(Instrumental group, 1979–present) Originally an acoustic jazz quintet led by vibist Mike Mainieri and featuring tenor saxophonist Michael Brecker, pianist Don Grolnick, bassist Eddie Gomez and drummer Steve Gadd, Steps changed personnel through the early 1980s, changed its name to Steps Ahead in 1983 and by 1985 had become a high-tech fusion outfit, with Mike ...
(Guitar, b. 1951) A masterful improviser who is equally adept at funk, fusion, bebop and ballads, Scofield came up in the mid-1970s with the Billy Cobham/George Duke fusion band before recording as a sideman with Charles Mingus, Gary Burton and Dave Liebman. In 1982–85 he worked with Miles Davis, and through the 1980s made six ...
Mike Stern (b. 1953), the American jazz guitarist, emerged as a major force in the jazz guitar scene through his work with Miles Davis’ band in the early Eighties, Stern has played with stars such as Stan Getz, Jaco Pastorius, Pat Martino and David Sanborn. Stern was also a guitarist in Steps Ahead and the Brecker Brothers ...
The flugelhorn developed from the bugle, a signalling horn used in the Middle Ages and made out of bull or ox horn. This developed into a large, semicircular hunting horn made of brass or silver that was used by the military during the Seven Years’ War (1756–63). History Wrapping the horn around itself once, so the bell pointed ...
Most famous of all the early keyboard instruments, the harpsichord was first mentioned in 1397, and the earliest representation to have survived dates from 1425. The harpsichord rose to prominence in the sixteenth century and flourished for a while before its harmonic limitations caused its gradual displacement by the piano in the eighteenth century. The harpsichord consisted of a ...
In 1905, and probably for several decades before that, there were more pianos in the United States than there were bathtubs. In Europe, throughout the nineteenth century, piano sales increased at a greater rate than the population. English, French and German makers dispatched veritable armies of pianos to every corner of the Earth. It was the ...
The basic construction of the violin, with its waisted or figure-of-eight body (with a hard-wood back, usually maple, and a softer front, usually spruce), was established early in the sixteenth century. The strings (tuned, from the top downwards, as E, A, D and G) run from a peg box, where tension can ...
Whistles, or duct flutes, have a device to channel the player’s breath, so a narrow air stream hits a sharpened edge, causing the necessary turbulence to vibrate the air column without the player using any special embouchure. Usually this duct is created by inserting a block, known as a fipple, into the end of the ...
To most people, the word ‘zither’ evokes The Third Man film theme and an image of a flat box with a lot of strings. But in organological classification it is a term covering a substantial proportion of the world’s stringed instruments. The technical definition is a little convoluted, but in effect a zither is one or more stretched strings ...
The family of brass instruments includes all those that are sounded by the vibrations of a player’s lips. Though not all are actually made of brass, the majority of instruments in the family are made from metal alloys coated with a shiny lacquer. Brass instruments differ less in their construction than the woodwind family. Like their cousins, they make ...
The revival and imitation of ancient theatrical genres in sixteenth-century Italy bore fruit in seventeenth-century England and France in the works of the great dramatists of those countries: William Shakespeare and Christopher Marlowe, Pierre Corneille and Jean Racine. In Italy, however, the sixteenth-century innovations in spoken drama were followed in the next century not by a great national ...
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 ...
Reggae is unique. No other style has made so much out of its original musical resources to present itself in so many different guises with only a couple of structural changes in over 40 years. No other style has so accurately reflected the people that create and consume it. Jamaican music’s relationship with its people is such that it is not ...
The term ‘woodwind’ refers collectively to the orchestral instruments whose sound is generated by reeds or by passing air across (as opposed to directly into) a mouthpiece: this covers the flute, oboe, clarinet and bassoon. All woodwind instruments sound different pitches in the same way as brass instruments – using enclosed columns of air, based on the principles ...
Boris Godunov, the only project out of nine that Mussorgsky completed himself, has been cited as the great masterpiece of nineteenth-century Russian opera – with its thrilling crowd scenes, historic panorama and the chilling power of its principal character. Boris was unusual in having its chief male role written for a bass voice and for the ‘sung prose’ ...
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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.