"Rosa organizes her friends into the Oak Street Band in order to earn money her family needs because of her Grandma's illness....Community, family and personal triumphs converge, making unforgettable music for everyone."--School Library Journal.

"Rosa organizes her friends into the Oak Street Band in order to earn money her family needs because of her Grandma's illness....Community, family and personal triumphs converge, making unforgettable music for everyone."--School Library Journal.

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.

Music is for Everyone is sure to get you excited about making music! Singer-songwriter Jill Barber takes her young readers through many different kinds of music--hip hop, jazz, classical, folk--and instruments in an energetic, rhyming tour. Sydney Smith's gleeful illustrations capture all the joy that comes from making music--in all its forms!

Offers tips, strategies, and advice on pursuing a music study program at a college, university, or conservatory.

Find out how Spotify changed the way we listen to music in just 50 minutes! Spotify is a music streaming service which was launched in 2008. Its freemium business model, which allows users to choose between listening to music for free or paying a monthly subscription to access an ad-free version of the site, has attracted 140 million active users (of whom 60 million are paying subscribers) to the site, and has generated billions of dollars in revenue, although the site continues operating at a net loss and has drawn heavy criticism from other major players in the music industry. In this concise and accessible guide, you will find out how Spotify revolutionised music lovers’ listening habits, and discover how other key players in the music industry are reacting to this change. In 50 minutes you will: •Learn about Spotify’s history, from its launch in 2008 right up to the present day •Understand the site’s freemium business model •Discover the how the rise of streaming has affected the music industry ABOUT 50MINUTES | BUSINESS STORIES The Business Stories series from the 50Minutes collection provides the tools to quickly understand the innovative companies that have shaped the modern business world. Our publications will give you contextual information, an analysis of business strategies and an introduction to future trends and opportunities in a clear and easily digestible format, making them the ideal starting point for readers looking to understand what makes these companies stand out.

Arranged in sixteen musical categories, provides entries for twenty thousand releases from four thousand artists, and includes a history of each musical genre.