Edward ‘Kid’ Ory was born in LaPlace, Louisiana in 1886. He learned trombone and led a group of young musicians, the Woodland Band, which he took to New Orleans around 1908. He played with veteran jazzmen in the following years and gained a reputation as a powerful ensemble player and inspired soloist, especially where the blues were ...
‘Medieval’ as a concept is very hard to define, and the period itself is just as difficult to delineate. It was a term invented by Renaissance writers who wished to make a distinction between their modernity and what had gone before. Although the onset of the Renaissance is often taken to be around the beginning of the fourteenth century, ...
‘Renaissance’ is a French word meaning ‘rebirth’. It has been used since the nineteenth century to describe the period between c. 1300 and 1600. Three hundred years is a long time for a single historical or cultural period, and the strain shows in any attempt to define the term ‘Renaissance’. The cultural phenomenon central to the Renaissance was a revival ...
Larry Coryell (b. 1943), a father of jazz-rock fusion, has recorded more than 70 albums over the past 35 years. Born in Galveston, Texas, Coryell tried his hand at a number of instruments before settling on the guitar. Chet Atkins, Chuck Berry and Wes Montgomery were major influences. As a child Coryell studied piano, switching to ...
British singer-songwriter and guitarist John Martyn (b. 1948) was born Iain David McGeachy in England. In his 40-year career he has released 20 studio albums. Martyn’s parents divorced when he was five, and he spent his childhood in England and Scotland. Martyn’s musical career began when he was 17. He blended blues and folk into a unique style, working ...
Highly respected blues guitarist Rory Gallagher was born in Ballyshannon, Ireland in 1948, and grew up in Cork. After learning his trade as a teenager playing in Irish show bands, Gallagher formed the power trio Taste in 1966. The band released two studio and two live albums. Shortly after their appearance at the 1970 Isle of Wight Festival ...
Blues and hard-rock guitarist Gary Moore was born in Belfast, Northern Ireland in 1952. He began playing the acoustic guitar at the age of eight, acquiring his first electric model at 14. Moore learned to play right-handed, despite being naturally left-handed. In 1969, he joined Skid Row, an Irish blues-rock group that featured Phil Lynott on ...
Mark Tremonti (b. 1974) rose to fame as the lead guitarist of Creed, enjoying enormous success at the turn of the twenty-first century with metal-influenced songs that crossed over to the pop charts. Tremonti’s tasteful power has garnered him many fans. His instructional DVD The Sound And The Story adds tips from several guitarists, including Michael Angelo Batio, ...
The word ‘Baroque’ is derived from the Portuguese barrocco, a term for a misshapen pearl, and it was still with this sense of something twisted that it was first applied – to the period between about 1600 and 1750 – in the nineteenth century. In 1768, Jean-Jacques Rousseau wrote: ‘a Baroque music is that in which the harmony ...
The late Baroque era (1700–50) was a time of major political change throughout Europe, involving a shift in the balance of power between sovereign states. Across the continent it was a period of almost continuous warfare, the effects of which were later felt in other parts of the world as a result of conflicting ambitions among the various trading ...
From the earliest years of the Baroque era musicians, scientists and assorted intellectuals, mainly from Italy, wrote treatises and manifestos discussing the theories, aesthetics and musical practice of a new style of music. By the early eighteenth century almost every country in Europe was producing writers who aimed to define musical styles and concepts. They attempted to ...
The very name, ‘Classical Era’, speaks for itself: it proclaims a period that is regarded as ‘Standard, first-class, of allowed excellence’, with manifestations that are ‘simple, harmonious, proportioned, finished’, to quote a dictionary definition. The period from 1750 to roughly 1820 is widely recognized as one of exceptional achievement in music – it is the ...
The first half of the nineteenth century was essentially a period of insurgence in Europe, from the French Revolution in 1789 to the series of uprisings that rocked the continent around 1848. Meanwhile, the Industrial Revolution was also underway, beginning in Britain, then spreading south through the rest of Europe. With these two strands of revolution came ...
The political structure of Europe changed greatly during the second half of the nineteenth century. Germany and Italy became united countries under supreme rulers. The Habsburgs’ Austrian Empire, ruled from Vienna, became fragmented into Austria-Hungary. The borders of this new confederation contained the cauldron of difficulties that eventually developed into the confrontations which culminated in World War I in ...
(Guitar, b. 1943) Guitarist Larry Coryell got his start in New York with Chico Hamilton. He was a trailblazer of both free jazz and jazz-rock fusion in groups such as the Free Spirits – with saxophonist Jim Pepper and drummer Bob Moses – and in vibist Gary Burton’s band. A remarkable technician, Coryell also ventured into free-jazz territory with ...
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.