Ever wondered why your life and health can sometimes be so hard to control? Or why it seems so easy for other people? Mark Hanson and Lucy Green draw on their years of experience as scientists and educators to cut through the usual information on genetics and lifestyle to reveal the secrets of early development which start to make each of us unique, during our first 1,000 days from the moment of conception. Some surprising discoveries, based on little-known new research, show how events during our first 1,000 days make each of us who we are and explain how we control our bodies, processes that go way beyond just the genes which we inherited. Provoking new ways of thinking about being parents, this book empowers individuals and society to give the next generation the gift of a good start to life and future health.

Music has long been a way in which visually impaired people could gain financial independence, excel at a highly-valued skill, or simply enjoy musical participation. Existing literature on visual impairment and music includes perspectives from the social history of music, ethnomusicology, child development and areas of music psychology, music therapy, special educational needs, and music education, as well as more popular biographical texts on famous musicians. But there has been relatively little sociological research bringing together the views and experiences of visually impaired musicians themselves across the life course. Insights in Sound: Visually Impaired Musicians' Lives and Learning aims to increase knowledge and understanding both within and beyond this multifaceted group. Through an international survey combined with life-history interviews, a vivid picture is drawn of how visually impaired musicians approach and conceive their musical activities, with detailed illustrations of the particular opportunities and challenges faced by a variety of individuals. Baker and Green look beyond affiliation with particular musical styles, genres, instruments or practices. All 'levels' are included: from adult beginners to those who have returned to music-making after a gap; and from 'regular' amateur and professional musicians, to some who are extraordinarily 'elite' or 'successful'. Themes surrounding education, training, and informal learning; notation and ear playing; digital technologies; and issues around disability, identity, opportunity, marginality, discrimination, despair, fulfilment, and joy surfaced, as the authors set out to discover, analyse, and share insights into the worlds of these musicians.

Music has long been a way in which visually impaired people could gain financial independence, excel at a highly-valued skill, or simply enjoy musical participation. Existing literature on visual impairment and music includes perspectives from the social history of music, ethnomusicology, child development and areas of music psychology, music therapy, special educational needs, and music education, as well as more popular biographical texts on famous musicians. But there has been relatively little sociological research bringing together the views and experiences of visually impaired musicians themselves across the life course. Insights in Sound: Visually Impaired Musicians' Lives and Learning aims to increase knowledge and understanding both within and beyond this multifaceted group. Through an international survey combined with life-history interviews, a vivid picture is drawn of how visually impaired musicians approach and conceive their musical activities, with detailed illustrations of the particular opportunities and challenges faced by a variety of individuals. Baker and Green look beyond affiliation with particular musical styles, genres, instruments or practices. All 'levels' are included: from adult beginners to those who have returned to music-making after a gap; and from 'regular' amateur and professional musicians, to some who are extraordinarily 'elite' or 'successful'. Themes surrounding education, training, and informal learning; notation and ear playing; digital technologies; and issues around disability, identity, opportunity, marginality, discrimination, despair, fulfilment, and joy surfaced, as the authors set out to discover, analyse, and share insights into the worlds of these musicians.

Popular musicians acquire some or all of their skills and knowledge informally, outside school or university, and with little help from trained instrumental teachers. How do they go about this process? Despite the fact that popular music has recently entered formal music education, we have as yet a limited understanding of the learning practices adopted by its musicians. Nor do we know why so many popular musicians in the past turned away from music education, or how young popular musicians today are responding to it. Drawing on a series of interviews with musicians aged between fifteen and fifty, Lucy Green explores the nature of pop musicians' informal learning practices, attitudes and values, the extent to which these altered over the last forty years, and the experiences of the musicians in formal music education. Through a comparison of the characteristics of informal pop music learning with those of more formal music education, the book offers insights into how we might re-invigorate the musical involvement of the population. Could the creation of a teaching culture that recognizes and rewards aural imitation, improvisation and experimentation, as well as commitment and passion, encourage more people to make music? Since the hardback publication of this book in 2001, the author has explored many of its themes through practical work in school classrooms. Her follow-up book, Music, Informal Learning and the School: A New Classroom Pedagogy (2008) appears in the same Ashgate series.

Popular musicians acquire some or all of their skills and knowledge informally, outside school or university, and with little help from trained instrumental teachers. How do they go about this process? Despite the fact that popular music has recently entered formal music education, we have as yet a limited understanding of the learning practices adopted by its musicians. Nor do we know why so many popular musicians in the past turned away from music education, or how young popular musicians today are responding to it. Drawing on a series of interviews with musicians aged between fifteen and fifty, Lucy Green explores the nature of pop musicians' informal learning practices, attitudes and values, the extent to which these altered over the last forty years, and the experiences of the musicians in formal music education. Through a comparison of the characteristics of informal pop music learning with those of more formal music education, the book offers insights into how we might re-invigorate the musical involvement of the population. Could the creation of a teaching culture that recognizes and rewards aural imitation, improvisation and experimentation, as well as commitment and passion, encourage more people to make music? Since the hardback publication of this book in 2001, the author has explored many of its themes through practical work in school classrooms. Her follow-up book, Music, Informal Learning and the School: A New Classroom Pedagogy (2008) appears in the same Ashgate series.

This is the first book to focus on the role of education in relation to music and gender. Invoking a concept of musical patriarchy and a theory of the social construction of musical meaning, Lucy Green shows how women's musical practices and gendered musical meanings have been reproduced, hand-in-hand, through history. Dr. Green views the contemporary school music classroom as a microcosm of the wider society, and reveals the participation of music education in the continued production and reproduction of gendered musical practices and meanings.

This is the first book to focus on the role of education in relation to music and gender. Invoking a concept of musical patriarchy and a theory of the social construction of musical meaning, Lucy Green shows how women's musical practices and gendered musical meanings have been reproduced, hand-in-hand, through history. Dr. Green views the contemporary school music classroom as a microcosm of the wider society, and reveals the participation of music education in the continued production and reproduction of gendered musical practices and meanings.

Musical identity raises complex, multifarious, and fascinating questions. Discussions in this new study consider how individuals construct their musical identities in relation to their experiences of formal and informal music teaching and learning. Each chapter features a different case study situated in a specific national or local socio-musical context, spanning 20 regions across the world. Subjects range from Ghanaian or Balinese villagers, festival-goers in Lapland, and children in a South African township to North American and British students, adults and children in a Cretan brass band, and Gujerati barbers in the Indian diaspora.

This pioneering book reveals how the music classroom can draw upon the world of popular musicians' informal learning practices, so as to recognize and foster a range of musical skills and knowledge that have long been overlooked within music education. It investigates how far informal learning practices are possible and desirable in a classroom context; how they can affect young teenagers' musical skill and knowledge acquisition; and how they can change the ways students listen to, understand and appreciate music as critical listeners, not only in relation to what they already know, but beyond. It examines students' motivations towards music education, their autonomy as learners, and their capacity to work co-operatively in groups without instructional guidance from teachers. It suggests how we can awaken students' awareness of their own musicality, particularly those who might not otherwise be reached by music education, putting the potential for musical development and participation into their own hands. Bringing informal learning practices into a school environment is challenging for teachers. It can appear to conflict with their views of professionalism, and may at times seem to run against official educational discourses, pedagogic methods and curricular requirements. But any conflict is more apparent than real, for this book shows how informal learning practices can introduce fresh, constructive ways for music teachers to understand and approach their work. It offers a critical pedagogy for music, not as mere theory, but as an analytical account of practices which have fundamentally influenced the perspectives of the teachers involved. Through its grounded examples and discussions of alternative approaches to classroom work and classroom relations, the book reaches out beyond music to other curriculum subjects, and wider debates about pedagogy and curriculum.

"Hooray Professor Lucy Green's classic text is now available, in its second edition, to a new generation. The first edition contributed to the development of a new field, the sociology of music education. But the argument is of wider interest, and has been useful to me in better understanding the mechanics of the professional life as applicable to the working player." Robert Fripp, King Crimson RESPONSES TO THE FIRST EDITION OF MUSIC ON DEAF EARS: "This is a fine book indeed. The clarity of mind shining through the text is apparent, and the concern with music, musical experience and the development of children in our schools is self-evident. . Musicians and educators would do well to reflect upon these ideas and the inherent challenges to our comfortable but essentially problematic ways of thinking about and responding to music." Keith Swanwick, Music and Letters "The argument, necessarily simplified here, is powerfully and cogently made. It not only impinges on educational practice but is one of the best general discussions of musical meaning and ideology I have read." Richard Middleton, Popular Music "This analysis has considerable explanatory power, especially in regard to the response of school pupils to various musical styles. . I recommend this interesting and uncomfortable book not just to music teachers but to all those musicians and music lovers who think at all about the nature of their art." Christopher Small, British Journal of Music Education

110 times wider than Earth; 15 million degrees at its core; an atmosphere so huge that Earth is actually within it: come and meet the star of our solar system Light takes eight minutes to reach Earth from the surface of the Sun. But its journey within the Sun takes hundreds of thousands of years. What is going on in there? What are light and heat? How does the Sun produce them and how on earth did scientists discover this? In this astonishing and enlightening adventure, you'll travel millions of miles from inside the Sun to its surface and to Earth, where the light at the end of its journey is allowing you to read right now. You'll discover how the Sun works (including what it sounds like), the latest research in solar physics and how a solar storm could threaten everything we know. And you'll meet the groundbreaking scientists, including the author, who pieced this extraordinary story together.

Hear, Listen, Play! is a book for all music teachers who are curious about the worlds of ear-playing, informal learning, improvisation, and vernacular music. Starting with a discussion of how popular musicians learn in the informal realm, the book then applies many aspects of their learning practices to three main areas within music education. It first tackles one-to-one specialist instrumental lessons before turning to ensemble work such as band and orchestra and finally to the generalist or specialist classroom. The methods within each section have been systematically tried and tested in research projects spanning more than a decade, and delivered here in a book written in straightforward and direct language which teachers will quickly find applicable to their working lives. Vignettes from the research participants provide depth throughout the book, and give illustrations of how both teachers and learners have experienced the methods themselves. This book is not a prescription for one particular way of teaching or learning, and it does not aim to critique, replace or change the excellent practices that are already on-going in the diverse world of music education and pedagogy. Rather, it offers something which is likely to be new to many teachers, and which they can add in to the mix.