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The American Songbook
- Music for the Masses
- Narrated by: Anna Crowe
- Length: 5 hrs and 4 mins
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The American Songbook
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Publisher's summary
With their unforgettable melodies, timeless messages, and stylistic indebtedness to both jazz and Broadway, American popular standards have proven to be among the most widely performed and enjoyed songs of the past century. Shaped in many ways by the technological and cultural developments of the early twentieth century, they have also managed to transcend these origins and become an enduring part of the American musical landscape. Ann van der Merwe explores how and why American songbook standards developed in the early twentieth century and how these standards have shaped American—and even global—musical culture ever since. The American Songbook explores key aspects of individual songs, including the musical and lyrical reasons for their broad appeal and applicability over the years. The American songbook continues to permeate the fabric of our daily lives. It is a repertoire that spans generations, from Fred Astaire to Tony Bennett and Lady Gaga. As a result, music lovers both young and old will enjoy discovering how these beloved songs emerged and why they remain relevant a century later.
The book is published by Rowman & Littlefield.
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 19
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 19
In her bestselling autobiography, Bedsit Disco Queen, Tracey Thorn recalled the highs and lows of a 30-year career in pop music. But with the touring, recording and extraordinary anecdotes, there wasn't time for an in-depth look at what she actually did for all those years: sing. She sang with warmth and emotional honesty, sometimes while battling acute stage fright.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Fascinating
- By Jane Sheedy on 01-11-17
By: Tracey Thorn
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Light & Shade
- Conversations with Jimmy Page
- By: Brad Tolinski
- Narrated by: Robert Fass, John Lee
- Length: 7 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 178
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 155
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 156
More than 30 years after disbanding in 1980, Led Zeppelin continues to be celebrated for its artistic achievements, broad musical influence, and commercial success. The band's notorious exploits have been chronicled in bestselling books; yet none of the individual members of the band has penned a memoir nor cooperated to any degree with the press or a biographer.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Production History, FY!
- By Amy Peacock on 02-21-17
By: Brad Tolinski
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The Secret Life of the American Musical
- How Broadway Shows Are Built
- By: Jack Viertel
- Narrated by: David Pittu
- Length: 11 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 246
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 221
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 221
For almost a century, Americans have been losing their hearts and losing their minds in an insatiable love affair with the American musical. It often begins in actors and reaches its passionate zenith when it comes time for love, marriage, and children, who will start the cycle all over again. Americans love musicals. Americans invented musicals. Americans perfected musicals. But what, exactly, is a musical?
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4 out of 5 stars
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Great review lacked music
- By joseph f mcgovern on 10-14-18
By: Jack Viertel
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Dig If You Will the Picture
- Funk, Sex, God and Genius in the Music of Prince
- By: Ben Greenman
- Narrated by: Peter Berkrot
- Length: 9 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 32
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 29
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 30
Ben Greenman, New York Times best-selling author, contributing writer to The New Yorker, and owner of thousands of recordings of Prince and Prince-related songs, knows intimately that there has never been a rock star as vibrant, mercurial, willfully contrary, experimental, or prolific as Prince. Uniting a diverse audience while remaining singularly himself, Prince was a tireless artist, a musical virtuoso and chameleon, and a pop-culture prophet.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Reads like a indepth career review & analysis
- By herb on 05-18-17
By: Ben Greenman
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The Rest Is Noise
- Listening to the 20th Century
- By: Alex Ross
- Narrated by: Grover Gardner
- Length: 23 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 484
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 303
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Story4 out of 5 stars 299
The Rest Is Noise takes the listener inside the labyrinth of modern music, from turn-of-the-century Vienna to downtown New York in the '60s and '70s. We meet the maverick personalities and follow the rise of mass culture on this sweeping tour of 20th-century history through its music.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Learned so much!
- By Paula on 02-18-08
By: Alex Ross
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Beethoven
- A Life in Nine Pieces
- By: Laura Tunbridge
- Narrated by: Laura Tunbridge
- Length: 7 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 24
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 20
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 21
The iconic image of Beethoven is of him as a lone genius: hair wild, fists clenched, and brow furrowed. Beethoven may well have shaped the music of the future, but he was also a product of his time, influenced by the people, politics, and culture around him. Oxford scholar Laura Tunbridge offers an alternative history of Beethoven's career, placing his music in contexts that shed light on why particular pieces are valued more than others, and what this tells us about his larger-than-life reputation.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Engaging, interesting, nice format
- By George on 07-04-22
By: Laura Tunbridge
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The Sound of Music Story
- How a Beguiling Young Novice, a Handsome Austrian Captain, and Ten Singing Von Trapp Children Inspired the Most Beloved Film of All Time
- By: Tom Santopietro
- Narrated by: Eric Michael Summerer
- Length: 11 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 39
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 36
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 35
Now Tom Santopietro has written the ultimate Sound of Music fan audiobook with all the inside dope, from behind-the-scenes stories of the filming in Austria and Hollywood to new interviews with Johannes von Trapp and others. Santopietro looks back at the real-life story of Maria von Trapp, goes on to chronicle the sensational success of the Broadway musical, and recounts the story of the near cancellation of the film when Cleopatra bankrupted 20th Century Fox.
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3 out of 5 stars
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A must for super-fans
- By Simone on 07-29-17
By: Tom Santopietro
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Bright Lights, Dark Shadows
- The Real Story of Abba
- By: Carl Magnus Palm
- Narrated by: Adrian Mulraney
- Length: 26 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 121
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 102
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Story4 out of 5 stars 100
An exploration of all aspects of the Abba member’s lives and careers. Amazingly detailed, it examines the group member’s family backgrounds, the pre-Abba days, the legendary 70s, the marriages, the divorces, the business ups and downs, and the post-Abba solo careers.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Awesome! -- All the Swedish words pronounced!
- By Howard_a on 06-18-12
By: Carl Magnus Palm
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Never a Dull Moment
- 1971 - the Year That Rock Exploded
- By: David Hepworth
- Narrated by: David Hepworth
- Length: 11 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 212
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 200
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 197
On New Year's Eve, 1970, Paul McCartney told his lawyers to issue the writ at the High Court in London, effectively ending The Beatles. You might say this was the last day of the pop era. The following day, which was a Friday, was 1971. You might say this was the first day of the rock era. And within the remaining 364 days of this monumental year, the world would hear Don McLean's "American Pie", The Rolling Stones' "Brown Sugar", The Who's "Baba O'Riley", Zeppelin's "Stairway to Heaven", and more.
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5 out of 5 stars
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A blast from the past
- By Amazon Customer on 07-30-16
By: David Hepworth
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Let’s Go Crazy
- Prince and the Making of Purple Rain
- By: Alan Light
- Narrated by: Fred Berman
- Length: 7 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 520
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 464
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 460
Purple Rain is a song, an album, and a film - each one a commercial success and cultural milestone. How did this semiautobiographical musical masterpiece that blurred R&B, pop, dance, and rock sounds come to alter the recording landscape and become an enduring touchstone for successive generations of fans?
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4 out of 5 stars
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A Must-Read For Any PRINCE Fan
- By Bryan K. Chavez on 05-06-16
By: Alan Light
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The New Analog
- Listening and Reconnecting in a Digital World
- By: Damon Krukowski
- Narrated by: Damon Krukowski
- Length: 3 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 34
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 32
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 32
Having made his name in the late 1980s as a member of the indie band Galaxie 500, Damon Krukowski has watched cultural life lurch from analog to digital. And as an artist who has weathered the transition, he has challenging, urgent questions for both creators and consumers about what we have thrown away in the process.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Very Interesting!
- By Daniel Cascaddan on 07-02-17
By: Damon Krukowski
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You Say Potato: A Book About Accents
- By: Ben Crystal, David Crystal
- Narrated by: David Crystal, Ben Crystal, Jane Savage, and others
- Length: 7 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 74
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 70
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 69
Some people say 'sconn' while others say 'schown'. He says 'bath' while she says 'bahth'. You say 'potayto'. I say 'potahto'. And - wait a second, no one says 'potahto'. No one's ever said 'potahto'. Have they? From reconstructing Shakespeare's accent to the rise and fall of received pronunciation, actor Ben Crystal and his linguist father, David, travel the world in search of the stories of spoken English.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Wish there were more native recordings.
- By Matt Dobler on 07-01-16
By: Ben Crystal, and others
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Alan Lomax: A Biography
- By: John Szwed
- Narrated by: Scott Sowers
- Length: 20 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 45
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 35
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 35
The remarkable life and times of the man who popularized American folk music and created the science of song. Folklorist, archivist, anthropologist, singer, political activist, talent scout, ethnomusicologist, filmmaker, concert and record producer, Alan Lomax is best remembered as the man who introduced folk music to the masses. Lomax began his career making field recordings of rural music for the Library of Congress and by the late 1930s brought his discoveries to radio, including Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger, and Burl Ives.
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5 out of 5 stars
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They Done Good
- By DonnaMarie113 on 06-26-22
By: John Szwed
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Solid State
- The Story of Abbey Road and the End of the Beatles
- By: Kenneth Womack, Alan Parsons - foreword
- Narrated by: William Hughes
- Length: 8 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 629
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 543
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 540
In February 1969, the Beatles began working on what became their final album together. Abbey Road introduced a number of new techniques and technologies to the Beatles' sound and included "Come Together", "Something", and "Here Comes the Sun", which all emerged as classics. Womack's colorful retelling of how this landmark album was written and recorded is a treat for fans of the Beatles. Solid State takes listeners back to 1969 and into EMI's Abbey Road Studios, which boasted an advanced solid state transistor mixing desk.
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1 out of 5 stars
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It's all about the recording studios
- By Tina on 02-18-20
By: Kenneth Womack, and others
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Your Song Changed My Life
- From Jimmy Page to St. Vincent, Smokey Robinson to Hozier, Thirty-Five Beloved Artists on Their Journey and the Music That Inspired It
- By: Bob Boilen
- Narrated by: Bob Boilen
- Length: 8 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 58
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 53
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Story4 out of 5 stars 52
From the beloved host and creator of NPR's All Songs Considered and Tiny Desk Concerts comes an essential oral history of modern music, told in the voices of iconic and up-and-coming musicians, including Dave Grohl, Jimmy Page, Michael Stipe, Carrie Brownstein, Smokey Robinson, and Jeff Tweedy, among others - published in association with NPR Music.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Cool if you know all interviewed artists
- By Farfield on 12-05-16
By: Bob Boilen
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Beatles '66
- The Revolutionary Year
- By: Steve Turner
- Narrated by: Simon Vance
- Length: 12 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 358
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 304
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 304
The year that changed everything for the Beatles was 1966 - the year of their last concert and of Revolver, their first album created to be listened to rather than performed. This was the year the Beatles risked their popularity by retiring from live performances, recording songs that explored alternative states of consciousness, experimenting with avant-garde ideas, and speaking their minds on issues of politics, war, and religion. Music journalist and Beatles expert Steve Turner investigates the enormous changes that took place in the Beatles' lives and work during 1966.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Great listen
- By Tad Davis on 07-28-18
By: Steve Turner