It will make you happy. Legendary producer and co-founder of Chic, Nile Rodgers wrote 'We are Family' for Sister Sledge and 'I'm Coming Out' for Diana Ross, produced 'Let's Dance' for David Bowie and 'Like a Virgin' for Madonna. He has worked with just about every major star, from Michael Jackson and Bob Dylan to Prince and Duran Duran. But before he reinvented pop music, Nile Rodgers invented himself. Born into a mixed-race family of dopefiend bohemians, he learned "at a very early age" everything he needed to know about love, loss, fashion, art, music, and the subversive power of underground culture. The stars of the scene were his glamorous teenage mom and heroin-addicted Jewish stepfather, but there were also monkeys, voodoo orishas, jazz cats, and contract killers in the mix. By the age of 16, Nile was busking his way through the 60s, half-hippie and half-Black Panther. He jammed with Jimi Hendrix, took acid with Timothy Leary, toured with Big Bird on Sesame Street's road show, and played guitar behind history's greatest soul singers. And then, one night, he discovered disco. This was pop's most glamorous and decadent age. Nile Rodgers wrote the songs, produced the hits and lived behind the velvet rope holding court in the bathroom stalls at Studio 54, club-hopping with Madonna, scarfing down burgers with Diana Ross. Le Freak is the personal, moving story of a creative genius, told in his own unique voice "warm, intimate and relentlessly charming. It is also a stunning recreation of an age" told by the man who wrote its soundtrack.

    Following the time-tested Dummies format, Mandolin For Dummies provides a level of content and instruction greater than anything currently available.Mandolin For Dummies breaks down the fundamentals of this instrument and provides the resources you need to practice and improve your ability over time.Packed with individualized instruction on key mandolin-friendly musical styles, including Irish and Celtic, "old time" American music, blues, bluegrass, swing, and jazz Files available via download provide audio tracks from the book and exercises so you can play along and build your skills -- almost 2 hours of music! Clear and useful photos and diagrams ensure you fret, strum, and pick with precision Includes a mandolin buying guide to help ensure you make the right purchases Tips on restringing mandolins and other DIY care and maintenance topics If you're an aspiring mandolin player, don't fret! Mandolin For Dummies has you covered.

    Often these writings include mesostics and essays created by subjecting the work of other writers to chance procedures using the I Ching (what Cage called writing through).

    Being Britney is the compelling account of a talented, troubled and talked-about modern icon, whose life, work and individual significance will be recognised for many decades to come.'After years of being framed as a victim, Britney deserves to be celebrated as the fighter, inspiration and enigma she truly is.' - Jennifer Otter Bickerdike

    Takes you from the fundamentals of fingerpicking to five authentic blues tunes. Includes graded exercises, illustrated tips, plus standard notation and tablature.

    Drawing on a number of accessible examples, the author prompts us to call on our own musical experiences in order to think more critically about the roles of the performers and the listener, about music as a commodity and an experience, what it means to understand music, and the values we ascribe to it. This very short introduction, written with both humor and flair, begins with a sampling of music as human activity and then goes on to consider the slippery phenomenon of how music has become an object of thought. Covering not only Western and classical music, Cook touches on all types from rock to Indonesian music and beyond. Incorporating musical forms from every continent, Music will make enjoyable reading for beginner and expert alike. About the Series: Combining authority with wit, accessibility, and style, Very Short Introductions offer an introduction to some of life's most interesting topics. Written by experts for the newcomer, they demonstrate the finest contemporary thinking about the central problems and issues in hundreds of key topics, from philosophy to Freud, quantum theory to Islam.

    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.

    The brief volume of the first 37 chapters focuses on Western (or Classical) music, which includes the first 6 parts of LISTENING TO MUSIC, 5th Edition, and omits all end-of-chapter "Cultural Context" boxes.

    Title: Play Ukulele Today! Level 1 Binding: Paperback Author: Tagliarino, Barrett Publisher: Hal Leonard Corporation

    scene. Released in 1982, the Metal Massacre LP included the debut recordings of local groups such as Steeler, Malice, Ratt, and Metallica. In the wake of the album's unexpected success Slagel virtually stumbled into creating a proper record label, issuing the first releases by Bitch, Armored Saint, and Slayer the following year. For The Sake Of Heaviness is an inside look at how Brian built Metal Blade from a one-man operation in his mom's non-air-conditioned garage to the preeminent international home of heavy music that it is today. He shares his insights into signing and working with Amon Amarth, Anvil, As I Lay Dying, Behemoth, The Black Dahlia Murder, Cannibal Corpse, Cirith Ungol, Corrosion of Conformity, D.R.I., Fates Warning, Flotsam and Jetsam, Gwar, King Diamond, King's X, Lizzy Borden, Manowar, Mercyful Fate, Overkill, Raven, Sacred Reich, Six Feet Under, Trouble, Unearth, Voivod, Whitechapel, and others. Always hard at work on a diverse range of projects, Brian reveals the early advice he gave that helped guide Mötley Crüe's career; how he helped Metallica replace their bassist-twice; his detailed work on Thin Lizzy and Alice Cooper reissues; his behind-the-scenes role in the careers of Mother Love Bone, Alice in Chains, Faith No More, Goo Goo Dolls, and Lamb of God; and his unlikely ventures with kindred metal heads-from hockey star Ken Baumgartner, to celebrity chef Chris Santos, to The Howard Stern Show's Richard Christy, to comedians Jim Florentine, Don Jamieson and Jim Breuer. Throughout For The Sake Of Heaviness, Brian steps aside to present first-person insights and extended guest interviews featuring friends, colleagues, Metal Blade staffers, and a long list of artists, including Metallica's James Hetfield, Slayer's Kerry King, King Diamond, and many more. Brian highlights the ins and outs of his 35 year metal odyssey, from promoting small shows in California's San Fernando Valley in the early days, to forging a major partnership with Warner Bros. Records; from weathering the Parents Music Resource Center's attempts to regulate lyrical content, to squaring off with Time Warner over Gwar's envelope-pushing themes; from nearly going bankrupt after underestimating the impact of the rise of CDs, to surviving and thriving in today's rapidly changing music business environment. Featuring a Foreword by Metallica's Lars Ulrich, For The Sake Of Heaviness pulls back the curtain to reveal the definitive look at how Metal Blade began, what they've accomplished, and where they're going. With the help of co-writer Mark Eglinton, Brian Slagel invites the reader into a personal conversation about his life's passion, and the passion that drives Metal Blade-finding, exposing, and promoting the best heavy music on the planet.

    Said's essays and articles on music. Addressing the work of a variety of composers, musicians, and performers, Said carefully draws out music's social, political, and cultural contexts and, as a classically trained pianist, provides rich and often surprising assessments of classical music and opera."Music at the Limits" offers both a fresh perspective on canonical pieces and a celebration of neglected works by contemporary composers. Said faults the Metropolitan Opera in New York for being too conservative and laments the way in which opera superstars like Pavarotti have "reduced opera performance to a minimum of intelligence and a maximum of overproduced noise." He also reflects on the censorship of Wagner in Israel; the worrisome trend of proliferating music festivals; an opera based on the life of Malcolm X; the relationship between music and feminism; the pianist Glenn Gould; and the works of Mozart, Bach, Richard Strauss, and others.Said wrote his incisive critiques as both an insider and an authority. He saw music as a reflection of his ideas on literature and history and paid close attention to its composition and creative possibilities. Eloquent and surprising, "Music at the Limits" preserves an important dimension of Said's brilliant intellectual work and cements his reputation as one of the most influential and groundbreaking scholars of the twentieth century.

    Herein, John Cage recalls the turning point in his career; Ben Johnston criticizes the operas of his teacher Harry Partch; La Monte Young attributes his creative discipline to a Morman childhood; and much more. The results are revelatory conversations with some of America's most radical musical innovators.

    Beginning with the primordial sounds of nature, we have experienced an ever-increasing complexity of our sonic surroundings. As civilization develops, new noises rise up around us: from the creaking wheel, the clang of the blacksmith’s hammer, and the distant chugging of steam trains to the “sound imperialism” of airports, city streets, and factories. The author contends that we now suffer from an overabundance of acoustic information and a proportionate diminishing of our ability to hear the nuances and subtleties of sound. Our task, he maintains, is to listen, analyze, and make distinctions. As a society we have become more aware of the toxic wastes that can enter our bodies through the air we breathe and the water we drink. In fact, the pollution of our sonic environment is no less real. Schafer emphasizes the importance of discerning the sounds that enrich and feed us and using them to create healthier environments. To this end, he explains how to classify sounds, appreciating their beauty or ugliness, and provides exercises and “soundwalks” to help us become more discriminating and sensitive to the sounds around us. This book is a pioneering exploration of our acoustic environment, past and present, and an attempt to imagine what it might become in the future.

    With this book, the author adds to the debate revolving around the 'anthropic principle' by developing the 'world principle.' The author offers the reader an original critique of materialist philosophy, ancient Greek philosophy, and in particular of Kant and Hawking, making this book highly informative and thought-provoking. The reader not only finds answers to questions about the meaning of our existence, but also gains new insights into science, philosophy and theology.

    In Black Noise: Rap Music and Black Culture in Contemporary America, Tricia Rose, described by the New York Times as a "hip hop theorist," takes a comprehensive look at the lyrics, music, cultures, themes, and styles of this highly rhythmic, rhymed storytelling and grapples with the most salient issues and debates that surround it.Assistant Professor of Africana Studies and History at New York University, Tricia Rose sorts through rap's multiple voices by exploring its underlying urban cultural politics, particularly the influential New York City rap scene, and discusses rap as a unique musical form in which traditional African-based oral traditions fuse with cutting-edge music technologies. Next she takes up rap's racial politics, its sharp criticisms of the police and the government, and the responses of those institutions. Finally, she explores the complex sexual politics of rap, including questions of misogyny, sexual domination, and female rappers' critiques of men.But these debates do not overshadow rappers' own words and thoughts. Rose also closely examines the lyrics and videos for songs by artists such as Public Enemy, KRS-One, Salt N' Pepa, MC Lyte, and L. L. Cool J. and draws on candid interviews with Queen Latifah, music producer Eric "Vietnam" Sadler, dancer Crazy Legs, and others to paint the full range of rap's political and aesthetic spectrum. In the end, Rose observes, rap music remains a vibrant force with its own aesthetic, "a noisy and powerful element of contemporary American popular culture which continues to draw a great deal of attention to itself."