Old favorites such as Beautiful Dreamer and Oh! Susanna as well as patriotic, plantation, and minstrel songs by the American composer are presented along with reproductions of original covers

(P/V/G Composer Collection). The first great American songwriter, Stephen Foster's songs are now part of the American folk tradition. This collection presents 30 of his compositions, plus photos and a new biography. Includes: Beautiful Dreamer * Camptown Races * Jeanie with the Light Brown Hair * My Old Kentucky Home * Oh! Susanna * Old Folks at Home (Swanee River) * more.

The Life and Songs of Stephen Foster offers an engaging reassessment of the life, politics, and legacy of the misunderstood father of American music. Once revered the world over, Foster’s plantation songs, like “Old Folks at Home” and “My Old Kentucky Home,” fell from grace in the wake of the Civil Rights Movement due to their controversial lyrics. Foster embraced the minstrel tradition for a brief time, refining it and infusing his songs with sympathy for slaves, before abandoning the genre for respectable parlor music. The youngest child in a large family, he grew up in the shadows of a successful older brother and his president brother-in-law, James Buchanan, and walked a fine line between the family’s conservative politics and his own pro-Lincoln sentiments. Foster lived most of his life just outside of industrial, smoke-filled Pittsburgh and wrote songs set in a pastoral South—unsullied by the grime of industry but tarnished by the injustice of slavery. Rather than defining Foster by his now-controversial minstrel songs, JoAnne O’Connell reveals a prolific composer who concealed his true feelings in his lyrics and wrote in diverse styles to satisfy the changing tastes of his generation. In a trenchant reevaluation of his NewYork Bowery years, O’Connell illustrates how Foster purposely abandoned the style for which he was famous to write lighthearted songs for newly popular variety stages and music halls. In the last years of his life, Foster’s new direction in songwriting stood in the vanguard of vaudeville and musical comedy to pave the way for the future of American popular music. His stylistic flexibility in the face of evolving audience preferences not only proves his versatility as a composer but also reveals important changes in the American music and publishing industries. An intimate biography of a complex, controversial, and now neglected composer, The Life and Songs of Stephen Foster is an important story about the father of American music. This invaluable portrait of the political, economic, social, racial, and gender issues of antebellum and Civil War America will appeal to history and music lovers of all generations.

(Guitar Collection). If you've learned the basics on guitar, you are probably eager to learn some songs. The First 50 series is for you! This book provides a combo of chords and lyrics for the most popular songs beginners want to strum on acoustic guitar. Includes: American Pie * Blowin' in the Wind * Daughter * Good Riddance (Time of Your Life) * Hey, Soul Sister * Home * I Will Wait * Losing My Religion * Mrs. Robinson * No Woman No Cry * Peaceful Easy Feeling * Rocky Mountain High * Sweet Caroline * Teardrops on My Guitar * Wonderful Tonight * You're Still the One * and more.