Showing results for "life" in Music

With the Rolling Stones, Keith Richards created the riffs, the lyrics and the songs that roused the world, and over four decades he lived the original rock-and-roll life: taking the chances he wanted, speaking his mind, and making it all work in a way that no one before him had ever done. Now, at last, the man himself tells us the story of life in the crossfire hurricane. And what a life....

In The Most Beautiful, a title inspired by the hit song Prince wrote about their legendary love story, Mayte Garcia for the first time shares the deeply personal story of their relationship and offers a singular perspective on the music icon and their world together: from their unconventional meeting backstage at a concert (and the long-distance romance that followed) to their fairy-tale wedding (and their groundbreaking artistic partnership) to the devastating losses that ultimately dissolved their relationship.

George Michael was an extravagantly gifted, openhearted soul singer whose work was both pained and smolderingly erotic. He was a songwriter of true craft and substance, and his music swept the world, starting in the mid-1980s. His fabricated image—that of a hypermacho sex god—loomed large in the pop culture of his day. It also hid—for a time—the secret he fought against revealing: Michael was gay. George Michael: A Life explores the compelling story of a superstar whose struggles, as well as his songs, continue to touch fans all over the world.

In The Life & Times of Beethoven, celebrated composer and music historian Professor Robert Greenberg of San Francisco Performances gives you a unique perspective on a musical genius the likes of which the world had never seen before - or since. Blending biography, history, and music appreciation, these 10 lectures portray Beethoven’s extraordinary (and still modern-sounding) music as a direct outgrowth of his life, environment, and interior emotional landscape.

The son of a British army sergeant-major and Italian mother, Brian grew up in Dunston, Tyne and Wear, as it emerged from the shadow of the Second World War. Then he saw Little Richard on the BBC and it changed the course of his life. The choirboy and cub scout was going to be singer.

Laurel Canyon was the neighborhood perched above the clubs and record companies of Sunset Strip where Joni Mitchell, Jim Morrison, Graham Nash, Cass Elliot, Carole King, Don Henley, and Peter Tork, just to name a few, lived and collaborated to make an indelible mark on our music and our culture.

Malcolm James McCormick began making music at a young age and by 15 was already releasing mixtapes. One of the first true viral superstars, his early records earned him a rabid legion of die-hard fans. But despite his undeniable success, Miller was plagued by struggles with substance abuse and depression, both of which fueled his raw and genre-defying music yet ultimately led to his demise. Traveling deep into Miller's inner circle, Most Dope tells the story of a passionate, gifted young man who achieved his life's ambition, only to be undone by his personal demons.

John Lennon 1980 traces the powerful, life-affirming story of the former Beatle’s remarkable comeback after five years of self-imposed retirement. Lennon’s final pivotal year would climax in several moments of creative triumph as he rediscovered his artistic self in dramatic fashion. With the bravura release of the Double Fantasy album with wife, Yoko Ono, he was poised and ready for an even brighter future only to be wrenched from the world by an assassin’s bullets.

In this updated edition of Graeme Thomson’s critically acclaimed biography, a near-exhaustive survey of Kate Bush’s life surveys everything from her upbringing in South London to her stunning return to live performance in August 2014. The original edition of Under the Ivy was called one of the best music biographies ever, and this updated edition adds a wealth of new research to include the complete scope of Bush’s oeuvre. With new interviews and in-depth analysis of her triumphant return to the stage, this is the most complete Kate Bush biography and a must for any fan.

In John Williams: A Composer's Life, the first biography of the composer, author Tim Greiving offers an engaging account of a man whose body of work is well-known but whose personal life has consistently remained very private.

The blues grew out of the plantations and prisons, the swampy marshes and fertile cotton fields of the Mississippi Delta. With original research and keen insights, Ted Gioia - the author of a landmark study of West Coast jazz and the critically acclaimed The History of Jazz - brings to life the stirring music of the Delta, evoking the legendary figures who shaped its sound and ethos: Robert Johnson, Charley Patton, Muddy Waters, John Lee Hooker, Howlin' Wolf, B. B. King, and others.

A music-obsessed retrospective, beginning with Thurston Moore's childhood epiphany of rock 'n' roll in the early 1960s into an infatuation with the subversive world of 1970s punk and no wave blasting forth from New York City - where he eventually runs off to join a band in 1978. By 1981 Moore would form the legendary and notorious experimental rock group Sonic Youth, who proceeded to record and tour relentlessly for almost 30 years, always progressing, always exploring. Along the way we meet a constellation of artists and musicians who colluded and collided with Sonic Youth.

In his song "You Can't Stop Rock and Roll" Ozzy Osbourne sings, "Rock and roll is my religion and my law". And that's why Raising Hell is a must-have for anyone who wants to hear about the iconoclastic culture of headbangers and the wild lives they lead. The book contains the crazy, funny, and sometimes horrifying anecdotes musicians have told about a lifestyle both invigorating and at times self-destructive.

In this intimate biography of the Prince of Soul, David Ritz provides a candid look at a star and a friend. Ritz had been collaborating with Marvin Gaye on his story for several years before the singer's tragic death and had conducted a series of extraordinary interviews in which Gaye discussed his deepest secrets. What emerges is a full-scale portrait of a charming but tortured artist, a brilliant singer with a divided soul.

No singer has been more mythologized and more misunderstood than jazz legend Billie Holiday, who helped to create much of the mystique herself with her autobiography, Lady Sings the Blues - and this authentic biography sets the record straight. Donald Clarke was given unrivaled access to a treasure trove of interviews from the 1970s with those who knew Lady Day in all stages of her short, tragic life - from her childhood in the streets and good-time houses of Baltimore, through the early days of success in New York and the years of fame, to her tragic decline.

This is the never-before-told story of the musical revolution that happened right under the nose of the Reagan '80s - when a small but sprawling network of bands, labels, fanzines, radio stations, and other subversives reenergized American rock with punk rock's do-it-yourself credo and created music that was deeply personal, often brilliant, always challenging, and immensely influential. This sweeping chronicle of music, politics, drugs, fear, loathing, and faith has been recognized as an indie rock classic in its own right.

This is the memoir music fans have been waiting for. Half of one of the greatest creative partnerships in popular music, Bernie Taupin is the man who wrote the lyrics for Elton John, who conceived the ideas that spawned countless hits, and sold millions and millions of records. Together, they were a duo, a unit, an immovable object. Their extraordinary, half-century-and-counting creative relationship has been chronicled in biopics and memoirs, but Taupin, a famously private person, has kept his own account of their adventures close to his chest, until now.

In a performance that combines the personal and poetic with the literary and the lyrical, Grammy, Oscar, Emmy, and Golden Globe-winning artist Common spins something entirely new and bold for both his old-school fans and those new to one of hip-hop’s most essential voices. This is Bluebird Memories, part of Audible's Words + Music that blends storytelling, music, and performance to create a one-of-a-kind listening experience.

An electrifying updated edition of the bestselling memoir from the frontwoman of the Divinyls and one of Australia's greatest rock singers. Brave, funny, ferocious, there's never been anyone like Chrissy Amphlett. A true legend of Australian rock'n'roll, we are so lucky that she shared her raw, gripping and searingly honest story. In these pages, Chrissy spared no one - least of all herself.

This classic book is the whole unruly story of dance music in one volume. It recreates the dance floors that made history, conjuring their atmosphere with loving detail and bringing you the voices of the DJs and clubbers at their heart—from grime, garage, house, hip hop and disco, to techno, soul, reggae, rock 'n' roll and EDM. Whether musical outlaw, obsessive crate-digger or overpaid superstar, the DJ has been at the spinning centre of nightlife for a century, making parties wilder, pushing clubbers harder and driving music into completely new shapes and styles.