(Vocals, b. 1930) Robert Calvin Brooks was born in Rosemark, Tennessee. He began recording in 1951 and was associated with B.B. King, Little Junior Parker, Johnny Ace and others in Memphis. A suave, deep-voiced blues romantic, he signed with Duke Records in 1952 and was one of the most consistent hitmakers in the soul ...
(Vocal/instrumental group, 1934–42) The Blue Ridge Playboys were a key early western-swing band. Based in Houston, they were formed in 1934 and were fronted by fiddler Leon ‘Pappy’ Selph (1914–99). Although Selph remained musically active to his death, the original band broke up soon after the US entry into the Second World War. The Playboys were not particularly ...
(Vocal duo, 1936–76) This prettiest and most poignant of country harmony duos was first heard on southern radio in 1935. The North Carolina-born Bolick brothers – Bill (b. 1917) and Earl (1919–98) – also recorded prolifically, accompanying themselves on mandolin and guitar, from 1936 to 1951, making definitive discs of traditional Americana like ‘Down On The Banks ...
(Vocal group, 1958–present) 1963’s ‘Hippy Hippy Shake’ came close to topping the UK chart, and it was to be one of the first examples of Merseybeat to enter the US Top 30. After a soundalike follow-up, ‘Good Golly Miss Molly’, peaked at a domestic No. 11, further hits were sporadic, though 1964’s ‘You’re No Good’ was ...
Though art music since the war tended more often to define itself in opposition to rock and commercial pop music, signs of mutual regard were already emerging in the 1960s. While it is Stockhausen’s face that stands out from the crowd on the front cover of the Beatles’ 1967 album Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, it was Berio ...
Camille Saint-Saëns (1835–1921) is said to have written the first film score with L’assassinat du duc de Guise (‘The Assassination of the Duke of Guise’, c. 1908). Many composers in the US and Europe followed suit, although few wished to make a career in films. A famous exception was Erich Wolfgang Korngold (1897–1957), whose scores include the Academy Award-winning The ...
The influence of jazz on concert music stretches back almost to the emergence of jazz itself from roots in gospel, ragtime and blues. One of the most popular black American dances of the 1890s was taken up by Debussy in his ‘Golliwog’s Cakewalk’ (from the piano suite Children’s Corner, 1906–08). Ragtime found its way into Satie’s ballet Parade and ...
The legend of Sun Records seems to expand and shine brighter with every passing year, as successive generations discover the almost unbelievable array of musical gems that were created at that modest little studio at 706 Union Avenue, Memphis. Sun was the brainchild of one man and it is no exaggeration to say that without his contribution, not ...
From its roots, country music has been associated with simplicity – in melody, in subject-matter and in instrumentation, and it is this that has perhaps ensured its longevity. However, all good musicians make their craft look simple, and the history of country music is packed with virtuosos, from the pioneering banjoist Earl Scruggs, through ...
In the Renaissance, both four- and five-course (eight- or 10-stringed) guitars were played, both of them notably smaller than the modern instrument and with only a shallow waist. In the Baroque period, players seem to have switched over to an instrument with six courses (six or 12 strings), which remains the standard guitar configuration. The instrument at this ...
Acoustic Guitar Throughout its history, the guitar has – perhaps more than any other instrument – managed to bridge the gap between the often disconnected worlds of classical, folk and popular music. Its roots go back to Babylonian times; by the 1500s it was prevalent in Spain, and is still sometimes called the Spanish guitar. Medieval versions – ...
Few would deny that the blues has played a more important role in the history of popular culture than any other musical genre. As well as being a complete art form in itself, it is a direct ancestor to the different types of current popular music we know and love today. Without the blues there would have been no Beatles ...
When Jimmie Rodgers and The Carter Family became country music’s first superstars in 1927, their audience was the farmers, miners, wives and other blue-collar workers of the rural South. It was an audience that left school early for a life of hard work in isolated communities. When those men and women gathered at a tavern or schoolroom on ...
In the nineteenth century, country music belonged to fireside and family, to the frontier town and the backwoods hamlet. Four decades into the twentieth, it was utterly transformed, driven headlong into the new world of the new century. First, fiddlers’ conventions and other public events provided a context of competition and offered the musician the chance ...
Like a great river that runs endlessly, forming numerous tributary streams as it flows, jazz continues to evolve over time. And no matter how far the River Jazz may flow from its source – whether through stylistic evolution or technological innovation – the essential spirit of the music remains intact. Granted, the more academic and esoteric extrapolations of ...
AUTHORITATIVE
An extensive music information resource, bringing together the talents and expertise of a wide range of editors and musicologists, including Stanley Sadie, Charles Wilson, Paul Du Noyer, Tony Byworth, Bob Allen, Howard Mandel, Cliff Douse, William Schafer, John Wilson...
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Classical, Rock, Blues, Jazz, Country and more. Flame Tree has been making encyclopaedias and guides about music for over 20 years. Now Flame Tree Pro brings together a huge canon of carefully curated information on genres, styles, artists and instruments. It's a perfect tool for study, and entertaining too, a great companion to our music books.
David Bowie
Fantastic new, unofficial biography covers
his life, music, art and movies, with a
sweep of incredible photographs.