(Guitar, vocals, b. 1927) Matt ‘Guitar’ Murphy came up in Memphis, playing with Howlin’ Wolf, Little Junior Parker and Bobby ‘Blue’ Bland before gaining serious attention with Memphis Slim’s band from 1952 to 1959. In the 1960s Murphy contributed to sessions by Sonny Boy Williamson II, Chuck Berry and Otis Rush, and was a crowd favourite ...
Twenty-first-century guitar hero Matthew Bellamy (b. 1978) was born in Cambridge, England. His father George was rhythm guitarist in the Tornadoes, who scored a massive transatlantic hit with the Joe Meek-produced ‘Telstar’. Before learning guitar, Bellamy took piano lessons as a boy, equally inspired by Ray Charles and classical music. In the mid-1980s, the family moved ...
c. 1622–77 English composer While a chorister at Exeter Cathedral, where he learnt to play the organ, the young Matthew Locke met Christopher Gibbons (1615–76), with whom he later collaborated on the music for the masque Cupid and Death (1653). Locke’s revision of the piece in 1659 has survived in autograph and is the only known complete score of ...
(Yo’-han Mat’-te-zon) 1681–1764 German composer and theorist Mattheson was the most important writer on music during the Baroque era. His Die Vernünfftler, which translated the Tatler and Spectator of Addison and Steele, was the first German weekly (1713). He befriended Handel when he arrived in Hamburg in 1703 and sang the leading tenor role in Handel’s first opera, Almira ...
(Mat-te’-as Ga’-ôrg Mon) 1717–50 Austrian composer Although he died at the middle of the century, Monn was an important figure in the development of the symphony. A Viennese (he was organist at the Karlkirche), he wrote some 21 symphonies, which make early use of the procedures of classical sonata form; all are in three movements except one, from 1740 ...
(Piano, b. 1960) A prolific recording artist, Shipp considers himself to be a follower of bassist William Parker, with whom he has worked on many projects including the David S. Ware’s Quartet. His keyboard style is rhythmically propulsive; he lays dense harmonic accompaniments for single-note instruments. In 1999 he contracted with Thirsty Ear Records to produce his own ...
(Vocals, guitar, b. 1959) Kathy Mattea joined bluegrass band Pennsboro as a student, before moving to Nashville. After working in Bobby Goldsboro’s road show, she signed with Mercury in 1983. Her first two albums were only modest successes, but Walk The Way The Wind Blows (1986) included her first Top 3 single – a cover of ...
1681–1764, German Born into a wealthy family, Mattheson received a gentleman’s education in languages and the arts, and studied law before becoming immersed in Hamburg’s operatic scene. He made his debut as a soprano in 1696, but his voice broke soon after and he sang tenor roles until 1705. He took part in more than 60 new ...
c. 1730–94, Italian Mattia Verazi was the author of around 20 libretti, most of them written for performance in Italy. Among the first was Ifigenia in Aulide (1751), which was set to music by Jommelli. Some 10 years later, Verazi was at the court in Mannheim, which later moved to Munich. Verazi went too. The most important ...
1856–1928, Italian Battistini was gifted with a beautiful baritone voice and after only a short period of study was given the opportunity to take on the leading role in Gaetano Donizetti’s (1797–1848) La favorite in 1878. Such was his success that Battistini embarked immediately on a busy schedule. His liquid, agile, high voice was ideally suited for the ...
(Vocal/instrumental group, 1991–present) South African-born Matthews (guitar, vocals) formed his band in Virginia, recruiting Stefan Lessard (bass), Leroi Moore (saxophone), Boyd Tinsley (violin) and Carter Beauford (drums) into the ranks. Fusing elements of world music into a sound that celebrated folk, funk and rock in equal parts, they built an audience by undertaking constant touring, ...
By turns avant-garde adventurer, high-voltage rocker and Third World explorer, Yorkshire-born guitarist John McLaughlin has seldom repeated himself. Born in 1942, McLaughlin studied piano from the age of nine and taught himself guitar after becoming interested in country blues, flamenco and Django Reinhardt. A gig with Pete Deuchar’s Professors of Ragtime in 1958 was his ticket to ...
(Piano, vocals, 1915–88) John Len Chatman was born in Memphis, Tennessee. Influenced by barrelhouse pianists such as Roosevelt Sykes, Slim forged an early career in Memphis playing in cafes, juke joints and other music venues around the Beale Street area. He moved to Chicago in 1937, where he worked with Big Bill Broonzy. He began ...
(Vocal/instrumental group, 1978–present) Jake and Elwood Blues began life in a 1976 Saturday Night Live sketch featuring John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd singing ‘I’m A King Bee’ dressed as giant bees. The show’s musical director, Paul Shaffer helped assemble a band to support comedian Steve Martin in 1978. They recruited legendary Booker T. And The M.G.s guitarist ...
Of the entire century, the 1970s were the years of catching one’s breath. Superficially, the promise of the 1960s had faded or failed, the victim of wretched excess and just plain bad taste. America’s war in Vietnam sputtered to an end, international relations elsewhere seemed to stalemate in détente and economically the world suffered from stagflation: exhaustion ...
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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
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