In the last few decades, new technologies have brought composers and listeners to the brink of an era of limitless musical possibility. They stand before a vast ocean of creative potential, in which any sounds imaginable can be synthesised and pieced together into radical new styles and forms of music-making. But are musicians taking advantage of this potential? How could we go about creating and listening to new music, and why should we? Bringing the ideas of twentieth-century avant-garde composers Arnold Schoenberg and John Cage to their ultimate conclusion, Infinite Music proposes a system for imagining music based on its capacity for variation, redefining musical modernism and music itself in the process. It reveals the restrictive categories traditionally imposed on music-making, replaces them with a new vocabulary and offers new approaches to organising musical creativity. By detailing not just how music is composed but crucially how it's perceived, Infinite Music maps the future of music and the many paths towards it.
(Amadeus). With style, wit, and expertise, Leonard Bernstein shares his love and appreciation for music in all its varied forms in The Infinite Variety of Music , illuminating the deep pleasure and sometimes subtle beauty it offers. He begins with an "imaginary conversation" with George Washington entitled "The Muzak Muse," in which he argues the values of actively listening to music by learning how to read notes, as opposed to simply hearing music in a concert hall. The book also features the reproduction of five television scripts from Bernstein on the influence of jazz, the timeless appeal of Mozart, musical romanticism, and the complexities of rhythmic innovation. Also included are Bernstein's analyses of symphonies by Dvorak, Tchaikovsky, Beethoven, and Brahms, a rare reproduction of a 1957 lecture on the nature of composing, and a report on the musical scene written for the New York Times after his sabbatical leave from directorship of the New York Philharmonic during the 1964-65 season.
What is music?Modern society has come to view music largely as entertainment and commodity. In response, We Are Music: An Existential Journey Toward Infinity provides the reader with a holistic starting point. Music has unlimited potential to transform and enlighten, and is only impeded when bound by materialism, physicalism, and reductionism. We Are Music is an attempt to bring music back to the core of humanity as an agent of positive empowerment, self-actualization, and beyond.Embracing interconnectivity, music is more deeply experienced alongside the arts, science, social sciences, math, philosophy, history, and, above all, spirituality. An endless spiral, self-perception and identity can be vastly expanded, if not questioned and transcended.Music is an infinite field and any attempt to define and describe it is problematically finite and consequently limited. Herein lies the impossibility of the book which both excites and disturbs; the paradox of being and not being.A roadmap for music lovers toward self-realization, We Are Music is for those who desire to delve deeper into the power and illusion of self through music.
The title says it all – folk music giant Daniel Johnston brings his unfiltered creative energy and life-long love of the form to his first comic book, an infinite journey into musical and comic-book greatness. SPACE DUCKS: AN INFINITE COMIC BOOK OF MUSICAL GREATNESS is a visceral, engaging work of art by celebrated singer/songwriter Daniel Johnston. The book combines the unique and brilliant characters, images and words of Daniel Johnston along with Daniel's amazing music, and the musical and artistic contributions of fans, to create a one-of-a-kind interactive comic book experience. This project combines Daniel’s music and art to create a must-see experience for art, music, and comic fans everywhere.
A landmark in jazz studies, Thinking in Jazz reveals as never before how musicians, both individually and collectively, learn to improvise. Chronicling leading musicians from their first encounters with jazz to the development of a unique improvisatory voice, Paul Berliner documents the lifetime of preparation that lies behind the skilled improviser's every idea. The product of more than fifteen years of immersion in the jazz world, Thinking in Jazz combines participant observation with detailed musicological analysis, the author's experience as a jazz trumpeter, interpretations of published material by scholars and performers, and, above all, original data from interviews with more than fifty professional musicians: bassists George Duvivier and Rufus Reid; drummers Max Roach, Ronald Shannon Jackson, and Akira Tana; guitarist Emily Remler; pianists Tommy Flanagan and Barry Harris; saxophonists Lou Donaldson, Lee Konitz, and James Moody; trombonist Curtis Fuller; trumpeters Doc Cheatham, Art Farmer, Wynton Marsalis, and Red Rodney; vocalists Carmen Lundy and Vea Williams; and others. Together, the interviews provide insight into the production of jazz by great artists like Betty Carter, Miles Davis, Dizzy Gillespie, Coleman Hawkins, and Charlie Parker. Thinking in Jazz overflows with musical examples from the 1920s to the present, including original transcriptions (keyed to commercial recordings) of collective improvisations by Miles Davis's and John Coltrane's groups. These transcriptions provide additional insight into the structure and creativity of jazz improvisation and represent a remarkable resource for jazz musicians as well as students and educators. Berliner explores the alternative ways—aural, visual, kinetic, verbal, emotional, theoretical, associative—in which these performers conceptualize their music and describes the delicate interplay of soloist and ensemble in collective improvisation. Berliner's skillful integration of data concerning musical development, the rigorous practice and thought artists devote to jazz outside of performance, and the complexities of composing in the moment leads to a new understanding of jazz improvisation as a language, an aesthetic, and a tradition. This unprecedented journey to the heart of the jazz tradition will fascinate and enlighten musicians, musicologists, and jazz fans alike.
The Book Aims At The Inner Soul And Accordingly The Essays Are Centered Around Music As A Cosmic Energy And Its Role And Functions In The Game Plan Of Creation. Discovers Music As A Spiritual Activity. Also Contains Poetic Quotes Reflecting The Spirit Of Bauls Of Bengal.
A LOCUS AWARD FINALIST FOR BEST FIRST NOVEL! The Guardian's Pick for Best Science Fiction Book of the Year! A timely and uncanny portrait of a world in the wake of fake news, diminished privacy, and a total shutdown of the Internet BEFORE: In Bristol’s center lies the Croft, a digital no-man’s-land cut off from the surveillance, Big Data dependence, and corporate-sponsored, globally hegemonic aspirations that have overrun the rest of the world. Ten years in, it’s become a center of creative counterculture. But it’s fraying at the edges, radicalizing from inside. How will it fare when its chief architect, Rushdi Mannan, takes off to meet his boyfriend in New York City—now the apotheosis of the new techno-utopian global metropolis? AFTER: An act of anonymous cyberterrorism has permanently switched off the Internet. Global trade, travel, and communication have collapsed. The luxuries that characterized modern life are scarce. In the Croft, Mary—who has visions of people presumed dead—is sought out by grieving families seeking connections to lost ones. But does Mary have a gift or is she just hustling to stay alive? Like Grids, who runs the Croft’s black market like personal turf. Or like Tyrone, who hoards music (culled from cassettes, the only medium to survive the crash) and tattered sneakers like treasure. The world of Infinite Detail is a small step shy of our own: utterly dependent on technology, constantly brokering autonomy and privacy for comfort and convenience. With Infinite Detail, Tim Maughan makes the hitherto-unimaginable come true: the End of the Internet, the End of the World as We Know It.
The “beautifully written” (The New York Times) autobiography of Michael Nesmith, from his star-making role on The Monkees and his invention of the music video to his critical contributions to movies, comedy, and the world of virtual reality “Reads like the chronicle of a relentless seeker.”—Los Angeles Times Michael Nesmith’s eclectic, electric life spanned his star-making role on The Monkees, his invention of the music video, and his critical contributions to movies, comedy, and the world of virtual reality. But above all, his is a seeker’s story, a pilgrimage in search of a set of principles to live by. That search took Nesmith from a childhood in Dallas to the set of The Monkees in Los Angeles to the heart of swinging London with John Lennon and Jimi Hendrix. This funny, thoughtful, self-aware book is a window into an unexpected life, inflected at every turn by the surprising candor and absurdist humor of an American original.
On her tenth birthday, super-smart Maisie wakes to a shifted reality and must work within the laws of the universe and trust the love of her family to set the world right. Alternate chapters present divergent timelines.
