A Chicago Tribune Book of 2019, Notable Chicago Reads A Booklist Top 10 Arts Book of 2019 A No Depression Top Music Book of 2019 Curtis Mayfield. The Chi-Lites. Chaka Khan. Chicago’s place in the history of soul music is rock solid. But for Chicagoans, soul music in its heyday from the 1960s to the 1980s was more than just a series of hits: it was a marker and a source of black empowerment. In Move On Up, Aaron Cohen tells the remarkable story of the explosion of soul music in Chicago. Together, soul music and black-owned businesses thrived. Record producers and song-writers broadcast optimism for black America’s future through their sophisticated, jazz-inspired productions for the Dells and many others. Curtis Mayfield boldly sang of uplift with unmistakable grooves like “We’re a Winner” and “I Plan to Stay a Believer.” Musicians like Phil Cohran and the Pharaohs used their music to voice Afrocentric philosophies that challenged racism and segregation, while Maurice White of Earth, Wind, and Fire and Chaka Khan created music that inspired black consciousness. Soul music also accompanied the rise of African American advertisers and the campaign of Chicago’s first black mayor, Harold Washington, in 1983. This empowerment was set in stark relief by the social unrest roiling in Chicago and across the nation: as Chicago’s homegrown record labels produced rising stars singing songs of progress and freedom, Chicago’s black middle class faced limited economic opportunities and deep-seated segregation, all against a backdrop of nationwide deindustrialization. Drawing on more than one hundred interviews and a music critic’s passion for the unmistakable Chicago soul sound, Cohen shows us how soul music became the voice of inspiration and change for a city in turmoil.

Crossroads, turning point, impulse, inspiration, instinct, influence - call it what you will. Each and every one of us have made crucial decisions, and if we're lucky been helped with the right words at the right time. Over 50 of our most talented and courageous figures, from JK Rowling to David Beckham, have come together to give the stories behind their defining moments. From mentors to mothers, impulses to instincts, these moving, honest stories will inspire you to take a fresh look at your own direction-

Movin' On Up takes a fun ride through the then-and-now of a great city and its ball club. The city and its team have cooked up a partnership as strong and as strange as scrapple and toast over the past 121 years. Since 1883, the Phillies have been on the move-at times slowly, many times glacially, and sometimes quickly. Movin' On Up layers the present on the past by revisiting the places the Fightin' Phils once called their new home. But Movin' On Up is really about people, past, and present-not only players, but others who help and helped Philly move on up to the fabulous sports town we know today. The journey rolls along humorous and poignant episodes, old and new, that have splashed Philly and its fan with the signature color that both fascinates and infuriates outsiders. As this new millennium dashes toward the midpoint of its first decade, Philly's Phillies have a new park, a new team, and a new attitude. Well, maybe the attitude isn't all that new, as you'll read-and ne

When times are tough, you pull yourself up and push yourself to the top ... of a beanstalk ... where you might get schooled in forces and motion by a STEM-loving giant named Dennis. At least that's what happens to Jack in this delicious twist on a classic fairy tale, supported by critical thinking questions and a glossary of key physics terms.

Curtis Mayfield was one of the seminal vocalists and most talented guitarists of his era, and his music played a vital role in the civil rights movement: "People Get Ready" was the black anthem of the time. In Traveling Soul, Todd Mayfield tells his famously private father's story in riveting detail. Born into dire poverty, raised in the slums of Chicago, Curtis became a musical prodigy, not only singing like a dream but growing into a brilliant songwriter. In the 1960s he opened his own label and production company and worked with many other top artists, including the Staple Singers. Curtis's life was famously cut short by an accident that left him paralyzed, but in his declining health he received the long-awaited recognition of the music industry. Passionate, illuminating, vivid, and absorbing, Traveling Soul will doubtlessly take its place among the classics of music biography.

With an abundance of data and evidence, Move UP explores the societal and biological factors that determine whether cultures are able to ascend socially, economically and intellectually. This provocative, ambitious and entertaining book devises a formula that will allow countries and individuals to assess their own potential for upward mobility. Drawing on science and statistics as much as on human instinct and emotion, Move UP reconsiders the modern world with a motion to improving it.