-
Bach
- Music in the Castle of Heaven
- Narrated by: Antony Ferguson
- Length: 21 hrs and 43 mins
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Buy for $39.95
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
Listeners also enjoyed...
-
Bach's Musical Universe
- The Composer and His Work
- By: Christoph Wolff
- Narrated by: Paul Heitsch
- Length: 13 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A concentrated study of Johann Sebastian Bach's creative output and greatest pieces, capturing the essence of his art.
By: Christoph Wolff
-
Wagnerism
- Art and Politics in the Shadow of Music
- By: Alex Ross
- Narrated by: Alex Ross
- Length: 28 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Alex Ross, renowned New Yorker music critic and author of the international best seller and Pulitzer Prize finalist The Rest Is Noise, reveals how Richard Wagner became the proving ground for modern art and politics - an aesthetic war zone where the Western world wrestled with its capacity for beauty and violence.
-
-
Not Just for Wagner Experts!
- By Rupert Pupkin on 09-26-20
By: Alex Ross
-
Johann Sebastian Bach
- The Learned Musician
- By: Christoph Wolff
- Narrated by: John Pruden
- Length: 21 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Although we have heard the music of J. S. Bach in countless performances and recordings, the composer himself still comes across only as an enigmatic figure in a single familiar portrait. As we mark the 250th anniversary of Bach's death, author Christoph Wolff presents a new picture that brings to life this towering figure of the Baroque era. This engaging new biography portrays Bach as the living, breathing, and sometimes imperfect human being that he was, while bringing to bear all the advances of the last half-century of Bach scholarship.
-
-
Has all the boring details...
- By L. Jensen on 05-14-19
By: Christoph Wolff
-
Beethoven
- Anguish and Triumph
- By: Jan Swafford
- Narrated by: Michael Prichard
- Length: 39 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Jan Swafford's biographies have established him as a revered music historian, capable of bringing his subjects vibrantly to life. His magnificent new biography of Ludwig van Beethoven peels away layers of legend to get to the living, breathing human being who composed some of the world's most iconic music.
-
-
Huge book - musical reader appreciates best
- By DMgraphicGlass on 01-20-15
By: Jan Swafford
-
Mozart
- The Reign of Love
- By: Jan Swafford
- Narrated by: Tim Campbell
- Length: 30 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Like Jan Swafford’s biographies Beethoven and Johannes Brahms, Mozart is the complete exhumation of a genius in his life and ours: A man who would enrich the world with his talent for centuries to come and who would immeasurably shape classical music. As Swafford reveals, it’s nearly impossible to understand classical music’s origins and indeed its evolutions, as well as the Baroque period, without studying the man himself.
-
-
Comprehensive Bio
- By Judy on 01-07-21
By: Jan Swafford
-
Elements of Jazz: From Cakewalks to Fusion
- By: Bill Messenger, The Great Courses
- Narrated by: Bill Messenger
- Length: 5 hrs and 59 mins
- Original Recording
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Jazz is a uniquely American art form, one of America's great contributions to not only musical culture, but world culture, with each generation of musicians applying new levels of creativity that take the music in unexpected directions that defy definition, category, and stagnation. Now you can learn the basics and history of this intoxicating genre in an eight-lecture series that is as free-flowing and original as the art form itself.
-
-
A Disappointingly Distorted, Myopic View Of Jazz
- By Parallax View on 08-18-13
By: Bill Messenger, and others
-
Bach's Musical Universe
- The Composer and His Work
- By: Christoph Wolff
- Narrated by: Paul Heitsch
- Length: 13 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A concentrated study of Johann Sebastian Bach's creative output and greatest pieces, capturing the essence of his art.
By: Christoph Wolff
-
Wagnerism
- Art and Politics in the Shadow of Music
- By: Alex Ross
- Narrated by: Alex Ross
- Length: 28 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Alex Ross, renowned New Yorker music critic and author of the international best seller and Pulitzer Prize finalist The Rest Is Noise, reveals how Richard Wagner became the proving ground for modern art and politics - an aesthetic war zone where the Western world wrestled with its capacity for beauty and violence.
-
-
Not Just for Wagner Experts!
- By Rupert Pupkin on 09-26-20
By: Alex Ross
-
Johann Sebastian Bach
- The Learned Musician
- By: Christoph Wolff
- Narrated by: John Pruden
- Length: 21 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Although we have heard the music of J. S. Bach in countless performances and recordings, the composer himself still comes across only as an enigmatic figure in a single familiar portrait. As we mark the 250th anniversary of Bach's death, author Christoph Wolff presents a new picture that brings to life this towering figure of the Baroque era. This engaging new biography portrays Bach as the living, breathing, and sometimes imperfect human being that he was, while bringing to bear all the advances of the last half-century of Bach scholarship.
-
-
Has all the boring details...
- By L. Jensen on 05-14-19
By: Christoph Wolff
-
Beethoven
- Anguish and Triumph
- By: Jan Swafford
- Narrated by: Michael Prichard
- Length: 39 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Jan Swafford's biographies have established him as a revered music historian, capable of bringing his subjects vibrantly to life. His magnificent new biography of Ludwig van Beethoven peels away layers of legend to get to the living, breathing human being who composed some of the world's most iconic music.
-
-
Huge book - musical reader appreciates best
- By DMgraphicGlass on 01-20-15
By: Jan Swafford
-
Mozart
- The Reign of Love
- By: Jan Swafford
- Narrated by: Tim Campbell
- Length: 30 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Like Jan Swafford’s biographies Beethoven and Johannes Brahms, Mozart is the complete exhumation of a genius in his life and ours: A man who would enrich the world with his talent for centuries to come and who would immeasurably shape classical music. As Swafford reveals, it’s nearly impossible to understand classical music’s origins and indeed its evolutions, as well as the Baroque period, without studying the man himself.
-
-
Comprehensive Bio
- By Judy on 01-07-21
By: Jan Swafford
-
Elements of Jazz: From Cakewalks to Fusion
- By: Bill Messenger, The Great Courses
- Narrated by: Bill Messenger
- Length: 5 hrs and 59 mins
- Original Recording
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Jazz is a uniquely American art form, one of America's great contributions to not only musical culture, but world culture, with each generation of musicians applying new levels of creativity that take the music in unexpected directions that defy definition, category, and stagnation. Now you can learn the basics and history of this intoxicating genre in an eight-lecture series that is as free-flowing and original as the art form itself.
-
-
A Disappointingly Distorted, Myopic View Of Jazz
- By Parallax View on 08-18-13
By: Bill Messenger, and others
-
Fryderyk Chopin
- A Life and Times
- By: Dr. Alan Walker
- Narrated by: Corrie James
- Length: 23 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Based on 10 years of research and a vast cache of primary sources located in archives in Warsaw, Paris, London, New York, and Washington, D.C., Alan Walker's monumental Fryderyk Chopin: A Life and Times is the most comprehensive biography of the great Polish composer to appear in English in more than a century. Walker's work is a corrective biography, intended to dispel the many myths and legends that continue to surround Chopin.
-
-
This book is a masterpiece
- By Carpe Diem on 02-09-19
By: Dr. Alan Walker
-
For the Love of Music
- A Conductor's Guide to the Art of Listening
- By: John Mauceri
- Narrated by: John Mauceri
- Length: 6 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
With a lifetime of experience, profound knowledge and understanding, and heartwarming appreciation, an internationally celebrated conductor and teacher answers the questions: Why should I listen to classical music? How can I get the most from the listening experience? Unpretentious, graceful, instructive, this is a book for the aficionado, the novice, and anyone looking to have the love of music fired within them.
-
-
Divine Time with a Maestro
- By Meg on 12-18-19
By: John Mauceri
-
The Night Circus
- A Novel
- By: Erin Morgenstern
- Narrated by: Jim Dale
- Length: 13 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The circus arrives without warning. No announcements precede it. It is simply there, when yesterday it was not. Within the black-and-white striped canvas tents is an utterly unique experience full of breathtaking amazements. It is called Le Cirque des Rêves, and it is only open at night. But behind the scenes, a fierce competition is underway - a duel between two young magicians, Celia and Marco, who have been trained since childhood expressly for this purpose by their mercurial instructors.
-
-
Dreamlike Experience to Savor
- By Suzn F on 09-18-11
By: Erin Morgenstern
-
Opera 101
- A Complete Guide to Learning and Loving Opera
- By: Fred Plotkin
- Narrated by: Fred Plotkin
- Length: 18 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Opera is the fastest growing of all the performing arts, attracting audiences of all ages who are enthralled by the gorgeous music, vivid drama, and magnificent production values. If you've decided that the time has finally come to learn about opera and discover for yourself what it is about opera that sends your normally reserved friends into states of ecstatic abandon, this is the book for you.
-
-
A tedious introduction
- By Ravi on 08-30-05
By: Fred Plotkin
-
The Rest Is Noise
- Listening to the 20th Century
- By: Alex Ross
- Narrated by: Grover Gardner
- Length: 23 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
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.
-
-
Learned so much!
- By Paula on 02-18-08
By: Alex Ross
-
The Lacuna
- By: Barbara Kingsolver
- Narrated by: Barbara Kingsolver
- Length: 19 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Born in the United States, but reared in Mexico, Harrison Shepherd finds precarious shelter but no sense of home on his thrilling odyssey. Life is whatever he learns from housekeepers and, one fateful day, by mixing plaster for famed muralist Diego Rivera. When he goes to work for Rivera, his wife, exotic artist Kahlo, and exiled leader Lev Trotsky, Shepherd inadvertently casts his lot with art and revolution.
-
-
Great Writers need Great Narrators
- By Gypsy Wife on 12-04-09
-
Life & Works - Franz Schubert
- By: Jeremy Siepmann
- Narrated by: Jeremy Siepmann, Tom George, Peter Yapp, and others
- Length: 4 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The life of Franz Schubert has been a gift to romantically inclined biographers: the beautiful, brilliant, modest boy who sprang to fully fledged genius at the age of sixteen; the quintessential ‘artist in a garret’, entirely consumed by his art and living a hand-to-mouth existence in Vienna (home of Mozart, Haydn and Beethoven); the gentle, cheerful, convivial young man who prized friendship almost as highly as music itself; the unworldly poet from whom great music poured like water from a fountain; the unrecognized master who died almost penniless at the age of 31.
-
-
Very well done
- By Jeffrey Keimer on 09-16-14
By: Jeremy Siepmann
-
The Life and Works of Bach
- By: Jeremy Siepmann
- Narrated by: Jeremy Siepmann, John Shrapnel, Trevor Nichols, and others
- Length: 4 hrs and 34 mins
- Original Recording
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Although now beloved and revered by millions as the greatest composer who ever lived, Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750) was best known in his lifetime as an organist, and was eclipsed in fame as a composer by two of his twenty children. For the last twenty-seven years of his life he was a schoolteacher and choir director whose duties extended to meal supervision and dormitory inspection. Yet throughout his career he composed a vast body of music which is amongst the most joyful, dancing and enrapturing ever written.
-
-
A good introduction to Bach's Life and Work
- By Dr on 01-10-15
By: Jeremy Siepmann
-
Language of the Spirit
- An Introduction to Classical Music
- By: Jan Swafford
- Narrated by: Tom Perkins
- Length: 9 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In Language of the Spirit, renowned music scholar Jan Swafford argues that we have it all wrong: classical music has something for everyone and is accessible to all. Ranging from Gregorian chant to Handel's Messiah, from Vivaldi's The Four Seasons to the postmodern work of Philip Glass, Swafford is an affable and expert guide to the genre. He traces the history of Western music, introduces listeners to the most important composers and compositions, and explains the underlying structure and logic of their music.
-
-
Great intro to various important composers & works
- By Jay G on 06-14-18
By: Jan Swafford
-
Composers
- Their Lives and Works
- By: DK
- Narrated by: Richard Trinder
- Length: 13 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Introduced with more than 90 biographical entries that trace the friendships, loves, and rivalries that inspired each musical genius and their work. Profiles offer revealing insights into what drove each individual to create the musical masterpieces - symphonies, concertos, and operatic scores - that changed the direction of classical music and are still celebrated as masterpieces today.
-
-
Exceeded my expectations
- By PavFan on 02-21-22
By: DK
-
Space Chronicles
- Facing the Ultimate Frontier
- By: Neil deGrasse Tyson
- Narrated by: Mirron Willis
- Length: 10 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
With his signature wit and thought-provoking insights, Neil deGrasse Tyson - one of our foremost thinkers on all things space - illuminates the past, present, and future of space exploration and brilliantly reminds us why NASA matters now as much as ever. As Tyson reveals, exploring the space frontier can profoundly enrich many aspects of our daily lives, from education systems and the economy to national security and morale.
-
-
The least helpful review of Space Chronicles.
- By Joshua Kring on 06-17-15
-
George Frideric Handel
- A Life with Friends
- By: Ellen T. Harris
- Narrated by: Andi Arndt
- Length: 12 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
An intimate portrait of Handel’s life and inner circle, modeled after one of the composer’s favorite forms: the fugue. During his lifetime, the sounds of Handel’s music reached from court to theater, echoed in cathedrals, and filled crowded taverns, but the man himself - known to most as the composer of Messiah - is a bit of a mystery. Though he took meticulous care of his musical manuscripts and even provided for their preservation on his death, very little of an intimate nature survives.
-
-
Interesting book, lackluster performance
- By Ongeblozzen on 12-04-14
By: Ellen T. Harris
Publisher's summary
Johann Sebastian Bach is one of the most unfathomable composers in the history of music. How can such sublime work have been produced by a man who (when we can discern his personality at all) seems so ordinary, so opaque - and occasionally so intemperate? John Eliot Gardiner grew up passing one of the only two authentic portraits of Bach every morning and evening on the stairs of his parents’ house, where it hung for safety during World War II. He has been studying and performing Bach ever since, and is now regarded as one of the composer's greatest living interpreters. The fruits of this lifetime's immersion are distilled in this remarkable book, grounded in the most recent Bach scholarship but moving far beyond it, and explaining in wonderful detail the ideas on which Bach drew, how he worked, how his music is constructed, how it achieves its effects - and what it can tell us about Bach the man.
Gardiner's background as a historian has encouraged him to search for ways in which scholarship and performance can cooperate and fruitfully coalesce. This has entailed piecing together the few biographical shards, scrutinizing the music, and watching for those instances when Bach's personality seems to penetrate the fabric of his notation. Gardiner's aim is "to give the reader a sense of inhabiting the same experiences and sensations that Bach might have had in the act of music-making. This, I try to show, can help us arrive at a more human likeness discernible in the closely related processes of composing and performing his music." It is very rare that such an accomplished performer of music should also be a considerable writer and thinker about it. John Eliot Gardiner takes us as deeply into Bach’s works and mind as perhaps words can. The result is a unique book about one of the greatest of all creative artists.
More from the same
Related to this topic
-
The Rest Is Noise
- Listening to the 20th Century
- By: Alex Ross
- Narrated by: Grover Gardner
- Length: 23 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
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.
-
-
Learned so much!
- By Paula on 02-18-08
By: Alex Ross
-
Beethoven
- A Life in Nine Pieces
- By: Laura Tunbridge
- Narrated by: Laura Tunbridge
- Length: 7 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
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.
-
-
Engaging, interesting, nice format
- By George on 07-04-22
By: Laura Tunbridge
-
Augustine
- Conversions to Confessions
- By: Robin Lane Fox
- Narrated by: Michael Page
- Length: 25 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Saint Augustine is one of the most influential figures in all of Christianity, yet his path to sainthood was by no means assured. Born in AD 354 to a pagan father and a Christian mother, Augustine spent the first 30 years of his life struggling to understand the nature of God and his world. He learned about Christianity as a child but was never baptized, choosing instead to immerse himself in the study of rhetoric, Manicheanism, and then Neoplatonism - all the while indulging in a life of lust and greed.
-
-
Excellent
- By Chelsie P. on 12-06-16
By: Robin Lane Fox
-
Kierkegaard
- A Single Life
- By: Stephen Backhouse
- Narrated by: Tom Parks
- Length: 8 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
An accessible, expert introduction to one of the greatest minds of 19th century. Whether you're completely new to him, or if you're already familiar with his work, Kierkegaard: A Single Life presents a fresh understanding of his life and thought. Kierkegaard was a brilliant and enigmatic loner whose ideas permeated culture, shaped modern Christianity, and influenced people as diverse as Franz Kafka and Martin Luther King Jr. Though few people today have read his work, that lack of familiarity with the real Kierkegaard is changing with this biography by scholar Stephen Backhouse.
-
-
Great!
- By Will on 07-11-17
-
The Fellowship
- The Literary LIves of the Inklings: J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Owen Barfield, Charles Williams
- By: Philip Zaleski, Carol Zaleski
- Narrated by: John Curless
- Length: 26 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
C. S. Lewis is the 20th century's most widely read Christian writer and J. R. R. Tolkien its most beloved mythmaker. For three decades they and their closest associates formed a literary club known as the Inklings, which met weekly in Lewis' Oxford rooms and a nearby pub. They read aloud from works in progress, argued about anything that caught their fancy, and gave one another invaluable companionship, inspiration, and criticism.
-
-
If You Love Literature...
- By Ray M on 07-14-16
By: Philip Zaleski, and others
-
William Blake vs the World
- By: John Higgs
- Narrated by: John Higgs
- Length: 11 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A wild and unexpected journey through culture, science, philosophy, and religion to better understand the mercurial genius of William Blake.
-
-
Best book ever
- By idamae on 11-04-22
By: John Higgs
-
The Rest Is Noise
- Listening to the 20th Century
- By: Alex Ross
- Narrated by: Grover Gardner
- Length: 23 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
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.
-
-
Learned so much!
- By Paula on 02-18-08
By: Alex Ross
-
Beethoven
- A Life in Nine Pieces
- By: Laura Tunbridge
- Narrated by: Laura Tunbridge
- Length: 7 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
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.
-
-
Engaging, interesting, nice format
- By George on 07-04-22
By: Laura Tunbridge
-
Augustine
- Conversions to Confessions
- By: Robin Lane Fox
- Narrated by: Michael Page
- Length: 25 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Saint Augustine is one of the most influential figures in all of Christianity, yet his path to sainthood was by no means assured. Born in AD 354 to a pagan father and a Christian mother, Augustine spent the first 30 years of his life struggling to understand the nature of God and his world. He learned about Christianity as a child but was never baptized, choosing instead to immerse himself in the study of rhetoric, Manicheanism, and then Neoplatonism - all the while indulging in a life of lust and greed.
-
-
Excellent
- By Chelsie P. on 12-06-16
By: Robin Lane Fox
-
Kierkegaard
- A Single Life
- By: Stephen Backhouse
- Narrated by: Tom Parks
- Length: 8 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
An accessible, expert introduction to one of the greatest minds of 19th century. Whether you're completely new to him, or if you're already familiar with his work, Kierkegaard: A Single Life presents a fresh understanding of his life and thought. Kierkegaard was a brilliant and enigmatic loner whose ideas permeated culture, shaped modern Christianity, and influenced people as diverse as Franz Kafka and Martin Luther King Jr. Though few people today have read his work, that lack of familiarity with the real Kierkegaard is changing with this biography by scholar Stephen Backhouse.
-
-
Great!
- By Will on 07-11-17
-
The Fellowship
- The Literary LIves of the Inklings: J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Owen Barfield, Charles Williams
- By: Philip Zaleski, Carol Zaleski
- Narrated by: John Curless
- Length: 26 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
C. S. Lewis is the 20th century's most widely read Christian writer and J. R. R. Tolkien its most beloved mythmaker. For three decades they and their closest associates formed a literary club known as the Inklings, which met weekly in Lewis' Oxford rooms and a nearby pub. They read aloud from works in progress, argued about anything that caught their fancy, and gave one another invaluable companionship, inspiration, and criticism.
-
-
If You Love Literature...
- By Ray M on 07-14-16
By: Philip Zaleski, and others
-
William Blake vs the World
- By: John Higgs
- Narrated by: John Higgs
- Length: 11 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A wild and unexpected journey through culture, science, philosophy, and religion to better understand the mercurial genius of William Blake.
-
-
Best book ever
- By idamae on 11-04-22
By: John Higgs
-
God’s Secretaries
- The Making of the King James Bible
- By: Adam Nicolson
- Narrated by: Clive Chafer
- Length: 8 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It is the greatest work of English prose ever written, and it is no coincidence that the translation was made at the moment “Englishness” and the English language had come into its first passionate maturity. Boisterous, elegant, subtle, majestic, finely nuanced, sonorous, and musical, the English of Jacobean England has a more encompassing idea of its own reach and scope than any before or since. It is a form of the language that drips with potency and sensitivity. The age, with all its conflicts, explains the book.
-
-
Not what I was expecting
- By Greg on 12-29-13
By: Adam Nicolson
-
C. S. Lewis - A Life
- Eccentric Genius, Reluctant Prophet
- By: Alister E. McGrath
- Narrated by: Robin Sachs
- Length: 13 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In honor of the 50th anniversary of C. S. Lewis' death, celebrated Oxford don Dr. Alister McGrath presents us with a compelling and definitive portrait of the life of C. S. Lewis, the author of the well-known Narnia series. For more than half a century, C. S. Lewis’ Narnia series has captured the imaginations of millions. In C. S. Lewis - A Life, Dr. Alister McGrath recounts the unlikely path of this Oxford don, who spent his days teaching English literature to the brightest students in the world and his spare time writing.
-
-
Awakening my curiosity and desire to read more!
- By Pearl Glacier on 03-13-13
-
Aquinas at Prayer
- The Bible, Mysticism and Poetry
- By: Paul Murray OP
- Narrated by: Paul Murray OP
- Length: 9 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Aquinas at Prayer draws attention to important aspects of Aquinas's life and work which have been all too often overlooked or forgotten. Today Aquinas is almost exclusively regarded as an outstanding scholastic philosopher and theologian. But what is little known is that Aquinas was, first and last, a teacher of the Bible - a Master of the Sacred Page. Moreover there is a distinctly mystical character to his theology. And, as a writer, he was not only a poet but, arguably, the greatest Latin poet of the Middle Ages.
-
-
The Veil of is Torn.... he is indeed a Saint
- By Jj on 02-26-15
By: Paul Murray OP
-
The Year of Our Lord 1943
- Christian Humanism in an Age of Crisis
- By: Alan Jacobs
- Narrated by: Paul Boehmer
- Length: 8 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
By early 1943, it had become increasingly clear the Allies would win the Second World War. Christian intellectuals on both sides of the Atlantic thought the soon-to-be-victorious nations were not culturally or morally prepared for their success. These Christian intellectuals - Jacques Maritain, T. S. Eliot, C. S. Lewis, W. H. Auden, and Simone Weil, among others - sought both to articulate a sober and reflective critique of their own culture and to outline a plan for the moral and spiritual regeneration of their countries in the post-war world.
-
-
The Audible is a Train Wreck
- By John on 09-04-18
By: Alan Jacobs
-
Religion for Atheists
- A Non-Believer's Guide to the Uses of Religion
- By: Alain de Botton
- Narrated by: Kris Dyer
- Length: 5 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The boring debate between fundamentalist believers and non-believers is finally moved on by Alain de Botton's inspiring new book, which boldly argues that the supernatural claims of religion are of course entirely false - and yet that religions still have important things to teach the secular world.
-
-
Disappointing, Erroneous, Implausible
- By Douglas C. Bates on 11-02-12
By: Alain de Botton
-
Dangerous Mystic
- Meister Eckhart's Path to the God Within
- By: Joel F. Harrington
- Narrated by: Mark Bramhall
- Length: 13 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Meister Eckhart was a medieval Christian mystic whose wisdom powerfully appeals to seekers seven centuries after his death. In the modern era, Eckhart's writings have struck a chord with thinkers as diverse as Heidegger, Merton, Sartre, John Paul II, and the current Dalai Lama. He is the inspiration for the best-selling New Age author Eckhart Tolle's pen name, and his 14th-century quotes have become an online sensation. Today, a variety of Christians, as well as many Zen Buddhists, Sufi Muslims, Jewish Cabbalists, and various spiritual seekers, all claim Eckhart as their own.
-
-
Meister Ekhart foisting his sexuality....
- By Kindle Customer on 08-08-19
-
Sailing the Wine-Dark Sea
- Why the Greeks Matter
- By: Thomas Cahill
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 7 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Best selling history writer Thomas Cahill continues his series on the roots of Western civilization with this volume about the contributions of ancient Greece to the development of contemporary culture. Tracing the origin of Greek culture in the migrations of armed Indo-European horsemen into Attica and the Peloponnesian peninsula, he follows their progress into the creation of the Greek city-states, the refinement of their machinery of war, and the flowering of intellectual and artistic culture.
-
-
Super super
- By Richard on 12-28-03
By: Thomas Cahill
-
Brand Luther
- How an Unheralded Young Minister Turned His Small German Town into a Center of Publishing, Made Himself the Most Famous Man in Europe - and Started the Protestant Reformation
- By: Andrew Pettegree
- Narrated by: Paul Hecht
- Length: 11 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When an obscure monk named Martin Luther tacked his theses on the door of the Wittenberg church in 1517, protesting corrupt practices, he was virtually unknown. Within months his ideas spread across Germany then all of Europe; within years their author was not just famous but infamous, responsible for catalyzing the violent wave of religious reform that would come to be known as the Protestant Reformation and engulfing Europe in decades of bloody war.
-
-
Informed, Impacting
- By Bill Martin on 01-14-16
By: Andrew Pettegree
-
A Life Observed
- A Spiritual Biography of C.S. Lewis
- By: Devin Brown
- Narrated by: Jon Gauger
- Length: 7 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A Life Observed tells the inspiring story of Lewis' spiritual journey from cynical atheist to joyous Christian. Drawing on Lewis' autobiographical works, books by those who knew him personally, and his apologetic and fictional writing, this spiritual biography brings the beloved author’s story to life while shedding light on his best-known works.
-
-
A beautifully written remembrance
- By Rob on 02-06-18
By: Devin Brown
-
A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare
- 1599
- By: James Shapiro
- Narrated by: James Shapiro
- Length: 6 hrs and 28 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
1599 was an epochal year for Shakespeare and England. During that year, Shakespeare wrote four of his most famous plays: Henry the Fifth, Julius Caesar, As You Like It, and, most remarkably, Hamlet; Elizabethans sent off an army to crush an Irish rebellion, weathered an Armada threat from Spain, gambled on a fledgling East India Company, and waited to see who would succeed their aging and childless queen.
-
-
Note!--Abridged version
- By Scott on 01-05-16
By: James Shapiro
-
Natasha's Dance
- A Cultural History of Russia
- By: Orlando Figes
- Narrated by: Ric Jerrom
- Length: 29 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Beginning in the 18th century with the building of St. Petersburg - a 'window on the West' - and culminating with the challenges posed to Russian identity by the Soviet regime, Figes examines how writers, artists, and musicians grappled with the idea of Russia itself - its character, spiritual essence and destiny. He skillfully interweaves the great works - by Dostoevsky, Stravinsky, and Chagall - with folk embroidery, peasant songs, religious icons and all the customs of daily life, from food and drink to bathing habits to beliefs about the spirit world.
-
-
A Kaleidescopic panorama of an enigmatic culture.
- By Tarquin on 02-13-19
By: Orlando Figes
-
The Man Who Invented Fiction
- How Cervantes Ushered in the Modern World
- By: William Egginton
- Narrated by: Michael Butler Murray
- Length: 8 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the early 17th century, a crippled, graying, almost toothless veteran of Spain's wars against the Ottoman Empire published a novel. It was the story of a poor nobleman, his brain addled from studying too many novels of chivalry, who deludes himself that he is a knight errant and sets off on hilarious adventures. That story, Don Quixote, went on to sell more copies than any other book beside the Bible, making its author, Miguel de Cervantes, the single most-read author in human history.
-
-
Very Interesting and Informative, but Poorly Read
- By LCorSMT on 06-21-23
By: William Egginton
People who viewed this also viewed...
-
Johann Sebastian Bach
- The Learned Musician
- By: Christoph Wolff
- Narrated by: John Pruden
- Length: 21 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Although we have heard the music of J. S. Bach in countless performances and recordings, the composer himself still comes across only as an enigmatic figure in a single familiar portrait. As we mark the 250th anniversary of Bach's death, author Christoph Wolff presents a new picture that brings to life this towering figure of the Baroque era. This engaging new biography portrays Bach as the living, breathing, and sometimes imperfect human being that he was, while bringing to bear all the advances of the last half-century of Bach scholarship.
-
-
Has all the boring details...
- By L. Jensen on 05-14-19
By: Christoph Wolff
-
Bach's Musical Universe
- The Composer and His Work
- By: Christoph Wolff
- Narrated by: Paul Heitsch
- Length: 13 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A concentrated study of Johann Sebastian Bach's creative output and greatest pieces, capturing the essence of his art.
By: Christoph Wolff
-
Language of the Spirit
- An Introduction to Classical Music
- By: Jan Swafford
- Narrated by: Tom Perkins
- Length: 9 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In Language of the Spirit, renowned music scholar Jan Swafford argues that we have it all wrong: classical music has something for everyone and is accessible to all. Ranging from Gregorian chant to Handel's Messiah, from Vivaldi's The Four Seasons to the postmodern work of Philip Glass, Swafford is an affable and expert guide to the genre. He traces the history of Western music, introduces listeners to the most important composers and compositions, and explains the underlying structure and logic of their music.
-
-
Great intro to various important composers & works
- By Jay G on 06-14-18
By: Jan Swafford
-
Fryderyk Chopin
- A Life and Times
- By: Dr. Alan Walker
- Narrated by: Corrie James
- Length: 23 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Based on 10 years of research and a vast cache of primary sources located in archives in Warsaw, Paris, London, New York, and Washington, D.C., Alan Walker's monumental Fryderyk Chopin: A Life and Times is the most comprehensive biography of the great Polish composer to appear in English in more than a century. Walker's work is a corrective biography, intended to dispel the many myths and legends that continue to surround Chopin.
-
-
This book is a masterpiece
- By Carpe Diem on 02-09-19
By: Dr. Alan Walker
-
Elements of Jazz: From Cakewalks to Fusion
- By: Bill Messenger, The Great Courses
- Narrated by: Bill Messenger
- Length: 5 hrs and 59 mins
- Original Recording
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Jazz is a uniquely American art form, one of America's great contributions to not only musical culture, but world culture, with each generation of musicians applying new levels of creativity that take the music in unexpected directions that defy definition, category, and stagnation. Now you can learn the basics and history of this intoxicating genre in an eight-lecture series that is as free-flowing and original as the art form itself.
-
-
A Disappointingly Distorted, Myopic View Of Jazz
- By Parallax View on 08-18-13
By: Bill Messenger, and others
-
Mozart
- The Reign of Love
- By: Jan Swafford
- Narrated by: Tim Campbell
- Length: 30 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Like Jan Swafford’s biographies Beethoven and Johannes Brahms, Mozart is the complete exhumation of a genius in his life and ours: A man who would enrich the world with his talent for centuries to come and who would immeasurably shape classical music. As Swafford reveals, it’s nearly impossible to understand classical music’s origins and indeed its evolutions, as well as the Baroque period, without studying the man himself.
-
-
Comprehensive Bio
- By Judy on 01-07-21
By: Jan Swafford
-
Johann Sebastian Bach
- The Learned Musician
- By: Christoph Wolff
- Narrated by: John Pruden
- Length: 21 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Although we have heard the music of J. S. Bach in countless performances and recordings, the composer himself still comes across only as an enigmatic figure in a single familiar portrait. As we mark the 250th anniversary of Bach's death, author Christoph Wolff presents a new picture that brings to life this towering figure of the Baroque era. This engaging new biography portrays Bach as the living, breathing, and sometimes imperfect human being that he was, while bringing to bear all the advances of the last half-century of Bach scholarship.
-
-
Has all the boring details...
- By L. Jensen on 05-14-19
By: Christoph Wolff
-
Bach's Musical Universe
- The Composer and His Work
- By: Christoph Wolff
- Narrated by: Paul Heitsch
- Length: 13 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A concentrated study of Johann Sebastian Bach's creative output and greatest pieces, capturing the essence of his art.
By: Christoph Wolff
-
Language of the Spirit
- An Introduction to Classical Music
- By: Jan Swafford
- Narrated by: Tom Perkins
- Length: 9 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In Language of the Spirit, renowned music scholar Jan Swafford argues that we have it all wrong: classical music has something for everyone and is accessible to all. Ranging from Gregorian chant to Handel's Messiah, from Vivaldi's The Four Seasons to the postmodern work of Philip Glass, Swafford is an affable and expert guide to the genre. He traces the history of Western music, introduces listeners to the most important composers and compositions, and explains the underlying structure and logic of their music.
-
-
Great intro to various important composers & works
- By Jay G on 06-14-18
By: Jan Swafford
-
Fryderyk Chopin
- A Life and Times
- By: Dr. Alan Walker
- Narrated by: Corrie James
- Length: 23 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Based on 10 years of research and a vast cache of primary sources located in archives in Warsaw, Paris, London, New York, and Washington, D.C., Alan Walker's monumental Fryderyk Chopin: A Life and Times is the most comprehensive biography of the great Polish composer to appear in English in more than a century. Walker's work is a corrective biography, intended to dispel the many myths and legends that continue to surround Chopin.
-
-
This book is a masterpiece
- By Carpe Diem on 02-09-19
By: Dr. Alan Walker
-
Elements of Jazz: From Cakewalks to Fusion
- By: Bill Messenger, The Great Courses
- Narrated by: Bill Messenger
- Length: 5 hrs and 59 mins
- Original Recording
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Jazz is a uniquely American art form, one of America's great contributions to not only musical culture, but world culture, with each generation of musicians applying new levels of creativity that take the music in unexpected directions that defy definition, category, and stagnation. Now you can learn the basics and history of this intoxicating genre in an eight-lecture series that is as free-flowing and original as the art form itself.
-
-
A Disappointingly Distorted, Myopic View Of Jazz
- By Parallax View on 08-18-13
By: Bill Messenger, and others
-
Mozart
- The Reign of Love
- By: Jan Swafford
- Narrated by: Tim Campbell
- Length: 30 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Like Jan Swafford’s biographies Beethoven and Johannes Brahms, Mozart is the complete exhumation of a genius in his life and ours: A man who would enrich the world with his talent for centuries to come and who would immeasurably shape classical music. As Swafford reveals, it’s nearly impossible to understand classical music’s origins and indeed its evolutions, as well as the Baroque period, without studying the man himself.
-
-
Comprehensive Bio
- By Judy on 01-07-21
By: Jan Swafford
-
Composers
- Their Lives and Works
- By: DK
- Narrated by: Richard Trinder
- Length: 13 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Introduced with more than 90 biographical entries that trace the friendships, loves, and rivalries that inspired each musical genius and their work. Profiles offer revealing insights into what drove each individual to create the musical masterpieces - symphonies, concertos, and operatic scores - that changed the direction of classical music and are still celebrated as masterpieces today.
-
-
Exceeded my expectations
- By PavFan on 02-21-22
By: DK
-
Beethoven
- Anguish and Triumph
- By: Jan Swafford
- Narrated by: Michael Prichard
- Length: 39 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Jan Swafford's biographies have established him as a revered music historian, capable of bringing his subjects vibrantly to life. His magnificent new biography of Ludwig van Beethoven peels away layers of legend to get to the living, breathing human being who composed some of the world's most iconic music.
-
-
Huge book - musical reader appreciates best
- By DMgraphicGlass on 01-20-15
By: Jan Swafford
-
The Great Passion
- By: James Runcie
- Narrated by: Pip Torrens
- Length: 8 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1727, Stefan Silbermann is a grief-stricken 13-year-old, struggling with the death of his mother and his removal to a school in distant Leipzig. Despite his father’s insistence that he try not to think of his mother too much, Stefan is haunted by her absence, and, to make matters worse, he’s bullied by his new classmates. But when the school’s cantor, Johann Sebastian Bach, takes notice of his new pupil’s beautiful singing voice and draws him from the choir to be a soloist, Stefan’s life is permanently changed.
-
-
Simple Riveting!
- By Tim McGreer on 11-24-23
By: James Runcie
-
Beethoven
- A Life in Nine Pieces
- By: Laura Tunbridge
- Narrated by: Laura Tunbridge
- Length: 7 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
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.
-
-
Engaging, interesting, nice format
- By George on 07-04-22
By: Laura Tunbridge
-
Maestros and Their Music
- The Art and Alchemy of Conducting
- By: John Mauceri
- Narrated by: John Mauceri
- Length: 9 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
John Mauceri brings a lifetime of experience to bear in an unprecedented, hugely informative, consistently entertaining exploration of his profession, rich with anecdotes from decades of working alongside the greatest names of the music world. With candor and humor, Mauceri makes clear that conducting is itself a composition: of legacy and tradition, techniques handed down from master to apprentice - and more than a trace of ineffable magic.
-
-
Disappointing. Dry.
- By Jane on 12-30-17
By: John Mauceri
-
The Life and Works of Bach
- By: Jeremy Siepmann
- Narrated by: Jeremy Siepmann, John Shrapnel, Trevor Nichols, and others
- Length: 4 hrs and 34 mins
- Original Recording
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Although now beloved and revered by millions as the greatest composer who ever lived, Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750) was best known in his lifetime as an organist, and was eclipsed in fame as a composer by two of his twenty children. For the last twenty-seven years of his life he was a schoolteacher and choir director whose duties extended to meal supervision and dormitory inspection. Yet throughout his career he composed a vast body of music which is amongst the most joyful, dancing and enrapturing ever written.
-
-
A good introduction to Bach's Life and Work
- By Dr on 01-10-15
By: Jeremy Siepmann
-
The Cello Suites
- J. S. Bach, Pablo Casals, and the Search for a Baroque Masterpiece
- By: Eric Siblin
- Narrated by: David de Vries
- Length: 8 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
One fateful evening, journalist Eric Siblin attended a recital of Johann Sebastian Bach's Cello Suites and began an epic quest that would unravel three centuries of intrigue, politics, and passion. Winner of the Mavis Gallant Prize for Nonfiction and the McAuslan First Book Prize, The Cello Suites weaves together three dramatic narratives: the disappearance of Bach's manuscript in the 18th century; Pablo Casals's discovery and popularization of the music in Spain in the late-19th century; and Siblin's infatuation with the suites in the present day.
-
-
Bach Stories with Brilliance
- By RFC on 03-13-24
By: Eric Siblin
-
Counterpoint
- A Memoir of Bach and Mourning
- By: Philip Kennicott
- Narrated by: Paul Heitsch
- Length: 8 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
As his mother was dying, Philip Kennicott began to listen to the music of Bach obsessively. It was the only music that didn't seem trivial or irrelevant, and it enabled him to both experience her death and remove himself from it. He spent the next five years trying to learn one of the composer's greatest keyboard masterpieces, the Goldberg Variations. In Counterpoint, he recounts his efforts to rise to the challenge, and to fight through his grief by coming to terms with his memories of a difficult, complicated childhood.
-
-
Excellent for musicians and music appreciators!
- By K on 12-01-20
By: Philip Kennicott
-
For the Love of Music
- A Conductor's Guide to the Art of Listening
- By: John Mauceri
- Narrated by: John Mauceri
- Length: 6 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
With a lifetime of experience, profound knowledge and understanding, and heartwarming appreciation, an internationally celebrated conductor and teacher answers the questions: Why should I listen to classical music? How can I get the most from the listening experience? Unpretentious, graceful, instructive, this is a book for the aficionado, the novice, and anyone looking to have the love of music fired within them.
-
-
Divine Time with a Maestro
- By Meg on 12-18-19
By: John Mauceri
-
The Fall of Robespierre
- 24 Hours in Revolutionary Paris
- By: Colin Jones
- Narrated by: Sasha Higgins
- Length: 18 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The day of 9 Thermidor (July 27, 1794) is universally acknowledged as a major turning-point in the history of the French Revolution. At midnight, Maximilien Robespierre was planning to destroy one of the most dangerous plots that the Revolution had faced. By midnight at the close of the day, his world had been turned upside down. He was an outlaw, on the run, and himself wanted for conspiracy against the Republic. He shot himself shortly afterwards. Half-dead, the guillotine finished him off. The Fall of Robespierre provides an hour-by-hour analysis of these twenty-four hours.
-
-
Really interesting but. . .
- By Alan M on 08-14-23
By: Colin Jones
-
Bach, Beethoven, and the Boys
- Music History as It Ought to Be Taught
- By: David W. Barber
- Narrated by: Jean-Michel George
- Length: 3 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
David W. Barber has delighted fans around the world with Accidentals on Purpose, When the Fat Lady Sings, and other internationally best-selling books of musical humor. His best-selling Bach, Beethoven and the Boys chronicles the lives of the great (and not-so-great) composers, exploring their sex lives, exposing their foibles, and expanding on our understanding of these all-too-human creatures.
-
-
Wanted: More audiobooks from the author
- By Ruffkutt on 08-20-18
By: David W. Barber
-
The Enlightenment That Failed
- Ideas, Revolution, and Democratic Defeat, 1748-1830
- By: Jonathan I. Israel
- Narrated by: James Cameron Stewart
- Length: 60 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Enlightenment That Failed explores the growing rift between those Enlightenment trends and initiatives that appealed exclusively to elites and those aspiring to enlighten all of society by raising mankind's awareness, freedoms, and educational level generally. Jonathan I. Israel explains why the democratic and radical secularizing tendency of the Western Enlightenment, after gaining some notable successes during the revolutionary era (1775-1820) in numerous countries, especially in Europe, North America, and Spanish America, ultimately failed.
-
-
Enlightened radical
- By Anonymous User on 07-02-22
What listeners say about Bach
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- David Steinsaltz
- 03-22-15
Brilliant book badly presented
Gardiner's brilliant investigation of the man through the music is thrilling and moving. Ferguson's reading could be worse, but not much. His intonation is generally passable, but he is clearly not competent to read this book. Technical music terms, but also multisyllabic academic expressions flummox him, receiving weird emphases and pauses that force the reader to guess what is really being said, not to mention disrupting the illusion that the reader is speaking with understanding. That's not even to count the sporadic errors like "Bach finds the means to take the string out of the aggression".
Worst of all is his pronunciation of German, which is crucial to a biography of Bach. One wonders why Ferguson didn't look at the text and just decide that it would be too embarrassing: Either he should pass on the job, or spend an hour or two at least learning some of the basics of German pronunciation. He sounds like a computer programmed to pronounce English written text, fed with German writing and just ploughing through it. It would be barely less comprehensible -- and less disruptive to the reader -- if the German expressions and texts were simply cut out and replaced with silence or white noise..
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
35 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Stefan
- 01-16-15
Fire the Reader!!!
Gardiner's book is fascinating, personal and based on current research, but it would be hard to imagine a reading that was less cognizant of musical or theological terms. In nearly every paragraph, the reader mispronounces terms in Latin, Italian, German and even English! It was infuriating at times, making it a struggle to listen to the end.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
20 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Tom
- 09-09-14
A Deep History of Bach
Is there anything you would change about this book?
I listen to about three books a week, so I have a broad experience in the varying qualities of books of various genres. I've listened to longer histories, Toland's biography of Hitler, for example, and I have to say that this history of Bach must be one of those books that just needs to be read, not heard. The narration is very precise, which does not necessarily equal pleasant reading. I ended up returning this book, simply because there was not enough movement in the narrative to maintain my interest.
What was the most interesting aspect of this story? The least interesting?
I did appreciate the scholarship in this book, but it does not make for interesting listening.
Did Antony Ferguson do a good job differentiating all the characters? How?
None at all.
Could you see Bach being made into a movie or a TV series? Who should the stars be?
Not a chance.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
13 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Silesia
- 12-29-17
BacK ?? A bad joke !
How do I wish I had read the reviews. It is all there. When in the beginning the name pronounced as „BacK“, I knew that I could not go on. That such a brilliant author would be paired with such an incompetent reader speaks very poorly about audible. Sadly, there is no return, nor any consolation for crushed expectations.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
7 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Jean
- 09-29-14
Interesting
The author is a well known Conductor in England. He is the founder of the Monteverdi Choir and the English Baroque Soloists. In some ways this book is an autobiography of Gardiner and his search for information to understand Bach, wrapped in a biography of Bach.
Gardiner tells of the difficulties Bach had with his employers throughout his career and his recurrent refusal to accept authority. He tells of Bach’s life as an orphan and his problems with schools. Gardiner book is dense with fact and full of diversions. The book is also rich in informal conjectures. He writes of Back’s gradual turn from what listeners today might consider “the parochiality of the liturgical context” to “music that shows more and more signs of an almost limitless appeal.” Gardiner speculates “It is entirely possible that Bach’s growing disenchantment with Cantatas in the 1730s arose from a since that the communality of belief that he had once shared with his congregation was breaking down, and that, for whatever reason, he was now failing to make his mark.”
The author writes in a lively, conversational style. Gardiner has done an excellent job of painting us a picture of Bach considering how little information about him is available. Antony Ferguson does a great job narrating the book.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
7 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Sudi
- 03-30-15
3 Stars for Being Too Deep for Me
I'm trying, as an adult beginner, to learn something about music by taking violin lessons. Even playing a few Bach things, on an elementary level. The instrument is a beast and I was hoping to glean some insight into the musical process by listening to this tome.
Unfortunately, this is the second book I have had to abandon. (The first, "The Night Circus", was ended mid-listen because of lack of plot movement and character development -- it was a novel, unlike this history/biography. That abandonment was due to the author's superficial approach to the novel's structure, unlike this book's profile: way too technical and fathoms too deep for my understanding.) So alas, "Bach: Music in the Castle of Heaven" is too esoteric for me, a mere musical bimbo, wanting to hear about a genius I have only recently begun to appreciate.
Someone who has a firm foundation in musical studies and performance will probably find this book accessible. I was unable to intellectually crack the musical terminologies and references to Bach and other artists' works-- through my own unfamiliarity, not because the book was poorly written or faulty in its structure. I often thought while listening that the one advantage of this audio production was (maybe) the musical references should have actually been played and incorporated into the text since there would be a reference to a passage, not only by Bach but by some other composer, and I would be lost. I just didn't know the piece and the thread of purpose in its mention was meaningless to me.
I don't know German, either, so there was nothing to forgive on my end for mispronunciation of German terms by Mr. Ferguson, something mentioned in other reviews.
But that was me. If you know music and didn't study French for your art history degree, you might really get into this work. Because chewing through and ingesting this information is real work.
And by the way, great title, Mr. Gardiner.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
5 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Kathryn
- 11-15-14
Better read than listen to this one!
For a book about a musician, this book has the least musical narrator I've come upon. His accent is so uneven. Is he British? Aussie? American? When he is quoting something where a slight to the source is implied he seems to put on an American southerner accent. Well, the question alone of what he was trying for with this strange mix of accents is quite distracting. I really feel like he ruins a most excellent book. John Eliot Gardner's writing dances along like his conducting a Bach Cantatta. To bad the narrator has not the least lilt in his voice to accompany such a soaring narrative!
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
5 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- William Maxim
- 01-10-15
Good English, poor German
I loved the narrator's moderate British diction. He failed, however, to render the frequent German titles and phrases in a consistently accurate pronunciation. He seems to know that "ei" is different from "ie," that "v" is spoken as "f" and "w" as "v," but he rarely succeeds in getting it right. Probably he took a couple of years of college German and passed at the bottom of his class.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
4 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Morgan
- 09-12-15
Great book, frustrating narrator
This is a wonderful and thorough book ruined in this instance by a bad narrator. He has the annoying habit of halting before German words or phrases, and his pronunciation of words such as "Thuringia" is inconsistent throughout. It is all the more disappointing after hearing such flawless narrators as Grover Gardner and Simon Vance. I hope this is re-done, because I would like to enjoy it in audiobook form, but not like this.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
3 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Malachiter
- 04-05-21
Erudite book wrecked by narrator's pronunciation
Antony Ferguson has a fine voice, but I wonder why he would elect to read a book filled with references which he clearly lacks the education to impart?
John Eliot Gardiner is an erudite curator of the finest Western musical art, fluent in Italian, German, French, and Latin. He writes with the authority of one who assumes you will follow his switches between language, because to stop for every translation would be cumbersome. Gardiner writes for an educated audience. I would think it obvious that a reader of this book should feel fully confident in the pronunciation of those languages before taking on a project of this erudition. Unfortunately, not only do cringeworthy mispronunciations happen every minute in this reading, but even simple English language words are savaged. Was Mr. Ferguson in a rush to get this recorded? As an Englishman and classically trained actor, does he struggle with his native language as much as this reading would suggest? Worse, there are strange pauses in the reading rhythm that suggest that when he arrives at a word he doesn't know, he leaves an editing space, then fills it in later (often incorrectly.) This amounts to a kind of halting, monotonous experience lacking in phrasing, narrative tension and, ... dare I say it ... music! I hope Audible will find a reader who is as conversant in continental languages as Gardiner, in order to do justice to the author's deep research and humanity.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
2 people found this helpful