A level 2 Oxford Bookworms Library graded reader. Written for Learners of English by Rosemary Border. One day, a farmer tells a farm boy to take everything out of an old building and throw it away. 'It's all rubbish,' he says. In the middle of all the rubbish, the boy finds a beautiful old piano. He has never played before, but now, when his fingers touch the piano, he begins to play. He closes his eyes and the music comes to him - and the music moves his fingers. When he opens his eyes again, he knows that his life is changed for ever . . .
A level 1 Oxford Bookworms Library graded reader. This version includes an audio book: listen to the story as you read. Retold for Learners of English by Diane Mowat. Outside, the night is cold and wet. Inside, the White family sits and waits. Where is their visitor? There is a knock at the door. A man is standing outside in the dark. Their visitor has arrived. The visitor waits. He has been in India for many years. What has he got? He has brought the hand of a small, dead animal - a monkey's paw. Outside, in the dark, the visitor smiles and waits for the door to open.
A level 1 Oxford Bookworms Library graded reader. This version includes an audio book: listen to the story as you read. Written for Learners of English by Christine Lindop. Luke is a good-looking young man, but he's not very clever with words. Gemma is clever with words, but what does she want? Lucy and Becky are good friends, but what about Sam? He makes wonderful cakes, but does he make mistakes too? Nina and Dragan are in love, so deeply in love, but they live in the wrong place, at the wrong time . . . All love stories have moments of happiness, pain, misunderstanding, laughter, and sometimes great sadness. But love will nearly always find a way . . .
A beautifully illustrated, totally engrossing celebration of the piano, and the composers and performers who have made it their own. With honed sensitivity and unquestioned expertise, Stuart Isacoff—pianist, critic, teacher, and author of Temperament: How Music Became a Battleground for the Great Minds of Western Civilization—unfolds the ongoing history and evolution of the piano and all its myriad wonders: how its very sound provides the basis for emotional expression and individual style, and why it has so powerfully entertained generation upon generation of listeners. He illuminates the groundbreaking music of Mozart, Beethoven, Liszt, Schumann, and Debussy. He analyzes the breathtaking techniques of Glenn Gould, Oscar Peterson, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Arthur Rubinstein, and Van Cliburn, and he gives musicians including Alfred Brendel, Murray Perahia, Menahem Pressler, and Vladimir Horowitz the opportunity to discuss their approaches. Isacoff delineates how classical music and jazz influenced each other as the uniquely American art form progressed from ragtime, novelty, stride, boogie, bebop, and beyond, through Scott Joplin, Fats Waller, Duke Ellington, Bill Evans, Thelonious Monk, Chick Corea, Herbie Hancock, Cecil Taylor, and Bill Charlap. A Natural History of the Piano distills a lifetime of research and passion into one brilliant narrative. We witness Mozart unveiling his monumental concertos in Vienna’s coffeehouses, using a special piano with one keyboard for the hands and another for the feet; European virtuoso Henri Herz entertaining rowdy miners during the California gold rush; Beethoven at his piano, conjuring healing angels to console a grieving mother who had lost her child; Liszt fainting in the arms of a page turner to spark an entire hall into hysterics. Here is the instrument in all its complexity and beauty. We learn of the incredible craftsmanship of a modern Steinway, the peculiarity of specialty pianos built for the Victorian household, the continuing innovation in keyboards including electronic ones. And most of all, we hear the music of the masters, from centuries ago and in our own age, brilliantly evoked and as marvelous as its most recent performance. With this wide-ranging volume, Isacoff gives us a must-have for music lovers, pianists, and the armchair musician.
Gillespie discusses 350 composers and their works for harpsichord and piano, including Bach, Handel, Mozart, Beethoven, and Debussy. Includes 116 musical examples, illustrations, and a glossary of musical terms.
(Keyboard Instruction). Ever think to yourself, "I wish I hadn't stopped playing the piano!"? If so, then this is the perfect book to help you dive back into the fun world of creating music! It allows you to play the songs you know and love, from pop tunes to folk songs to familiar classical music. 44 songs include: Amazing Grace * Eine Kleine Nachtmusik * Forrest Gump Main Title (Feather Theme) * I Walk the Line * Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring * Let It Be * The Music of the Night * Stand by Me * Sweet Home Alabama * Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star * and many more!
A level 2 Oxford Bookworms Library graded reader. This version includes an audio book: listen to the story as you read. Retold for Learners of English by Ralph Mowat. In the jungle of Southern India the Seeonee Wolf-Pack has a new cub. He is not a wolf - he is Mowgli, a human child, but he knows nothing of the world of men. He lives and hunts with his brothers the wolves. Baloo the bear and Bagheera the panther are his friends and teachers. And Shere Khan, the man-eating tiger, is his enemy. Kipling's famous story of Mowgli's adventures in the jungle has been loved by young and old for more than a hundred years.
A level 2 Oxford Bookworms Library graded reader. This version includes an audio book: listen to the story as you read. Retold for Learners of English by John Escott. There has been a ghost in the house for three hundred years, and Lord Canterville's family have had enough of it. So Lord Canterville sells his grand old house to an American family. Mr Hiram B. Otis is happy to buy the house and the ghost - because of course Americans don't believe in ghosts. The Canterville ghost has great plans to frighten the life out of the Otis family. But Americans don't frighten easily - especially not two noisy little boys - and the poor ghost has a few surprises waiting for him.
A level 2 Oxford Bookworms Library graded reader. Retold for Learners of English by Jennifer Bassett. The room was on the fourth floor, and the key on the inside. The windows were closed and fastened - on the inside. The chimney was too narrow for a cat to get through. So how did the murderer escape? And whose were the two angry voices heard by the neighbours as they ran up the stairs? Nobody in Paris could find any answers to this mystery. Except Anguste Dupin, who could see further and think more clearly than other people. The answers to the mystery were all there, but only a clever man could see them.
A level 2 Oxford Bookworms Library graded reader. This version includes an audio book: listen to the story as you read. Written for Learners of English by Peter Dainty. All he wanted to do was to marry the woman he loved. But his country said 'No!' He was Edward VIII, King of Great Britain, King of India, King of Australia, and King of thirty-nine other countries. And he loved the wrong woman. She was beautiful and she loved him - but she was already married to another man. It was a love story that shook the world. The King had to choose: to be King, or to have love . . . and leave his country, never to return.
