Hard rock is a cross between rock’n’roll and blues, but played louder – everything on ‘11’ or ‘one louder’, as guitarist Nigel Tufnell in spoof rock band Spinal Tap would say. The electric guitar is the prominent instrument in hard rock, and most hard rock songs are based on a guitar ‘riff’. The classic example of a hard rock ...
Alternative-rock guitarist Peter Buck (b. 1956) was born in Berkeley, California. After dropping out of college, he moved to Athens, Georgia, where he met singer Michael Stipe while working in a record shop. The pair discovered that they had similar tastes in music: punk rock, Patti Smith and Television. Together with Mike Mills (bass) and ...
Davey Graham (b. 1940) (originally Davy Graham) is a guitarist who is credited with sparking the folk-rock revolution in the UK in the Sixties. He inspired many of the famous fingerstyle guitarists, such as Bert Jansch, John Renbourn, Martin Carthy, Paul Simon and even Jimmy Page, who heavily based his solo ‘White Summer’ on Graham’s ‘She ...
One of the founding fathers of rock’n’roll, Charles Edward (Chuck) Berry was born in 1926 in St Louis, Missouri, to a middle-class family. His interest in the blues began in high school, where he gave his first public performance. In 1944, he was convicted of armed robbery and sentenced to three years in an Intermediate Reformatory ...
Veteran Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards (b. 1943) was born in Dartford, Kent. After being expelled from technical school in 1958, Richards attended Sidcup Art College. The art-school environment was crucial to Richards’ development, as it was for many of his generation. Here he was able to nurture his passion for rhythm and blues, finding many fellow ...
A pioneering guitarist and the principal creative force behind The Who, Pete Townshend was born in Chiswick, London in 1941. The Townshends were a musical family – Pete’s grandfather was a musician, his father a dance-band saxophonist and his mother a singer. Consequently, a career in music seemed natural for Pete, and his parents encouraged him. ...
Lita Rossana Ford (b. 1958) was born in London. After her family settled in Los Angeles in the 1960s, she took up guitar at the age of 11, inspired by Deep Purple’s Ritchie Blackmore. When she was 16, she met novelty-music producer Kim Fowley, who helped recruit her, along with Joan Jett, Sandy West, ...
For over 30 years, guitarist Alex Lifeson has quietly served as the cohesive key to success for progressive rockers Rush – arguably the most enduring and successful hard-rock band of all time. A guitarist always more interested in finding the right chord voicing or textural effect to make a chorus work than in shredding the frets off his axe du ...
Clad head-to-toe in studded black leather and featuring a thundering rhythm section, a dynamic twin-guitar assault and one of the purest rock vocalists in music history, it simply doesn’t get any more ‘metal’ than Judas Priest. And the man behind many of the band’s greatest riffs and solos is guitarist Glenn Tipton (b. 1947). Born in Blackheath, England ...
Producer-performer Lenny Kravitz (b. 1964) has explored multiple genres during his 25-year career as a music star, but has often been thought of as married to retro styles. Born in New York, Kravitz was raised in Los Angeles. His parents, a television producer and an actress, were well connected in show business. Kravitz decided to pursue rock’n’roll ...
In his short life, California guitarist-mandolinist Clarence White (1944–73) conceived innovations that would inspire country and rock guitarists from both a stylistic and technical perspective long after his death. He brought bluegrass picking to the forefront of rock, turning acoustic guitar into a solo instrument. He developed a device for electric guitar that let traditional guitarists sound like pedal-steel ...
Freddie (sometimes spelled Freddy) King (1934–76) revitalized the Chicago blues scene in the 1960s. His aggressive playing and piercing solos helped to set up the blues-rock movement, and he was a major influence on 1960s British guitarists like Eric Clapton, Peter Green and Mick Taylor. King’s mother taught him to play guitar as a child in Gilmer, Texas ...
Django Reinhardt (1910–53) overcame physical disabilities to create a unique playing style and one of the most highly influential sounds in jazz. He was born in Belgium to gypsy parents. At the age of eight his mother’s tribe settled near Paris. The French Gypsies, or Manouches, were medieval in their beliefs, and distrustful of modern science. But Django ...
In his 40-year career as an award-winning songwriter, guitarist and musician’s musician, Richard Thompson (b. 1949) has won fans for his work as an original member of Fairport Convention, as part of a duo with former wife Linda Thompson and as a solo artist. His songs have been recorded by Bonnie Raitt, Elvis Costello, Emmylou Harris ...
(Rin’-härt Ki’-zer) 1674–1739 German composer Keiser studied at St Thomas’s School, Leipzig. His first operas were performed at the Brunswick court during the early 1690s. In 1695 he moved to Hamburg, where he became director of the Gänsemarkt theatre in 1702. He wrote over 60 operas, mainly for Hamburg, but periods of absence did not further his cause. ...
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.