SKU: MB.30844M
ISBN 9781513464268. 8.75 x 11.75 inches.
Skip James was one of the most influential early Bluesmen, but his importance as a stylist remained undiscovered until he was brought out of a long retirement by the Folk/Blues revival of the early 1960â??s. Born in 1902 and raised in Bentonia, Nehemiah Curtis James was brought up in a religious family: his father was a bootlegger who reformed and became a Baptist preacher. Skip learned piano in school but picked up guitar from his friend Henry Stuckey. In 1931 Skip was picked up by a scout for Paramount Records and he cut 26 tracks, of which 18 were released, in a two day session at their Grafton, Wisconsin studios. These recordings presented a unique and haunting genius that influenced legendary bluesmen as Robert Johnson, Kansas Joe McCoy and Johnny Temple. But the recordings sold poorly, having been released during the Great Depression, and he drifted into obscurity.
We have included as online downloads Skipâ??s 1931 recordings. The crackling sound of these rare recordings cannot obscure the brilliance of this seminal Blues master.
After over 30 yearâ??s retirement from music, Skip was rediscovered by Blues enthusiasts Bill Barth, John Fahey and Henry Vestine. They persuaded Skip to appear at the Newport Folk Festival in 1964, where his renditions of his old songs were still powerful and moving. His performances as well as his old and new recordings influenced a generation of new musicians: Eric Clapton, Alan Wilson of Canned Heat, Cream, Deep Purple, Chris Thomas King, Alvin Youngblood Hart, Derek Trucks, Beck, Big Sugar, John Martyn, Lucinda Williams and Rory Block to name a few.
Books on legendary Blues musicians written by white musicologists tend to offer a subjective perspective on how the artists felt, thought or reacted. A tainted picture is captured that has more to do with the writerâ??s social and musical experiences. This autobiography is different. The words, thoughts and feelings come directly from the artistâ??s lips. This is the story of Nehemiah â??Skipâ? James told by Nehemiah â??Skipâ? James.
SKU: HL.14048001
ISBN 9788759836880. 11.5x16.5 inches. English.
Program note: I was born with a right hand that is not fully functional, and though it never prevented me from loving playing the piano as well as I could with this physical limitation, it has obviously given me an alternative focus on the whole piano literature and has given me a close relationship with the works written for the left hand by Ravel and others. This repertoire has been with me since my youth. My very first public performance of one of my own works was in autumn 1969. The piece was called October and I played the piano with my left hand and the horn, my principal instrument (the only instrument that can be played with only the left hand). Part of the piece requires the performer to play natural harmonics of the horn directly into the open strings of the grand piano to create resonance. The pedal was kept down by an assistant lying on the floor. Through decades the idea of writing a larger work for piano left hand has been in my mind. This new work is not written for a pianist with only one hand, but rather by a composer who can only play with the left hand. The title Left, alone contains all kinds of references, not only to the obvious fact that the left hand is playing alone. Left, alone is divided into two large parts, each consisting of three smaller movements - in effect, six in total. The work was commissioned by Westdeutscher Rundfunk, and co-commissioned by City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Danish National Symphony Orchestra and Rotterdam Philharmonic and written for Alexandre Tharaud. -Hans Abrahamsen.
SKU: HL.438832
UPC: 852940000783. 5.5x10.0x2.646 inches.
The Carl Martin PlexiTone, is as the name might indicate an unusual high gain three step rocket of an overdrive. The PlexiTone offers two step overdrive, the crunch channel and the high gain channel, on top of that it gives you an up to 20dB clean boost channel. The crunch channel goes from subtle overdrive to hard rock gain stage, the high gain channel goes from rock gain stages to absolutely meltdown, with loads of gain and low end, and all in a tone that brings the memory back to the early 80's high gain guitar hero's. The PlexiTone has as most Carl Martin pedals a built in regulated (+-12V) power supply, to secure the necessary headroom that gives you the great tone.
SKU: HL.232108
ISBN 9781783052738. UPC: 888680677329. 4.5x7.5x0.899 inches.
Complete lyrics and chords to 195 Beatles songs, including: Across the Universe • All My Loving • All You Need Is Love • And I Love Her • Back in the U.S.S.R. • The Ballad of John and Yoko • Birthday • Blackbird • A Day in the Life • Day Tripper • Dear Prudence • Drive My Car • Eight Days a Week • Eleanor Rigby • Good Day Sunshine • Got to Get You into My Life • A Hard Day's Night • Help! • Helter Skelter • Here Comes the Sun • Hey Jude • I Saw Her Standing There • I Want to Hold Your Hand • In My Life • Let It Be • The Long and Winding Road • Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds • Penny Lane • Revolution • Something • Ticket to Ride • Twist and Shout • When I'm Sixty-Four • While My Guitar Gently Weeps • Yellow Submarine • Yesterday • and more. 4-1/2 inches x 7-1/2 inches.
SKU: PR.16500104F
ISBN 9781491132159. UPC: 680160681082.
Ever since the success of my series of wind ensemble works Places in the West, I've been wanting to write a companion piece for national parks on the other side of the north American continent. The earlier work, consisting of GLACIER, THE YELLOWSTONE FIRES, ARCHES, and ZION, spanned some twenty years of my composing life, and since the pieces called for differing groups of instruments, and were in slightly different styles from each other, I never considered them to be connected except in their subject matter. In their depiction of both the scenery and the human history within these wondrous places, they had a common goal: awaking the listener to the fragile beauty that is in them; and calling attention to the ever more crucial need for preservation and protection of these wild places, unique in all the world. With this new work, commissioned by a consortium of college and conservatory wind ensembles led by the University of Georgia, I decided to build upon that same model---but to solidify the process. The result, consisting of three movements (each named for a different national park in the eastern US), is a bona-fide symphony. While the three pieces could be performed separately, they share a musical theme---and also a common style and instrumentation. It is a true symphony, in that the first movement is long and expository, the second is a rather tightly structured scherzo-with-trio, and the finale is a true culmination of the whole. The first movement, Everglades, was the original inspiration for the entire symphony. Conceived over the course of two trips to that astonishing place (which the native Americans called River of Grass, the subtitle of this movement), this movement not only conveys a sense of the humid, lush, and even frightening scenery there---but also an overview of the entire settling-of- Florida experience. It contains not one, but two native American chants, and also presents a view of the staggering influence of modern man on this fragile part of the world. Beginning with a slow unfolding marked Heavy, humid, the music soon presents a gentle, lyrical theme in the solo alto saxophone. This theme, which goes through three expansive phrases with breaks in between, will appear in all three movements of the symphony. After the mood has been established, the music opens up to a rich, warm setting of a Cherokee morning song, with the simple happiness that this part of Florida must have had prior to the nineteenth century. This music, enveloping and comforting, gradually gives way to a more frenetic, driven section representative of the intrusion of the white man. Since Florida was populated and developed largely due to the introduction of a train system, there's a suggestion of the mechanized iron horse driving straight into the heartland. At that point, the native Americans become considerably less gentle, and a second chant seems to stand in the way of the intruder; a kind of warning song. The second part of this movement shows us the great swampy center of the peninsula, with its wildlife both in and out of the water. A new theme appears, sad but noble, suggesting that this land is precious and must be protected by all the people who inhabit it. At length, the morning song reappears in all its splendor, until the sunset---with one last iteration of the warning song in the solo piccolo. Functioning as a scherzo, the second movement, Great Smoky Mountains, describes not just that huge park itself, but one brave soul's attempt to climb a mountain there. It begins with three iterations of the UR-theme (which began the first movement as well), but this time as up-tempo brass fanfares in octaves. Each time it begins again, the theme is a little slower and less confident than the previous time---almost as though the hiker were becoming aware of the daunting mountain before him. But then, a steady, quick-pulsed ostinato appears, in a constantly shifting meter system of 2/4- 3/4 in alteration, and the hike has begun. Over this, a slower new melody appears, as the trek up the mountain progresses. It's a big mountain, and the ascent seems to take quite awhile, with little breaks in the hiker's stride, until at length he simply must stop and rest. An oboe solo, over several free cadenza-like measures, allows us (and our friend the hiker) to catch our breath, and also to view in the distance the rocky peak before us. The goal is somehow even more daunting than at first, being closer and thus more frighteningly steep. When we do push off again, it's at a slower pace, and with more careful attention to our footholds as we trek over broken rocks. Tantalizing little views of the valley at every switchback make our determination even stronger. Finally, we burst through a stand of pines and----we're at the summit! The immensity of the view is overwhelming, and ultimately humbling. A brief coda, while we sit dazed on the rocks, ends the movement in a feeling of triumph. The final movement, Acadia, is also about a trip. In the summer of 2014, I took a sailing trip with a dear friend from North Haven, Maine, to the southern coast of Mt. Desert Island in Acadia National Park. The experience left me both exuberant and exhausted, with an appreciation for the ocean that I hadn't had previously. The approach to Acadia National Park by water, too, was thrilling: like the difference between climbing a mountain on foot with riding up on a ski-lift, I felt I'd earned the right to be there. The music for this movement is entirely based on the opening UR-theme. There's a sense of the water and the mysterious, quiet deep from the very beginning, with seagulls and bell buoys setting the scene. As we leave the harbor, the theme (in a canon between solo euphonium and tuba) almost seems as if large subaquatic animals are observing our departure. There are three themes (call them A, B and C) in this seafaring journey---but they are all based on the UR theme, in its original form with octaves displaced, in an upside-down form, and in a backwards version as well. (The ocean, while appearing to be unchanging, is always changing.) We move out into the main channel (A), passing several islands (B), until we reach the long draw that parallels the coastline called Eggemoggin Reach, and a sudden burst of new speed (C). Things suddenly stop, as if the wind had died, and we have a vision: is that really Mt. Desert Island we can see off the port bow, vaguely in the distance? A chorale of saxophones seems to suggest that. We push off anew as the chorale ends, and go through all three themes again---but in different instrumentations, and different keys. At the final tack-turn, there it is, for real: Mt. Desert Island, big as life. We've made it. As we pull into the harbor, where we'll secure the boat for the night, there's a feeling of achievement. Our whale and dolphin friends return, and we end our journey with gratitude and celebration. I am profoundly grateful to Jaclyn Hartenberger, Professor of Conducting at the University of Georgia, for leading the consortium which provided the commissioning of this work.
SKU: HL.14030976
ISBN 9788759853757. 9.5x14.25x0.086 inches. English.
The composer writes, 'Quite some time ago I heard - through a conversation in a mobile phone - a wonderful concert of ringing church bells from an European capital. I found it very hard to concentrate about the conversation, because I was so engrossed by the chaotic world of bell sound. The night after, I dreamt that the sound of those low singing bells was rising up from a piano in a huge empty concert hall. That experience became the starting point for my piano piece, 'The Shadows of Silence'. But before the piece gets to the ringing bells it moves through a landscape of shadows - Shadows of the silence before the bells - Silence before the storm - Shadows of melodies which all the time leaves traces even in the short passages of storm. After the passage with the low ringing bells the shadows of silence returns melted in to a lament, which are sending two regards. One to two small beautiful - not very well known - bars by Mozart, and one to the sextet in my own opera, 'Under the Sky'.
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