(Vocal/instrumental group, 1994–present) Gary Lightbody (vocals) is the sole remaining member from the mid-1990s line-up of Snow Patrol – now Paul Wilson (bass), Johnny Quinn (drums), Nathan Connolly (guitar) and Tom Simpson (keyboards) – from college days in Dundee. Eyes Open sold 4.7 million copies worldwide in 2006, tracks ‘Run’ and ‘Chasing Cars’ big hits. Fifth studio album ...
(Vocals, 1914–99) This Nova Scotia-born singer was one of country music’s most popular figures in the 1950s and 1960s, and a Grand Ole Opry headliner for a half century. He recorded over 100 albums and had nearly as many chart singles. For more than a decade he recorded for the Canadian Bluebird label before breaking through in the USA ...
(Vocals, 1914–99) Hank Snow ran away from his Canadian home at 12 to join the Merchant Marine. Wanderlust would inform his great ‘travelling’ songs, ‘I’m Movin’ On’ and ‘I’ve Been Everywhere’. A disciple of Jimmie Rodgers, Snow would bill himself as the Yodelling Ranger, until his developing baritone made him better suited for ballads like ‘Hello Love’, ...
(Vocal/instrumental group, 1995–present) Iowa-based metallers Slipknot – Corey Taylor (vocals), James Root (guitar), Nathan Jordison (drums), Sean Crahan, Chris Fehn (both percussion), Sid Wilson (DJ), Mick Thompson (guitar), Paul Gray (bass) and Craig Jones (samples) – are literally unrecognizable. When playing or posing for photographs, this nu metal band (very much in the vein of bands like Limp ...
Nashville’s Grand Ole Opry is the oldest continuously broadcast live music programme in the world. Since it hit the airways in 1926, it has served as a springboard for dozens of key artists’ rise to national fame. Its presence in Nashville was central to the growth of the city’s music industry. Opry Origins The Opry started almost by accident one ...
Bagpipe Somewhere, perhaps in Mesopotamia, about 7,000 years ago, a shepherd may well have looked at a goat skin and some hollow bones and had an idea for a new musical instrument: the bagpipe. In the early Christian era, the instrument spread from the Middle East eastward into India and westward to Europe. By the seventeenth ...
Country music has been euphemistically called ‘white man’s blues’ or ‘the poetry of the common man’. While both descriptions have elements of truth, neither is quite accurate. It is, in fact, a broad, nebulous, over-reaching category with no exact boundaries or parameters. Over the decades country music has grown to encompass a greatly varied assortment of ...
The 1950s and 1960s were milestone decades for country music. It was during these years that the stylistic tensions between traditional and contemporary, rural and urbane, became sharply delineated and the first ideological and aesthetic battle lines between the traditionalists and modernists were drawn in the sand. Out of this tension arose bold innovation and refreshing diversity. The 1950s ...
Eugene Onegin was written after the disaster of Tchaikovsky’s marriage in 1877, and was also influenced by his platonic relationship with his admirer and patron Nadezhda von Meck. Tchaikovsky began Eugene Onegin by writing the famous ‘letter scene’ from Act I, in which the heroine Tat’yana spends the night writing to Onegin, telling him of her love for ...
‘The Force of Destiny’ La forza del destino was commissioned by the Imperial Theatre, St Petersburg where it premiered in 1862. Verdi considered the opera an ‘excellent success’ with ‘opulent’ settings and costumes, although critics thought the tragic, lugubrious love story had a depressing effect on the audience. It was first performed in New York in 1865 and ...
Rock guitarist Albert Lee was born in Leominster, Herefordshire in 1943. The son of a musician, Lee started his musical career on piano, but like many of his generation, took up the guitar upon the arrival of rock’n’roll, inspired in particular by Buddy Holly. He played in various bands after leaving school at the age of ...
(Vocals, 1894–1937) Bessie Smith was the first blues recording star during the form’s initial heyday in the ‘jazz age’ of the 1920s. A protégé of the great Ma Rainey, Smith and her booming, sorrowful voice took the East Coast by storm in stage shows in the 1920s. Signed to Columbia Records, she scored with ‘Downhearted Blues’, ‘Nobody ...
Few genres are as closely identified with one person as bluegrass is with Bill Monroe (vocals, mandolin, 1911–96). Monroe not only defined the style’s instrumentation, style and repertoire, he also hired most of its major figures and gave the music its name – taken from his group, The Blue Grass Boys. Kentucky Roots Raised on his ...
(Vocals, b. 1927) Born in Maynardville, Tennessee, Smith’s earliest hits – including ‘Let’s Live A Little’ (1951), ‘Let Old Mother Nature Have Her Way’ (1951), ‘(When You Feel Like You’re In Love) Don’t Just Stand There’ (1952) and ‘Hey Joe’ (1953) – came in the early and mid-1950s. As a singer, Smith started out in the honky-tonk ...
1782–1871, French The French composer Daniel Auber made a favourable impression on his teacher, Luigi Cherubini (1760–1842) with his first opera, L’erreur du moment (‘The Mistake of the Moment’, 1805). However, he had to wait 15 years for popular appreciation until he established himself with two works: La bergère châtelaine (‘The Lady Shepherdess’, 1820) and Emma (1821). ...
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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.