Music

Reviewed by: 

Author Dan Callahan specializes in big biographies of stars such as Barbara Stanwyck and Vanessa Redgrave. He profiled Alfred Hitchcock, looked at the art of screen acting, and wrote a novel, too.

Reviewed by: 

“The author calls Billie ‘the consummate performer whose gift was her ability to make a listener experience the emotion she was feeling as she sang a song.’”

Author(s):
Genre(s):
Reviewed by: 

The ability to fill arenas is always there, even in his starkest songs, and when combined with extreme emotional honesty the effect is devastating.

Reviewed by: 

“a part of the Beatles history that was nearly lost but now is a compelling and important read.”

Reviewed by: 

“The reader will get an education in the formative years of a rock band, the grotty clubs, the vans, the marginal pay.”

Reviewed by: 

In her introduction to this memoir, Donna Leon confesses, “I have never planned more than the first step in anything I’ve done.” Perhaps that is why Wandering through Life is a series of s

Reviewed by: 

Everyone knows the music of Elton John. But some may not know that Elton never writes any lyrics.

Author(s):
Genre(s):
Reviewed by: 

“a worthy part of any Beatles’ fans collection.”

Author(s):
Genre(s):
Reviewed by: 

“Improbably, perhaps, for a work of music criticism, Kick Out the Jams is as revealing a first draft of history from those cumulatively calamitous three-and-a-half decades as you’r

Reviewed by: 

The relationship between journalist and subject is an ancient one, and the ice is frequently broken with the hoisting of a glass . . . or two.

Author(s):
Genre(s):
Reviewed by: 

“Don’t Call It Hair Metal is a loving paean to a halcyon time in hard-rock history.”

Reviewed by: 

Does the world need another book on Oscar Hammerstein II? Hugh Fordin’s Getting to Know Him is a solid biography.

Reviewed by: 

Ever since the music called jazz emerged in the Black and Creole communities of early 20th century New Orleans (as most histories of the music contend), the vast majority of journalists, authors, a

Reviewed by: 

“The book is a joy to read. You can dip in anywhere and swim about in Dylan’s brain.”

Reviewed by: 

Folk Music is not a conventional biography, and readers hoping to find in it details of Bob Dylan’s personal life will have to search elsewhere.

Reviewed by: 

Music memoirs come in many different forms, but Three Pianos by Andrew McMahon is in a small sub-genre: the self-loathing confessional.

Reviewed by: 

"In music, impact comes from steady improvement, pruning, intensifying, through intelligence, sensitivity."

Author(s):
Genre(s):
Reviewed by: 

“For those of us who care about opera, Don Giovanni Captured is a fascinating book.”

Author(s):
Genre(s):
Reviewed by: 

Even amid all his late-life venting in The Last Days, Geoff Dyer manages to please once again with his artful sentences and close observations.”

Author(s):
Genre(s):
Reviewed by: 

Let’s be honest—to really enjoy Through the Prism, Untold Stories from the Hipgnosis Archive by Aubrey Powell, it would help if you lived through the days of yore when rock album covers we

Reviewed by: 

“Hong’s memoir is as perfect in tone and pitch as a memoir can be.”

Author(s):
Genre(s):
Reviewed by: 

“This revealing, nicely crafted account of rock performers from Bill Haley and His Comets to Pink Floyd will appeal greatly to nostalgic rock fans.”

Reviewed by: 

There’s a lot to argue with in Joseph Horowitz’s Dvorák’s Prophecy and the Vexed Fate of Black Classical Music.

Pages