The best sound usually comes the first time you do something. If it's spontaneous, it's going to be rough, not clean, but it's going to have the spirit which is the essence of jazz." — Dave BrubeckHere, in their own words, such famous jazz musicians as Louis Armstrong, King Oliver, Fletcher Henderson, Bunk Johnson, Duke Ellington, Fats Waller, Clarence Williams, Jo Jones, Jelly Roll Morton, Mezz Mezzrow, Billie Holiday, and many others recall the birth, growth, and changes in jazz over the years. From its beginnings at the turn of the twentieth century in the red-light district in New Orleans (or Storyville, as it came to be known), to Chicago's Downtown section and the Original Dixieland Jazz Band and Chicago's South Side to jam sessions in Kansas City to Harlem during the Depression years, the West Coast and modern developments, the story of jazz is vividly and colorfully documented in hundreds of personal interviews, letters, tape recorded and telephone conversations, and excerpts from previously printed articles that appeared in books and magazines.There is no more fascinating and lively history of jazz than this firsthand telling by the men who made it. It should be read and re-read by all jazz enthusiasts, musicians, students of music and culture, students of American history, and other readers. "A lively book bearing the stamp of honesty and naturalness." — Library Journal. "A work of considerable substance." — The New Yorker. "Some of the quotations are a bit racy but they give the book a wonderful flavor." — San Francisco Chronicle.

    You can find his work being played with cherished delight by any budding pianist, and his music serves as a constant backdrop and mainstay for piano concertos worldwide. But what do we really know about Frédéric Chopin?A child prodigy, Frédéric Chopin was a transplant from Poland who took the artistic world of Paris by storm. He was never completely at ease in his surroundings, but he took the pain of an eternal outsider and used it as a transformative force not only in his life but in the lives of countless others to come. In this book, you will find the life and legacy of the composer and piano virtuoso Frédéric Chopin explored in full.

    I just wanted to be the biggest at what I do! Powerful, unstoppable, heavy - when that word still meant something good!" - Meat Loaf, as told to Mick Wall Everything in the story of Meat Loaf is big. From the place he was born (Texas); to the family he was born into (his father weighed 22 stone, his uncle weighed over 40 stone, while Meat Loaf himself weighed 17 stone before he was even in his teens); to the sound he made (a colossal collision between Richard Wagner, Phil Spector and Bruce Springsteen); and of course the records he sold - nearly 50 million in Britain and America alone. Now, on the eve of the 40th anniversary of Bat Out of Hell, the album that gave rise to Meat Loaf's astonishing career, and the premiere of Bat Out Of Hell: The Musical, Mick Wall, who has interviewed Meat Loaf on numerous occasions throughout his career, pulls back the curtains to reveal the soft-hearted soul behind the larger-than-life character he created for himself. From a tumultuous childhood with an alcoholic father to the relentless abusive bullying from classmates and their parents alike, nobody could have predicted Meat Loaf's meteoric rise to fame. But when the messianic rock opera Bat Out of Hell was released in 1977, it became one of the biggest albums of all time, selling over 45 million copies worldwide to date. Its release marked the start of a roller-coaster ride of incredible highs and seemingly career-ending lows. By the 80s, Meat Loaf was battling with drug and alcohol addiction and escalating money problems that would eventually lead to a nervous breakdown. But just when it seemed like it was all over, the astonishing success of Bat Out of Hell II and the mega-hit 'I'd Do Anything For Love (But I Won't Do That)' marked an extraordinary new wave of success. Now, Mick Wall will bring this extraordinary story up to date, drawing on the hours he spent with Meat Loaf, both in interviews and on tour, as well as offering up a unique insight from those who have known him best.

    Told in his own way, in his own words, a symphony written by the King of Jazz. His story spans and defines a half-century of modern music.This man who created over 1500 compositions was as much at home in Harlem's Cotton Club in the ‘20s as he was at a White House birthday celebration in his honor in the ‘60s. For Duke knew everyone and savored them all. Passionate about his music and the people who made music, he counted as his friends hundreds of the musicians who changed the face of music throughout the world: Bechet, Basie, Armstrong, Lena Horne, Ella Fitzgerald, Sinatra, to name a few of them. Here are 100 photographs to give us an intimate view of Duke's world—his family, his friends, his associates.What emerges most strongly in his commitment to music, the mistress for whom he saves the fullest intensity of his passion. ”Lovers have come and gone, but only my mistress stays,” he says. He composed not only songs that all the world has sung, but also suites, sacred works, music for stage and screen and symphonies. This rich book, the embodiment of the life and works of the Duke, is replete with appendices listing singers, arrangers, lyricists and the symphony orchestras with whom the Duke played. There is a book to own and cherish by all who love Jazz and the contributions made to it by the Duke.

    Best known in recent years for producing U2's sensational albums, Eno began his career as a synthesizer player for Roxy Music. He has since released many solo albums, both rock and ambient, written music for film and television soundtracks, and collaborated with David Bowie, David Byrne, Robert Fripp, and classical and experimental composers. His pioneering ambient sound has been enormously influential, and without him today's rock would have a decidedly different sound. Drawing on Eno's own words to examine his influences and ideas, this book—featuring a new afterword and an updated discography and bibliography—will long remain provocative and definitive.

    America's most widely used introduction to jazz, it teaches the chronology of jazz by showing students how to listen and what to notice in each style. Though originally conceived for nonmusicians and written at a college freshmen reading level, Jazz Styles also has been widely adopted in courses for musicians because of its point-by-point specification of each style's musical characteristics and its technical appendix. The text helps students hear how the styles differ and why the top names are important. The book's listening guides offer in-depth analysis for 38 historic recordings contained on the 2CD Jazz Classics collection.

    Air Guitar pioneered a kind of plain-talking in cultural criticism, willingly subjective and always candid and direct. A valuable reading tool for art lovers, neophytes, students and teachers alike, Hickey's book--now in its eighth printing--has galvanized a generation of art lovers, with new takes on Norman Rockwell, Robert Mapplethorpe, Stan Brakhage, Andy Warhol and Perry Mason. In June 2009, Newsweek voted Air Guitar one of the top 50 books that "open a window on the times we live in, whether they deal directly with the issues of today or simply help us see ourselves in new and surprising ways," and described the book as "a seamless blend of criticism, personal history, and a deep appreciation for the sheer nuttiness of American life."Dave Hickey (born 1939) is one of today's most revered and widely read art writers. He has written for Rolling Stone, Art News, Art in America, Artforum and Vanity Fair among many others.

    He references his own contributions to the canon of popular music, and he provides fascinating insider portraits of the industry and its protagonists. But above all, he questions our ideas of music and our attitude to sound, introducing us throughout this provocative and superbly written book to his current work, The17.