From "Over the Rainbow" to "Moon River" and from Al Jolson to Barbra Streisand, The Songs of Hollywood traces the fascinating history of song in film, both in musicals and in dramatic movies such as High Noon. Extremely well-illustrated with 200 film stills, this delightful book sheds much light on some of Hollywood's best known and loved repertoire, explaining how the film industry made certain songs memorable, and highlighting important moments of film history along the way. The book focuses on how the songs were presented in the movies, from early talkies where actors portrayed singers "performing" the songs, to the Golden Age in which characters burst into expressive, integral song-not as a "performance" but as a spontaneous outpouring of feeling. The book looks at song presentation in 1930s classics with Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers and in 1940s gems with Judy Garland and Gene Kelly. The authors also look at the decline of the genre since 1960, when most original musicals were replaced by film versions of Broadway hits such as My Fair Lady.

Famed lyricist Dorothy Fields penned the words to more than four hundred songs, among them mega-hits such as "On the Sunny Side of the Street," "I Can't Give You Anything But Love, " and "The Way You Look Tonight." In Pick Yourself Up, Charlotte Greenspan offers the most complete treatment of Fields's life and work to date, tracing her rise to prominence in a male-dominated world. Born in 1904 into a show business family - her father, Lou Fields, was a famed stage comedian turned Broadway producer - Fields first teamed with songwriter Jimmy McHugh in the late 1920s and went on to a series of Hollywood collaborations with Jerome Kern, including the Fred Astaire-Ginger Rogers classic Swing Time. With her brother Herbert, she co-authored the books for several of Cole Porter's shows and for Irving Berlin's classic Annie Get Your Gun. Fields's lyrics - colloquial, urbane, sometimes slangy, sometimes sensuous - won her high praise from later generations of songwriters including Stephen Sondheim, and her stellar career opened a path for other women in her profession, among them Betty Comden and Dory Previn.

Perry Como put aside his career as a barber to become one of the top American crooners of the 20th century and also one of the first multimedia stars. His record sales exceeded 100 million. In 1948, Como was the first popular singer to cross over to television and The Perry Como Show became the benchmark for a broadcast music and variety show. Como's career illuminates developments in the music and television business in the middle of the last century. This biography features 73 photographs, a complete discography, a listing of all television appearances, and a year by year chronology of Perry Como's life from 1912 to 2001.

What would Taylor do? Songwriting genius, poised performer, warm-hearted friend-we'd all love to be a bit more like Taylor Swift. This brilliant guide will show you how. Whether it is standing up for yourself and your friends, opening your heart to love, or refusing to let others write your reputation, these life lessons will help you shake off your troubles and become folklore for Swifties everywhere. Containing advice on love, friendship, overcoming fears, being yourself, and finding creative inspiration, Be More Taylor Swift is the perfect gift for Taylor Swift fans.

London. Wham! Pop, glitz and glamour. And two girls with stars in their eyes. Our friendship began one windy day in 1982, outside Finsbury Park tube. It was an instant like at first sight. We were on our way to a Wham! rehearsal. Pepsi was the new girl in the band and over a car stereo, a cassette tape and that journey to Bushey we bonded. We had no idea that we were on the first of many journeys together and that soon we'd be travelling all over Europe, Australia, America, China and Japan. Or that no matter where we went, together, we'd find a way to make every exotic destination feel like home. We'd both been teenagers during the seventies - a dreary and difficult decade, especially if you were young in London and you didn't have much money. So, in 1982, anything was possible for us - a pair of twentysomethings who hadn't been to university, who didn't have any money, who dreamt of singing and dancing, but ultimately lived for fun. Everything felt new and life was a question mark. We had no idea what was lying ahead, but we wanted to say yes. What we didn't know was that we were saying yes to a lifetime of connection that has endured whatever we've done, wherever we've been. From the side of the stage to its centre - we have many stories to tell. And it's all here, it's all in black and white.

Stephen Sondheim's Company appeared in 1970, and the American musical theatre has never been the same. The adventures of a bachelor and his married friends, Company exploded the musical's traditional business model of romantic tales with a beginning, middle, and end (in that order) and neatly packaged songs. In Sondheim's shows, the music flows in and out of the stories, often completely taking over, and romance may be overshadowed by doubt. Moreover, Follies (1971) skips the beginning, Sunday in the Park With George (1984) lacks a middle, and Merrily We Roll Along (1981) has an end, a middle, and a beginning in that order. As Ethan Mordden explains it, Stephen Sondheim is a classical composer who happens to write musicals, which explains why the center of gravity in his scores is so elevated. But more: Sondheim has intellectualized the musical by tackling serious content usually reserved for the spoken stage: nonconformism (in Anyone Can Whistle, 1964), history (in Pacific Overtures, 1976), a serial killing spree and cannibalism (Sweeney Todd, 1979). Yet these are above all theatrical shows, produced with flair and brilliance, whether in the lush operetta of A Little Night Music (1973) or the quixotic fairy-tale magic of Into the Woods (1987). Mordden has pitched his tone to address the newcomer and the aficionado alike, with fresh insights and analysis of every single Sondheim show, from his first hits (West Side Story, 1957; Gypsy, 1959) to his most recent titles (Passion, 1994; Road Show, 2008). Each musical gets its own chapter, with articles as well on Sondheim's life and his major influences. Comprehensive bibliographical and discographical essays place the Sondheim literature and recordings in perspective. Writing with his usual blend of the scholarly and the popular-with a wicked sense of humor-Ethan Mordden reveals why Stephen Sondheim has become Broadway's most significant voice in the last fifty years.

"Wonderful"-The New York Times. "Provocative, opinionated, and never dull"-Down Beat. "A singular book."-Studs Terkel. When it was first published, Alec Wilder's American Popular Song quickly became a classic and today it remains essential reading for countless musicians, lovers of American Song, and fans of Alec Wilder. Now, in a 50th anniversary edition, popular music scholar Robert Rawlins brings the book fully up-to-date for the 21st century. Whereas previous editions featured only piano scores, the format has been changed to lead sheet notation with lyrics, making it accessible to a wider readership. Rawlins has also added more than sixty music examples to help complete the chapter on Irving Berlin. One of the most fascinating features of the original edition was Wilder's inventive use of language, often revealing his strong and sometimes irreverent opinions. Wilder's prose remains relatively unaltered, but footnotes have been provided that clarify, elucidate, and even correct. Moreover, a new chapter has been added, discussing fifty-three songs by numerous composers that Wilder might have well included but was not able to. Songs by Ann Ronnell, Fats Waller, Jule Styne and many others are capped off with an examination of ten of Wilder's own songs.

As a young girl toiling in a South Wales tin works, Dorothy Squires dreamt of being a singing star, but was ridiculed by all around her. At the tender age of sixteen she escaped the valleys and boarded a train for London. It was here that she met and fell in love with songwriter and band leader Billy Reid, the older man who was to make her a star. The pair became an international success, but the relationship foundered, and Dorothy found herself falling in love with the much younger Roger Moore, a struggling actor who she would spend all her time establishing as a star. Written by Dorothy's good friend Jonny Tudor, this fascinating first biography of a Welsh singing phenomenon is an unprecedented insight into the glitz and glamour of 1940s and '50s Hollywood and Dorothy's triumphant comeback in the 1960s and '70s.

In the '60s and '70s, America's music scene was marked by raucous excess, reflected in the tragic overdoses of young superstars such as Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin. At the same time, the uplifting harmonies and sunny lyrics that propelled Karen Carpenter and her brother, Richard, to international fame belied a different sort of tragedy-the underconsumption that led to Karen's death at age thirty-two from the effects of an eating disorder. In Why Karen Carpenter Matters, Karen Tongson (whose Filipino musician parents named her after the pop icon) interweaves the story of the singer's rise to fame with her own trans-Pacific journey between the Philippines-where imitations of American pop styles flourished-and Karen Carpenter's home ground of Southern California. Tongson reveals why the Carpenters' chart-topping, seemingly whitewashed musical fantasies of "normal love" can now have profound significance for her-as well as for other people of color, LGBT+ communities, and anyone outside the mainstream culture usually associated with Karen Carpenter's legacy. This hybrid of memoir and biography excavates the destructive perfectionism at the root of the Carpenters' sound, while finding the beauty in the singer's all too brief life.

The remarkable autobiography of the last great wartime icon. Born Vera Welch on 20 March, 1917 in the East End of London, Dame Vera Lynn's career was set from an early age - along with her father, who also did a 'turn', she sang in Working Men's Clubs from just seven years old. She had a successful radio career with Joe Loss and Charlie Kunz in the 1920s and '30s, but it was with World War II that she became the iconic figure that captured the imagination of the national public. Her spirit and verve, along with her ability to connect with the men fighting for their country and those left behind praying for their loved ones, made her the 'Forces' sweetheart'. Performing the songs that she will always be associated with, such as 'We'll Meet Again' and 'Yours', Vera toured Egypt, India and Burma to entertain the troops and bring them a sense of 'back home'. Her career after the war flourished, with hits in the US and the UK, but Vera was never able to leave behind her wartime role and was deeply affected by what she had seen. Still heavily involved with veteran and other charities, this is Dame Vera's vivid story of her life and her war - from bombs and rations to dance halls and the searing heat of her appearances abroad. Epitomising British fortitude and hope, Dame Vera gives a vivid portrait of Britain at war, and a unique story of one woman who came to symbolize a nation.

Evoking the pleasures of music as well as food, the word sabor signifies a rich essence that makes our mouths water or makes our bodies want to move. American Sabor traces the substantial musical contributions of Latinas and Latinos in American popular music between World War II and the present in five vibrant centers of Latin@ musical production: New York, Los Angeles, San Antonio, San Francisco, and Miami. From Tito Puente's mambo dance rhythms to the Spanglish rap of Mellow Man Ace, American Sabor focuses on musical styles that have developed largely in the United States-including jazz, rhythm and blues, rock, punk, hip hop, country, Tejano, and salsa-but also shows the many ways in which Latin@ musicians and styles connect US culture to the culture of the broader Americas. With side-by-side Spanish and English text, authors Marisol Berrios-Miranda, Shannon Dudley, and Michelle Habell-Pallan challenge the white and black racial framework that structures most narratives of popular music in the United States. They present the regional histories of Latin@ communities-including Chicanos, Tejanos, and Puerto Ricans-in distinctive detail, and highlight the shared experiences of immigration/migration, racial boundary crossing, contesting gender roles, youth innovation, and articulating an American experience through music. In celebrating the musical contributions of Latinos and Latinas, American Sabor illuminates a cultural legacy that enriches us all.

Throughout his life, German-Jewish composer Kurt Weill was fascinated by the idea of America. His European works depict America as a Capitalist dystopia. But in 1935, it became clear that Europe was no longer safe for Weill, and he set sail for New World, and his engagement with American culture shifted. From that point forward, most of his works concerned the idea of "America," whether celebrating her successes, or critiquing her shortcomings. As an outsider-turned-insider, Weill's insights into American culture were unique. He was keenly attuned to the difficult relationship America had with her immigrants, but was slower to grasp the subtleties of others, particularly those surrounding race relations, even though his works reveal that he was devoted to the idea of racial equality. The book treats Weill as a node in a transnational network of musicians, writers, artists, and other stage professionals, all of whom influenced each other. Weill sought out partners from a range of different sectors, including the Popular Front, spoken drama, and the commercial Broadway stage. His personal papers reveal his attempts to navigate not only the shifting tides of American culture, but the specific demands of his institutional and individual collaborators. In reframing Weill's relationship with immigration and nationality, the book also puts nuance contemporary ideas about the relationships of immigrants to their new homes, moving beyond ideas that such figures must either assimilate and abandon their previous identities, or resist the pull of their new home and stay true to their original culture.

The definitive autobiography of Willie Nelson

"Unvarnished. Funny. Leaving no stone unturned."

. . . So say the publishers about this book I've written.

What I say is that this is the story of my life, told as clear as a Texas sky and in the same rhythm that I lived it.

It's a story of restlessness and the purity of the moment and living right. Of my childhood in Abbott, Texas, to the Pacific Northwest, from Nashville to Hawaii and all the way back again. Of selling vacuum cleaners and encyclopedias while hosting radio shows and writing song after song, hoping to strike gold.

It's a story of true love, wild times, best friends, and barrooms, with a musical sound track ripping right through it.

My life gets lived on the road, at home, and on the road again, tried and true, and I've written it all down from my heart to yours.

The word motreb finds its roots in the Arabic verb taraba, meaning 'to make happy.' Originally denoting all musicians in Iran, motrebi came to be associated, pejoratively, with the cheerful vulgarity of the lowbrow entertainer. In Iranian Music and Popular Entertainment, GJ Breyley and Sasan Fatemi examine the historically overlooked motrebi milieu, with its marginalized characters, from luti to gardan koloft and mashti, as well as the tenacity of motreb who continued their careers against all odds. They then turn to losanjelesi, the most pervasive form of Iranian popular music that developed as motrebi declined, and related musical forms in Iran and its diasporic popular cultural centre, Los Angeles. For the first time in English, the book makes available musical transcriptions, analysis and lyrics that illustrate the complexities of this history. As it presents the findings of the authors' years of ethnographic work with the history's protagonists, from senior motreb to pop-rock stars, the book reveals parallels between the decline of motrebi and the rise of 'modernity.' In the twentieth century, the fate of Tehran's motrebi music was shaped by the social and urban polarization that ensued from the modern market economy, and losanjelesi would be similarly affected by transnational relations, revolution, war and migration. Through its detailed and informed examination of Iranian popular music, this study reveals much about the values and anxieties of Iranian society, and is a valuable resource for students and scholars of Iranian society and history.

Since She Bop was first published in 1995, digital downloading has transformed the music landscape. But has issue of gender inequality changed too? For She Bop, Lucy O Brien conducted over 250 interviews with female artists and women working behind the scenes in A and R, marketing, music publishing, and production to write a groundbreaking exploration of sexism in the music industry. Fusing many untold stories, O Brien presents a feminist history of women in popular music, from 1920s blues to the present day. Talking to iconic artists from Eartha Kitt and Nina Simone to Debbie Harry, Poly Styrene, and Beyonce, she charts how women have negotiated old boy power networks to be seen and to get their music heard. This revised edition updates that story through many fresh interviews and new perspectives. In a new introduction and additional closing chapter, O Brien asks why, in 2020, women own just 13 percent of music publishing and are still a minority among festival headliners. She celebrates the rise of unique women such as Lizzo and Billie Eilish who are bursting through and creating new possibilities for female artists, while also looking at the struggles of artists like Kesha and Aaliyah, and wondering whether the pop industry has had its #MeToo moment. When she first wrote She Bop, O Brien questioned the way the music press lumped female artists together under the term Women in Rock , saying that the ultimate goal was to make that phrase redundant. Now, despite the gender inequalities that still exist, greater awareness means few magazine editors would dare to feature women in such a derogatory way. Published to celebrate the original book s 25th anniversary and in the year that also marks the 50th anniversary of Women s Liberation this new She Bop will appeal to a huge cross-section of readers, from music fans to the LGBT audience and women of all generations.

The guitarist and composer Pat Metheny ranks among the most popular and innovative jazz musicians of all time. In Pat Metheny: The ECM Years, 1975-1984, Mervyn Cooke offers the first in-depth account of Metheny's early creative period, during which he recorded eleven stunningly varied albums for the pioneering European record label ECM (Edition of Contemporary Music). This impressive body of recordings encompasses both straight-ahead jazz playing with virtuosic small ensembles and the increasingly complex textures and structures of the Pat Metheny Group, a hugely successful band also notable for its creative exploration of advanced music technologies which were state-of-the-art at the time. Metheny's music in all its shapes and forms broke major new ground in its refusal to subscribe to either of the stylistic poles of bebop and jazz-rock fusion which prevailed in the late 1970s. Through a series of detailed analyses based on a substantial body of new transcriptions from the recordings, this study reveals the close interrelationship of improvisation and pre-composition which lies at the very heart of the music. Furthermore, these analyses vividly demonstrate how Metheny's music is often conditioned by a strongly linear narrative model: both its story-telling characteristics and atmospheric suggestiveness have sometimes been compared to those of film music, a genre in which the guitarist also became active during this early period. The melodic memorability for which Metheny's compositions and improvisations have long been world-renowned is shown to be just one important element in an unusually rich and flexible musical language that embraces influences as diverse as bebop, free jazz, rock, pop, country & western, Brazilian music, classical music, minimalism, and the avant-garde. These elements are melded into a uniquely distinctive soundworld which, above all, directly reflects Metheny's passionate belief in the need to refashion jazz in ways which can allow it to speak powerfully to each new generation of youthful listeners.

The first systematic study to address the character and scope of American popular music in India during British rule. American Popular Music in Britain's Raj is the first systematic study of the character and scope of American popular music in India during British rule. Drawing on ethnographic and archival research, it examines blackface minstrel shows, ragtime, jazz, and representations of Hollywood film music in Bombay cabarets and Hindi film songs, identifying key musical moments in the development of these styles between the mid-nineteenth and mid-twentieth centuries. The book describes the entertainment idioms and frameworks that supported the growth of these imported styles; further, it surveys a variety of historical contexts under colonialism that influenced their meaning and commercial value. Focusing on Calcutta (modern Kolkata), Lucknow, and Bombay (modern Mumbai), Bradley Shope traces the movement of this music between the United States, England, and India, and addresses a variety of groups and communities, including the US military in Calcutta during World War II, Anglo-Indians in Lucknow in the 1930s and 1940s, and British residents across North India in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Bradley G. Shope is assistant professor of music at Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi.

Gear Acquisition Syndrome, also known as GAS, is commonly understood as the musicians unrelenting urge to buy and own instruments and equipment as an anticipated catalyst of creative energy and bringer of happiness. For many musicians, it involves the unavoidable compulsion to spend money one does not have on gear perhaps not even needed. The urge is directed by the belief that acquiring another instrument will make one a better player. This book pioneers research into the complex phenomenon named GAS from a variety of disciplines, including popular music studies and music technology, cultural and leisure studies, consumption research, sociology, psychology and psychiatry. The newly created theoretical framework and empirical studies of online communities and offline music stores allow the study to consider musical, social and personal motives, which influence the way musicians think about and deal with equipment. As is shown, GAS encompasses a variety of practices and psychological processes. In an often life-long endeavour, upgrading the rig is accompanied by musical learning processes in popular music.

The Beatles are widely regarded as the foremost and most influential music band in history and their career has been the subject of many biographies. Yet the band's historical significance has not received sustained academic treatment to date. In The Beatles' Reception in the 1960s, Kenneth L. Campbell uses the Beatles as a lens through which to explore the sweeping, panoramic history of the social, cultural and political transformations that occurred in the 1960s. It draws on audience reception theory and untapped primary source material, including student newspapers, to understand how listeners would have interpreted the Beatles' songs and albums not only in Britain and the United States, but also globally. Taking a year-by-year approach, each chapter analyses the external influences the Beatles absorbed, consciously or unconsciously, from the culture surrounding them. Some key topics include race relations, gender dynamics, political and cultural upheavals, the Vietnam War and the evolution of rock music and popular culture. The book will also address the resurgence of the Beatles' popularity in the 1980s, as well as the relevance of The Beatles' ideals of revolutionary change to our present day. This is essential reading for anyone looking for an accessible yet rigorous study of the historical relevance of the Beatles in a crucial decade of social change.

THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER '. . . a compelling memoir. Breezy and unpretentious, The Sanest Guy in the Room is a delightful collection of memories, insider information and after-dinner anecdotes' The Times 'Brilliant stories and wonderful behind-the-scenes glimpses of a life and career in show-business . . . It's bloody brilliant . . . Read it!' Michael Ball Don Black is the songwriter's songwriter, a composer's dream collaborator, and the man behind some of the twentieth century's greatest musical numbers. Black made his first foray into the glittering world of showbiz as a stand-up, before realising his error and focusing on his lifelong passion instead - music. Shirley Bassey, Michael Jackson, Quincy Jones, Henry Mancini and Barbra Streisand are just some of the artists Black has worked with over the years - not to mention his frequent collaborator, West End legend Andrew Lloyd Webber - in what can only be described as a remarkable musical career. Yet, never one to court fame, Black has always remained what Mark Steyn coined as 'the sanest guy in the room'. Interwoven with the stories behind songs such as 'Diamonds are Forever' and 'Born Free' are vignettes of Black's life with his beloved wife Shirley, who died in March 2018, after almost sixty years of marriage. Black writes movingly about how the enormity of his grief changed his life, and how the dark days are slowly turning into dark moments. The Sanest Guy in the Room is a rich and delightful paean to a life lived through song. It reveals the essence of Black's craft, looks at those who have inspired him and allows us to understand what made those icons tick. It is also a poignant tribute to Shirley, his biggest inspiration. Told with wit, warmth and great humour, this is Don Black's astonishing musical journey and an insight into a life behind the lyrics.

In the mid-20th century, African musicians took up Cuban music as their own and claimed it as a marker of black Atlantic connections and of cosmopolitanism untethered from European colonial relations. Today, Cuban/African bands popular in Africa in the 1960s and '70s have moved into the world music scene in Europe and North America, and world music producers and musicians have created new West African-Latin American collaborations expressly for this market niche. World Music and the Black Atlantic follows two of these bands, Orchestra Baobab and AfroCubism, and the industry and audiences that surround them-from musicians' homes in West Africa, to performances in Europe and North America, to record label offices in London. World Music and the Black Atlantic examines the intensely transnational experiences of musicians, industry personnel, and audiences as they collaboratively produce, circulate, and consume music in a specific post-colonial era of globalization. Musicians, industry personnel, and audiences work with and push against one another as they engage in personal collaborations imbued with histories of global travel and trade. They move between and combine Cuban and Malian melodies, Norwegian and Senegalese markets, and histories of slavery and independence as they work together to create international commodities. Understanding the unstable and dynamic ways these peoples, musics, markets, and histories intersect elucidates how world music actors assert their places within, and produce knowledge about, global markets, colonial histories, and the black Atlantic. World Music and the Black Atlantic offers a nuanced view of a global industry that is informed and deeply marked by diverse transnational perspectives and histories of transatlantic exchange.

Freedom Girls: Voicing Femininity in 1960s British Pop shows how the vocal performances of girl singers in 1960s Britain defined-and sometimes defied-ideas about what it meant to be a young woman in the 1960s British pop music scene. The singing and expressive voices of Sandie Shaw, Cilla Black, Millie Small, Dusty Springfield, Lulu, Marianne Faithfull, and P.P. Arnold, reveal how vocal sound shapes access to social mobility, and consequently, access to power and musical authority. The book examines how Sandie Shaw and Cilla Black's ordinary girl personas were tied to whiteness and, in Black's case, her Liverpool origins. It shows how Dusty Springfield and Jamaican singer Millie Small engaged with the transatlantic sounds of soul and and ska, respectively, transforming ideas about musical genre, race, and gender. It reveals how attitudes about sexuality and youth in rock culture shaped the vocal performances of Lulu and Marianne Faithfull, and how P.P. Arnold has re-narrated rock history to center Black women's vocality. Freedom Girls draws on a broad array of archival sources, including music magazines, fashion and entertainment magazines produced for young women, biographies and interviews, audience research reports, and others to inform analysis of musical recordings (including such songs as "As Tears Go By," "Son of a Preacher Man," and others) and performances on television programs such as Ready Steady Go!, Shindig, and other 1960s music shows. These performances reveal the historical and contemporary connections between voice, social mobility, and musical authority, and demonstrate how singers used voice to navigate the boundaries of race, class, and gender.

Popular World Music, Second Edition introduces students to popular music genres and artists from around the world. Andrew Shahriari discusses international music styles familiar to most students-Reggae, Salsa, K-Pop, and more-with a comprehensive listening-oriented introduction to mainstream musical culture. Each chapter focuses on specific music styles and their associated geographic origin, as well as best-known representative artists, such as Bob Marley, Carmen Miranda, ABBA, and Ladysmith Black Mambazo. The text assumes no prior musical knowledge and emphasizes listening as a pathway to learning about music and culture. The subject matter fulfills core, general education requirements found today in the university curriculum. The salient musical and cultural features associated with each example are discussed in detail to increase appreciation of the music, its history, and meaning to its primary audience. NEW to this edition Updates to content to reflect recent developments in resources and popular music trends. Contributing authors in additional areas, including Folk Metal, Chinese Ethnic Minority Rock, and Trinidadian Steel Drum and Soca. "Artist Spotlight" sections highlighting important artists, such as Mary J. Blige, Bob Marley, Tito Puente, Enya, Umm Kulthum and more. "Ad-lib Afterthought" sections and "Questions to Consider" to prompt further discussion of each chapter. Lots of new photos! Updated and additional website materials for students and instructors.