Showing results by publisher "Audible Studios" in Entertainment & Celebrities

In John Prine, Eddie Huffman traces the long arc of Prine’s musical career, beginning with his early, seemingly effortless successes, which led paradoxically not to stardom but to a rich and varied career writing songs that other people have made famous. He recounts the stories, many of them humorous, behind Prine’s best-known songs and discusses all of Prine’s albums as he explores the brilliant records and the ill-advised side trips, the underappreciated gems and the hard-earned comebacks that led Prine to found his own successful record label, Oh Boy Records.

For the first time, Jackie "The Joke Man" Martling opens up about his life as a cast member and head writer for the comedy powerhouse The Howard Stern Show. In The Joke Man: Bow to Stern, Jackie tells of his beginnings as a working comedian and writer and his climb to the top on The Howard Stern Show. Jackie saw it all, and in The Joke Man: Bow to Stern he shares personal stories as well a look from behind the scenes at one of the highest-rated radio shows of all time.

In this book novelist Colm Tóibín offers a deeply personal introduction to the work and life of one of his most important literary influences - the American poet Elizabeth Bishop. Ranging across her poetry, prose, letters, and biography, Tóibín creates a vivid picture of Bishop while also revealing how her work has helped shape his sensibility as a novelist and how her experiences of loss and exile resonate with his own.

Beatrix Potter is one of the world's best-selling, most cherished authors, whose books have enchanted generations of children for over a hundred years. Yet how she achieved this legendary status is just one of several stories of Beatrix Potter's remarkable and unexpected life. Inspired by the 23 'tales', Matthew Dennison takes a selection of quotations from Potter's stories and uses them to explore her multifaceted life and character: repressed Victorian daughter, thwarted lover, artistic genius, formidable countrywoman.

In a book that inspired the Amazon original series starring Gael Garcia Bernal and Malcolm McDowell, oboist Blair Tindall recounts her decades-long professional career as a classical musician, from the recitals and Broadway orchestra performances to the secret life of musicians who survive hand to mouth in the backbiting New York classical music scene, trading sexual favors for plum jobs and assignments in orchestras across the city.

No college basketball coach has ever dominated the sport like John Wooden. His UCLA teams reached unprecedented heights in the 1960s and '70s, capped by a run of ten NCAA championships in twelve seasons and an eighty-eight-game winning streak, records that stand to this day. Wooden also became a renowned motivational speaker and writer, revered for his "Pyramid of Success." The portrait that emerges from Davis's remarkable biography is of a man in full, whose life story still resonates today.

Reflecting on the Beach Boys’ long, fascinating history, this book tells the story behind 50 of the band’s greatest songs from the perspective of group members, collaborators, fellow musicians, and notable fans. The band's music is as influential now as it was 50 years ago, and this retelling of how the iconic rock group found itself in the annals of pop culture couldn't come at a better time.

The star of television's The Golden Girls recounts the tale of Dinah, a seeing eye dog who, no longer able to work for her blind master after going blind herself, was adopted by White.

When Singer sewing machine tycoon Edward Clark built a luxury apartment building on Manhattan’s Upper West Side in the late 1800s, it was derisively dubbed “the Dakota” for being as far from the center of the downtown action as its namesake territory on the nation’s western frontier. Despite its remote location, the quirky German Renaissance-style castle, with its intricate façade, peculiar interior design, and gargoyle guardians peering down on Central Park, was an immediate hit, particularly among the city’s well-heeled intellectuals and artists.

In this funny, irreverent, unique, eccentric memoir, magician Steve Spill reveals how he managed to survive decades inside a rarely profitable, sometimes maddening, but often deliciously rewarding offbeat showbiz profession - magic!

Holly Knight’s singular music career included crafting a good part of the soundtrack to the MTV '80s with mega-hits for Tina Turner (“The Best”), Pat Benatar (“Love Is a Battlefield”), and Patty Smyth (“The Warrior”)—songs that celebrated female empowerment and shaped pop and rock for years to come.

"Friend, asshole, angel, mutant," singer-songwriter Vic Chesnutt "came along and made us gross and broken people seem...I dunno, cooler, I guess." A quadriplegic who could play only simple chords on his guitar, Chesnutt recorded 17 critically acclaimed albums before his death in 2009, including About to Choke, North Star Deserter, and At the Cut. In 2006, NPR placed him in the top five of the 10 best living songwriters, along with Bob Dylan, Tom Waits, Paul McCartney, and Bruce Springsteen.

Sophisticated Giant presents the life and legacy of tenor saxophonist Dexter Gordon (1923-1990), one of the major innovators of modern jazz. In a context of biography, history, and memoir, Maxine Gordon has completed the book that her late husband began, weaving his “solo” turns with her voice and a chorus of voices from past and present. Reading like a jazz composition, the blend of research, anecdote, and a selection of Dexter’s personal letters reflects his colorful life and legendary times.

Es esta, y no otra, proclámese con toda la pompa, la autobiografía autorizada por sus autores -y desautorizada por sus protagonistas y delatores-: la oficial, la jibarizada, la más asequible y, sin duda, “completamente diferente” a cualquier edición anterior de la misma.

In his debut collection of candid, shocking, and just plain hilarious essays, comedic artist and musician Greg Scarnici recounts the period in his life when he was just starting to understand his sexuality and the city of New York that he calls home.

The Partnership is the first book to tell the full story of Brecht and Weill's impulsive, combustible partnership, the compelling psychological drama of one of the most important creative collaborations of the past century. It is also the first book to give full credit where it is richly due to the three women whose creative gifts contributed enormously to their masterworks.

Groundbreaking transgender actress Alexandra Billings is “Davina”, Maura Pfefferman’s mentor, inspiration, and best friend. Alexandra discusses her own experiences while transitioning in the late 1970s, what it was like to be the first trans woman to play a transgender character on TV, and how an episode of The Phil Donahue Show may well have saved her life.

Music supervisor Bruce Gilbert (Orange is the New Black, Children's Hospital) reveals the back story of how music became a critical element for the evolution of Transparent. He goes into detail on how he chooses the right song for the right scene, the importance of creating playlists and mixtapes for the cast and crew, and his early childhood attempts at music supervision that paved the way for his future.

Amy Landecker is "Sarah", the oldest Pfefferman child, who rethinks her family life and her sexuality when she reconnects with her old girlfriend Tammy.

A heartwarming true-life fable from the Radio City Christmas Spectacular Santa - including his personal journey of discovering the magic of Christmas. Every year, over a million people attend the Radio City Christmas Spectacular, where they have the pleasure of seeing Charles Edward Hall don a traditional red suit and become the world's most famous Santa Claus - a role he has played for twenty-seven straight years. But Hall wasn’t always such a jolly old soul. Believe it or not, this Santa was once a Scrooge.