Tag Archives: books

Playing for Singers: The Mike Greensill Method

BR-Playing-for-SingersAuthor Mike Greensill, a member of Local 6 (San Francisco, CA), provides a practical guide to the art of vocal accompaniment for jazz or cabaret pianists. Topics covered include: arranging, chart writing, rehearsal techniques, duo/trio accompaniment, “out of tempo” accompaniment, and the accompanist as music director. This book also contains numerous musical examples.

Playing for Singers: The Mike Greensill Method, Art of Accompaniment for the Jazz or Cabaret Piano Player, by Mike Greensill, www.shermusic.com.

Charles Ives

Charles Ives’s Musical Universe

Charles IvesIn this landmark volume on Charles Ives, the largest ever published, detailed analyses are provided across his output, from Variations on America to the Universe Symphony, at last revealing much of the structural “code” that underlies his music. There is no comparable volume in existence that provides a similar level or breadth of insight across the composer’s output. Forensically answering, too, the challenges of revisionism, the real Charles Ives re-emerges for the first time in three decades—no longer an invention and captive of an alternate universe. Ives and his music emerge taller and more remarkable than ever.

Charles Ives’s Musical Universe, by Antony Cooke, Infinity Publishing, www.buybooksontheweb.com.

The Real Book

The Real Book: Volume V, C Instruments

The Real BookThe Real Book is Hal Leonard’s alternative to poorly designed, inaccurate, badly edited fake books on the market today. The Real Book is extremely accurate, neat, and designed for practical use, and each of its more than 400 songs is fully licensed for use. Volume V highlights major jazz composers of the last 60 years, with special attention given to the 1960s and 1970s. Included arrangements represent work of the jazz giants of the last 40 years—Miles, Corea, Evans, Jobim, Mulligan, Siver, and Powell, as well as many newer artists.

The Real Book: Volume V, C Instruments, www.halleonard.com.

Richard Wagner

Richard Wagner: The Lighter Side

Richard WagnerThis unique, entertaining, and eclectic book about Richard Wagner features a wide range of curious facts, lively anecdotes, and thought-provoking quotations relating to the man and his music. Author Terry Quinn presents hundreds of tidbits and features on each of the composer’s 13 operas and the challenges encountered in staging them. He explores Wagnerian directors, conductors, singers, key people in his life, as well as his dysfunctional family. The book is illustrated by colorful photographs, old and new, as well as reproductions of rare ephemera.

Richard Wagner: The Lighter Side, by Terry Quinn, www.amadeuspress.com

Bass Hanon

Bass Hanon: 75 Exercises to Build Endurance & Flexibility for Bass Guitar Players

Bass HanonThis bass guitar exercise book will help you increase your endurance and flexibility, challenging you in fun and methodical ways. Chop building topics include: left-hand finger patterns, pull-offs and hammer-ons, harmonic technique, string crossing, arpeggios, scales, blues sequences, chords, articulations, rhythms, and harmonics.

Bass Hanon: 75 Exercises to Build Endurance & Flexibility for Bass Guitar Players, by Scott Barnard, www.halleonard.com.

Led Zeppelin Celebration Day

Led Zeppelin Celebration Day

Led Zeppelin Celebration DayOn December 10, 2007 Led Zeppelin reunited for an Ahmet Ertegun tribute concert at London’s O2 Arena, which set a Guinness World Record for highest demand for tickets for one concert. A film of the performance, Celebration Day, was released in 2012. This songbook contains new transcriptions for 16 classic Led Zeppelin songs in tablature with chord symbols and diagrams, plus full lyrics to songs like “Good Times Bad Times,” “Ramble On,” “Since I’ve Been Loving You,” “Stairway to Heaven,” “Whole Lotta Love,” and “Kashmir.”

Led Zeppelin Celebration Day, Alfred Music, www.alfred.com.

Banjo Aerobics: A 50-Week Workout Program for Developing, Improving, and Maintaining Banjo Technique

Banjo Aerobics: A 50-Week Workout Program for Developing, Improving, and Maintaining Banjo Technique

 

Banjo Aerobics: A 50-Week Workout Program for Developing, Improving, and Maintaining Banjo TechniqueThis book, designed for all levels, will help you improve on basic techniques to play today’s traditional music, as well as many other styles, from old-time music to pop. With 50 distinct exercises, the book provides a year’s worth of practice material with a two-week vacation. Each exercise is labeled by playing/musical style, so you can focus on your favorites and skip around as you venture into new styles of playing and music. Along the way, you will improve your speed, dexterity, coordination, and accuracy, as you expand your melodic and harmonic vocabulary and knowledge of the fingerboard.

Banjo Aerobics: A 50-Week Workout Program for Developing, Improving, and Maintaining Banjo Technique, by Michael Bremer, Hal Leonard Corporation, www.halleonard.com.

The Beatles in 100 Objects

The Beatles in 100 Objects

The Beatles in 100 ObjectsThe British Invasion and Beatlemania set off a global revolution that influenced music, fashion, politics, and religion. One hundred of the most famous or influential Beatles objects—from instruments to outfits to handwritten notes, and more are explored in The Beatles in 100 Objects. Brian Southall, director of PR and Publicity at EMI Music during the Beatles years, describes each of the items and their significance in Beatles history. Each object has been colorfully photographed in this unique book.

The Beatles in 100 Objects by Brian Southall, Sterling Publishing, www.sterlingpublishing.com.

A View from the Side

A View from the Side: Stories and Perspectives on the Music Indust

A View from the SideA View from the Side is a unique look at the music business through the eyes of Local 802 (New York City) bassist Michael Visceglia. In this book he provides an insider’s look at the lives, aspirations, misadventures, phenomenal success, and tragic failure of some leading bass players. Visceglia has many years of experience playing professionally and has toured with Suzanne Vega and John Cale, and played bass for the Broadway show Kinky Boots. He includes revealing interviews with some of today’s top bassists, such as Lee Sklar of Local 47 (Los Angeles, CA) and fellow Local 802 members Will Lee and Tony Levin.

A View from the Side: Stories and Perspectives on the Music Industryby Michael Visceglia, Wizdom Media, www.wizdom-media.com.

The iPad in the Music Studio: Connecting Your iPad to Mics, Mixers, Instruments, Computers, and More

The iPad in the Music Studio: Connecting Your iPad to Mics, Mixers, Instruments, Computers, and More

The iPad in the Music Studio: Connecting Your iPad to Mics, Mixers, Instruments, Computers, and MoreiPads can bump up spontaneity and creativity in music production. The iPad in the Music Studio takes readers on a tour of the latest iPad-related music hardware and software. It includes information on technological innovations like hardware to link mics and instruments for live multi-track recording, controlling desktop software with an iPad, using iPads and iPhones with mixers, iPad and Guitar EFX software and hardware, DJ equipment and apps, and using the iPad to publish and distribute music through social media.

The iPad in the Music Studio, by Thomas Rudolph and Vincent Leonard,
Hal Leonard Corporation, www.halleonard.com.