This stunningly illustrated picture book debut about the power of music to transform hearts and minds will be an instant classic. A cat, a boy, an elderly woman, and a line of students may appear to have little in common, but when they pass under the same window, each are swept up and transformed in different ways by the magical music that streams toward them and buoys their weary spirits. But one day, the music stops, and the town must work together to save the music that they grew to love. The Song for Everyone is a stunning allegory for the emotional complexities we carry within us, the universally soothing effects of music, and the importance of community. Timeless and comforting, this picture book is one to read again and again.
The definitive biography of Creedence Clearwater Revival, exploring the band's legendary rise to fame and how their music embodied the cultural landscape of the late '60s and early '70s From 1969 to 1971, as the United States convulsed with political upheaval and transformative social movements, no band was bigger than Creedence Clearwater Revival. They managed a two-year barrage of top-10 singles and LPs that doubled as an ubiquitous soundtrack to one of the most volatile periods in modern American history, and they remain a staple of classic rock radio and films about the era. Yet despite their enduring popularity, no book has ever sought to understand Creedence in conversation with their time. A Song for Everyone finally tells that story: the thirteen-year saga of an unassuming suburban quartet's journey through the wilds of 1960s pop, and their slow accrual of a sound and ethos that were almost mystically aligned with the concerns of decade's end. Starting in middle school, these Californian friends and brothers cut a working-class path through the most expansive decade in American music, playing R&B, country, and rock 'n' roll under a variety of names as each of those genres expanded and evolved. When they finally synthesized those styles under a new name in 1968, Creedence Clearwater Revival became instantly epochal, then fell apart under the weight of personal grievances that dated back to adolescence. As musicians and as men, they embodied the contradictions and difficulties of their time, and those dimensions of their career have never been explored until now. Drawing on wide-ranging research into the social and musical developments of 1959-1972, extensive original interviews with surviving Creedence members and associates, and unpublished memoirs from people who knew the group closely, A Song for Everyone is the definitive account of a legendary and still-beloved American band. At the same time, it is also a cultural history of those same years—from Elvis to Altamont, Eisenhower to Watergate—seen through the eyes of four men who encapsulated them in song for all time, told by one of the rising figures in contemporary music writing.
What if life and love are throwing the same nightmares of the past at you over and over again? They suck! Don’t they? Or is it the case that we’ve misinterpreted what love and life really stand for? Till reaching the twenties, we all have survived something back in our pasts. Arvind and Sonali are no different. They find each other in their second year of engineering. Arvind confesses his love to Sonali. Although confused and not a firm believer in love, Sonali doesn’t reject, instead decides to be friends first. With time, their friendship and bonding bloom more. That’s when life introduces Smitha into their skit, turning the tables in a way in which no one has ever imagined, making their lives a complete mess. Growing with confusion and complications, the three of them tangle in between the plays of love and life. From loving love to hating it, from believing in life to blaming it, will they ever unravel from this chaos? Will they ever find a meaning? Or will a meaning find them and blossom their lives forever? Let’s find out.
A little girl imagines her first piano recital and spends a lot of time practicing to make sure that she is prepared to perform and surprisingly discovers yet another skill when she performs.
A stunningly illustrated picture book debut about the power of music to transform hearts and minds. From a tiny window, way up high, came a delicate tune. A melody, a song, a sound so sweet ... Day after day, the song drifts on to the breeze and through the town. It makes the old feel young and comforts the lonely. It fills the whole town with joy and kindness. No one knows who sings the song, but they know it is good. Until one day, the music stops. Can the town work together to save the song for everyone? In a gorgeous, lyrical story, debut picture-book creator Lucy Morris celebrates the joy of music, the importance of community, and the beauty of simple kindnesses. Sometimes it's the smallest things that draw us together. Timeless and comforting, this beautiful picture book is one to read again and again.
The Beautiful Music All Around Us presents the extraordinarily rich backstories of thirteen performances captured on Library of Congress field recordings between 1934 and 1942 in locations reaching from Southern Appalachia to the Mississippi Delta and the Great Plains. Including the children's play song "Shortenin' Bread," the fiddle tune "Bonaparte's Retreat," the blues "Another Man Done Gone," and the spiritual "Ain't No Grave Can Hold My Body Down," these performances were recorded in kitchens and churches, on porches and in prisons, in hotel rooms and school auditoriums. Documented during the golden age of the Library of Congress recordings, they capture not only the words and tunes of traditional songs but also the sounds of life in which the performances were embedded: children laugh, neighbors comment, trucks pass by. Musician and researcher Stephen Wade sought out the performers on these recordings, their families, fellow musicians, and others who remembered them. He reconstructs the sights and sounds of the recording sessions themselves and how the music worked in all their lives. Some of these performers developed musical reputations beyond these field recordings, but for many, these tracks represent their only appearances on record: prisoners at the Arkansas State Penitentiary jumping on "the Library's recording machine" in a rendering of "Rock Island Line"; Ora Dell Graham being called away from the schoolyard to sing the jump-rope rhyme "Pullin' the Skiff"; Luther Strong shaking off a hungover night in jail and borrowing a fiddle to rip into "Glory in the Meetinghouse." Alongside loving and expert profiles of these performers and their locales and communities, Wade also untangles the histories of these iconic songs and tunes, tracing them through slave songs and spirituals, British and homegrown ballads, fiddle contests, gospel quartets, and labor laments. By exploring how these singers and instrumentalists exerted their own creativity on inherited forms, "amplifying tradition's gifts," Wade shows how a single artist can make a difference within a democracy. Reflecting decades of research and detective work, the profiles and abundant photos in The Beautiful Music All Around Us bring to life largely unheralded individuals--domestics, farm laborers, state prisoners, schoolchildren, cowboys, housewives and mothers, loggers and miners--whose music has become part of the wider American musical soundscape. The hardcover edition also includes an accompanying CD that presents these thirteen performances, songs and sounds of America in the 1930s and '40s.
On the forbidding fringes of the tundra, where years are marked by seasons of snow, humans war with immortals in the name of their shared gods. Irjan, a human warrior, is ruthless and lethal, a legend among the Brethren of Hunters. But even legends grow tired and disillusioned. Scarred and weary of bloodshed, Irjan turns his back on his oath and his calling to hide away and live a peaceful life as a farmer, husband, and father. But his past is not so easily left behind. When an ambitious village priest conspires with the vengeful comrades Irjan has forsaken, the fragile peace in the Northlands of Davvieana is at stake. His bloody past revealed, Irjan’s present unravels as he faces an ultimatum: return to hunt the immortals or lose his child. But with his son’s life hanging in the balance, as Irjan follows the tracks through the dark and desolate snow-covered forests, it is not death he searches for, but life.
"Music is the second most important thing," I say. That was something my mother would always say. We've stopped saying it out loud, but I think it all the same. The most important thing is love. From the author of the New York Times and USA Today Bestselling If He Had Been With Me comes a captivating novel about navigating—and protecting—the loves and friendships that sustain us. Ramona fell for Sam the moment she met him. It was like she had known him forever. He's one of the few constants in her life, and their friendship is just too important to risk for a kiss. Though she really wants to kiss him... Sam loves Ramona, but he would never expect her to feel the same way-she's too quirky and cool for someone like him. Still, they complement each other perfectly, both as best friends and as a band. Then they meet Tom. Tom makes music too, and he's the band's missing piece. The three quickly become inseparable. Except Ramona's falling in love with Tom. But she hasn't fallen out of love with Sam either. How can she be true to her feelings and herself without losing the very relationships that make her heart sing? This Song is (Not) for You is perfect for readers looking for: Contemporary teen romance books Unputdownable & bingeworthy novels Complex emotional YA stories Novels that explore monogamy, polyamory, and asexuality Characters with a passion for music Performance art
In this highly anticipated follow-up to White Trash Damaged, Cass and Tucker have finally found their happily ever after, but can Eric, the band’s brooding drummer, ever let go of his past and find love? From a small-town boy with fantasies of superstardom to rock star on tour with the suddenly famous band Damaged, Eric’s life has not been an easy journey. Now he struggles to let go of his past of physical abuse, a past that still haunts him. His anger is causing him to spiral out of control and he risks losing everything he has worked so hard for. Only one person has ever gotten him to open up about his past: Sarah, the lead singer of Filth, the opening act on their first national tour—a fellow rocker with a confident façade that masks her own painful secrets. But their bands’ rocky past and Sarah’s tumultuous relationship with her bandmate and boyfriend Derek force her to keep Eric at a distance. As their friendship begins to grow into something more, Eric has to find a way to let go of his tortured past, or it could jeopardize his only chance for a happy future…
