Engaging Learners


Andy Griffith - 2012
    A class can be skilled and motivated to learn without a teacher always having to lead. Engaging learners in this way unpicks intrinsic motivation, the foundation that underpins a productive learning environment and helps to develop independent learning.Based on five years of intensive research through Osiris Education's award-winning Outstanding Teaching Intervention program this book is packed with proven advice and innovative tools that were developed in these successful outstanding lessons. Written in the same humorous, thought-provoking style with which they both teach and train, the authors aim to challenge all who teach, from newly qualified teachers to seasoned professionals, to reflect on their day-to-day practice and set an agenda for sustainable improvement.

Bobby Approved: Your Ultimate Shopping Guide At The Grocery Store


Bobby Parrish - 2019
    The shopping guide is designed to help you identity the best products on the store shelves and allow you to access this guide easily, as you shop. Ultimately, this guide will make you a better shopper and it will help get you in and out of the store with ease. Disclaimer: The opinions in this book are my own. I am not a licensed dietician or food scientist.

Creative Guitar 1: Cutting-Edge Techniques


Guthrie Govan - 2000
    This series of three books aim to provide frustrated rock guitarists with new directions to explore their art. Armed with the accompanying CD, featuring detailed examples of pentatonic patterns, minor arpeggios and backing tracks, you will be able to do much more than simply learn solos and licks note for note. This book also contains a thorough explanation of music theory.

Willin': The Story of Little Feat


Ben Fong-Torres - 2013
    Formed in 1969 by ex-members of Frank Zappa’s Mothers of Invention, Little Feat created groove-heavy music that was an irresistible mix of rock, blues, R&B, country, jazz, soul, and funk.Fronted by the charismatic but doomed vocalist and brilliant slide guitarist Lowell George, the band recorded such classic studio albums as Sailin’ Shoes and Dixie Chicken, as well as Waiting for Columbus, which many consider to be one of the best live albums of all time.Acclaimed journalist Ben Fong-Torres—working with Little Feat’s surviving members, their friends, and associates—wrote Willin’ based on hours of brand new interviews with the key players. The result? The first definitive biography of this beloved rock ’n’ roll institution.

Heroes: David Bowie and Berlin


Tobias Rüther - 2008
    The rocker settled in Berlin, where he would make his “Berlin Trilogy”—the albums Low, Heroes, and Lodger, which are now considered some of the most critically acclaimed and innovative of the late twentieth century. But Bowie’s time in Berlin was about more than producing new music. As Tobias Rüther describes in this fascinating tale of Bowie’s Berlin years, the musician traveled to West Berlin—the capital of his childhood dreams and the city of Expressionism—to repair his body and mind from the devastation of drug addiction, delusions, and mania.             Painting a vivid picture of Bowie’s life in the Schöneberg area of the city, Rüther describes the artist’s friendships and collaborations with his roommate, Iggy Pop, as well as Brian Eno and Tony Visconti. Rüther illustrates Bowie’s return to painting, days cycling to the Die Brücke museum, and his exploration of the city’s nightlife, both the wild side and the gay scene. In West Berlin, Bowie also met singer and actress Romy Haag; came to know Hansa Studios, where he would record Low and Heroes; and even landed the part of a Prussian aristocrat in Just a Gigolo, starring alongside Marlene Dietrich. Eventually Rüther uses Bowie and his explorations of the cultural and historical undercurrents of West Berlin to examine the city itself: divided, caught in the Cold War, and how it began to redefine itself as a cultural metropolis, turning to the arts to start a new history. Tying in with an exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, in September, 2014, Heroes tells the fascinating story of how the music of the future arose from the spirit of the past. It is an unforgettable look at one of the world’s most renowned musicians in one of its most inspiring cities.

Fundamentals of Piano Practice


Chuan C. Chang - 2007
    Mental play impacts every aspect of piano playing: memorizing, controlling nervousness, developing performance skills, playing musically, acquiring absolute pitch, composing, improvisation, etc. Genius is more created than born; most of what had been attributed to talent are simple knowledge-based solutions that we can all learn. Improved memory can raise the effective IQ; memory is an associative process based on algorithms -- music is such an algorithm, enabling us to memorize hours of repertoire. Learning piano makes you smarter and teaches project management. Includes chapter on tuning your own piano; the chromatic scale, temperaments, circle of fifths, etc., are explained.

Behind Bars: The Definitive Guide to Music Notation


Elaine Gould - 2011
    In the most thorough and painstakingly researched book to be published since the 1980s, specialist music editor Elaine Gould provides a comprehensive grounding in notational principles.Behind Bars covers everything from basic rules, conventions and themes to complex instrumental techniques, empowering the reader to prepare music with total clarity and precision. With the advent of computer technology, it has never been more important for musicians to have ready access to principles of best practice in this dynamic field, and this book will support the endeavors of software users and devotees of hand-copying alike. The author's understanding of, and passion for, her subject has resulted in a book that is not only practical but also compellingly readable.This seminal and all-encompassing guide encourages new standards of excellence and accuracy and, at a weighty 704 pages, it is supported by 1,500 music examples of published scores from Bach to Xenakis.

Nurtured by Love: The Classic Approach to Talent Education


Shinichi Suzuki - 1966
    In it, the author presents the philosophy and principles of Suzuki's teaching methods. Through the examples from his own life and teaching, Suzuki establishes his case for early childhood education and the high potential of every human being---not just those seemingly gifted.

I'd Rather Be The Devil


Stephen Calt - 1994
    In documenting the singer's decline during the period of his greatest exposure, Stephen Calt challenges the values of blues enthusiasts and calls into question widely accepted beliefs about the blues genre, its history and its exponents.

Baroque Music Today: Music as Speech; Ways to a New Understanding of Music


Nikolaus Harnoncourt - 1982
    Our 'understanding' of old music allows us only a glimpse of the spirit in which it is rooted. We see that music always reflects the spiritual and intellectual climate of its time. Its content can never surpass the human power of expression, and any gain on one side must be compensated by a corresponding loss on the other." In these essays, Nikolaus Harnoncourt summarizes his views arising from years devoted to the performance of early music. The problem of interpreting historical music is particularly critical in our age, when modern music has little appeal for the listening public. The vacuum left by the absence of a truly living contemporary music is therefore filled by older music. But for performers and audiences to understand music of earlier times, they must learn to comprehend the languages and messages of the past.

Adult Piano Adventures All-In-One Lesson Book 1: A Comprehensive Piano Course


Nancy Faber - 2001
    Adult Piano Adventures enables the adult beginner to play music for pleasure while developing musical understanding. This comprehensive "All-In-One" book includes lessons, technique, and theory in a single volume for ease of use. Book 1 presents the fundamentals of music notation, chord playing, and musical form. The redesigned layout improves information hierarchy, putting focus on key concepts and step-by-step learning. Online support is now included, with over two hours of instructional videos and audio accompaniment tracks that inspire rhythmic vitality and artistic expression. Songs include: Amazing Grace * The Can-Can * Catch a Falling Star * Danny Boy * Eine Kleine Nachtmusik * The Entertainer * Greensleeves * The Lion Sleeps Tonight * and more!

Guitar Aerobics: A 52-Week, One-lick-per-day Workout Program for Developing, Improving and Maintaining Guitar Technique


Troy Nelson - 2007
    The guitar exercises cover several musical styles including rock, blues, jazz, metal, country, and funk. Techniques taught include alternate picking, arpeggios, sweep picking, string skipping, legato, string bending, and rhythm guitar. These exercises will increase your speed and improve your dexterity and pick- and fret-hand accuracy the more you practice them. The accompanying CD includes all 365 workout licks plus play-along grooves in every style at eight different metronome settings.

Rock Bottom: A Music Writer's Journey into Madness


Michael Odell - 2017
    He has a public meltdown while chaperoning Oasis at an awards ceremony; he’s lost joy in his bathroom full of rock’n’roll memorabilia; and his young son is in trouble at school for emulating rock star behaviour.Reluctantly Michael consults Mrs Henckel, a no-nonsense therapist with zero experience of pop culture. As Michael addresses his feelings about the past, in particular his failed teenage band, Mental Elf, he’s forced to confront the question: is it finally time to grow up and forget rock’n’roll?Michael Odell is a former contributing editor to Q magazine and has written about music for NME, the Guardian, the Independent and Spin, among others. Currently he does interviews and writes on family matters for The Times. He lives in Bristol."Please don't put your life in the hands of a rock 'n' roll band, who'll throw it all away." So advised Noel Gallagher in 1995 and Michael Odell ignored him anyway.One of Britain's most fearless rock interrogators, Odell turns his merciless searchlight on himself in this wry, compelling odyssey into the heart of his own - and rock n roll's - madness. Larks with the legends are all here (Bowie, McCartney, Mick `n' Keef ... Michael Buble) but it's his inner life which illuminates, his psyche traumatically crumbling as he confronts his chaotic past. Hilarious, tragic and timely, this is high farce in high (and low) places, uncovering why rock's lost highway is littered with the bodies of the righteous dreamers. Could it be because "the music people are all mad?" (Clue: yes.)' -- Sylvia Patterson, author of I'm Not with the Band `Hilarious and disarmingly honest; a journey into the neurosis of rock fame, but through doors you don't expect.' -- Rachel Joyce, author of The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry `Rock Bottom is one of the best music books ever written, because Michael Odell knows music isn't about the musicians - it's about what it does to the listener, even if what it does ends up being wholly disastrous. It's sad, funny, fascinating and wise. And everyone who ever claimed a record changed their life should read it, and then think again.' -- Michael Hann, former Guardian music editor

The Vinyl Dialogues: Stories behind memorable albums of the 1970s as told by the artists


Mike Morsch - 2014
    The Vinyl Dialogues offers the stories behind 31 of the top albums of the 70s, including backstories behind the albums, the songs, and the artists. It was the 1970s: Big hair, bell-bottomed pants, Elvis sideburns and puka shell necklaces. The drugs, the freedom, the Me Generation, the lime green leisure suits. And then there was the music and how it defined a generation. The birth of Philly soul, the Jersey Shore Sound and disco. It's all there in "The Vinyl Dialogues," as told by the artists who lived and made Rock and Roll history throughout the decade.Throw in a little political intrigue - The Guess Who being asked not to play its biggest hit, "American Woman," at a White House appearance and Brewer and Shipley being called political subversives and making President Nixon's infamous "enemies list" - and "The Vinyl Dialogues offers a first-hand snapshot of a country in transition, hung over from the massive cultural changes of the 1960s and ready to dress outrageously and to shake its collective booty. All seen through the eyes, recollections and perspectives of the artists who lived it and made all that great music on all those great albums.

Def Jam, Inc.: Russell Simmons, Rick Rubin, and the Extraordinary Story of the World's Most Influential Hip-Hop Label


Stacy Gueraseva - 2005
    Few could or would have predicted that the improvised raps and raw beats busting out of New York City's urban underclass would one day become a multimillion-dollar business and one of music's most lucrative genres. Among those few were two visionaries: Russell Simmons, a young black man from Hollis, Queens, and Rick Rubin, a Jewish kid from Long Island. Though the two came from different backgrounds, their all-consuming passion for hip-hop brought them together. Soon they would revolutionize the music industry with their groundbreaking label, Def Jam Records. Def Jam, Inc. traces the company's incredible rise from the NYU dorm room of nineteen-year-old Rubin (where LL Cool J was discovered on a demo tape) to the powerhouse it is today; from financial struggles and scandals-including The Beastie Boys's departure from the label and Rubin's and Simmons's eventual parting-to revealing anecdotes about artists like Slick Rick, Public Enemy, Foxy Brown, Jay-Z, and DMX. Stacy Gueraseva, former editor in chief of Russell Simmons's magazine, Oneworld, had access to the biggest players on the scene, and brings you real conversations and a behind-the-scenes look from a decade-and a company-that turned the music world upside down. She takes you back to New York in the '80s, when late-night spots such as Danceteria and Nell's were burning with young, fresh rappers, and Simmons and Rubin had nothing but a hunch that they were on to something huge. Far more than just a biography of the two men who made it happen, Def Jam, Inc. is a journey into the world of rap itself. Both an intriguing business history as well as a gritty narrative, here is the definitive book on Def Jam-a must read for any fan of hip-hop as well as all popular-culture junkies.