The Castrato is a nuanced exploration of why innumerable boys were castrated for singing between the mid-sixteenth and late-nineteenth centuries. It shows that the entire foundation of Western classical singing, culminating in bel canto, was birthed from an unlikely and historically unique set of desires, public and private, aesthetic, economic, and political. In Italy, castration for singing was understood through the lens of Catholic blood sacrifice as expressed in idioms of offering and renunciation and, paradoxically, in satire, verbal abuse, and even the symbolism of the castrato's comic cousin Pulcinella. Sacrifice in turn was inseparable from the system of patriarchy involving teachers, patrons, colleagues, and relatives whereby castrated males were produced not as nonmen, as often thought nowadays, but as idealized males. Yet what captivated audiences and composers from Cavalli and Pergolesi to Handel, Mozart, and Rossini were the extraordinary capacities of castrato voices, a phenomenon ultimately unsettled by Enlightenment morality. Although the castrati failed to survive, their musicality and vocality have persisted long past their literal demise.

(Guitar Method). A modern method ideal for all beginning guitarists, studying individually or in a class. Technique and reading skills are developed through two-, three- and four-part ensemble arrangements of traditional and newly composed music. Also includes an introduction to chord playing. Also available: Phase 2 Book 50449470 $7.95

Im Jahr 2017 wird der 100. Geburtstag des Regisseurs und B hnenbildners Wieland Wagner, eines Enkels von Richard Wagner, begangen. Zu diesem Anlass erscheint eine umfassende Bild- und Textdokumentation seines k nstlerischen Schaffens. Mit der Wiederaufnahme der Bayreuther Festspiele im Jahr 1951 begann die bedeutende Epoche von Neu-Bayreuth , die von Wieland Wagner wesentlich gepr gt war. Mit seinen revolution ren Wagner-Inszenierungen und vor allem seinen vision ren Bildfindungen hat er einen neuen Stil aus dem Geist der altgriechischen Trag die geschaffen, der internationale Beachtung fand. Auch au erhalb von Bayreuth hat er mit seinen Neudeutungen der Aida und des Otello von Giuseppe Verdi, der Elektra und der Salome von Richard Strauss, der Lulu und des Wozzeck von Alban Berg, der Carmen von Georges Bizet sowie der Antigonae und des Osterspiels von Carl Orff das Musiktheater revolutioniert. Der Band l sst mit eindrucksvollen Bildern seiner k hnen Inszenierungen das Wirken Wieland Wagners wieder lebendig werden.

Empirically proving that -- no matter where you are -- kids wanna rock, this is Chuck Klosterman's hilrious memoir of growing up as a shameless metalhead in Wyndmere, North Dakotoa (population: 498). With a voice like Ace Frehley's guitar, Klosterman hacks his way through hair-band history, beginning with that fateful day in 1983 when his older brother brought home Mötley Crüe's Shout at the Devil. The fifth-grade Chuck wasn't quite ready to rock -- his hair was too short and his farm was too quiet -- but he still found a way to bang his nappy little head. Before the journey was over, he would slow-dance to Poison, sleep innocently beneath satanic pentagrams, lust for Lita Ford, and get ridiculously intellectual about Guns N' Roses. C'mon and feel his noize.