All in the Downs

Author: Shirley Collins
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 1907222413
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 290

Book Description
A memoir from one of Britain's legendary singers, folklorists, and music historians. A legendary singer, folklorist, and music historian, Shirley Collins has been an integral part of the folk-music revival for more than sixty years. In her new memoir, All in the Downs, Collins tells the story of that lifelong relationship with English folksong—a dedication to artistic integrity that has guided her through the triumphs and tragedies of her life. All in the Downs combines elements of memoir—from her working-class origins in wartime Hastings to the bright lights of the 1950s folk revival in London—alongside reflections on the role traditional music and the English landscape have played in shaping her vision. From formative field recordings made with Alan Lomax in the United States to the “crowning glories” recorded with her sister Dolly on the Sussex Downs, she writes of the obstacles that led to her withdrawal from the spotlight and the redemption of a new artistic flourishing that continues today with her unexpected return to recording in 2016. Through it all, Shirley Collins has been guided and supported by three vital and inseparable loves: traditional English song, the people and landscape of her native Sussex, and an unwavering sense of artistic integrity. All in the Downs pays tribute to these passions, and in doing so, illustrates a way of life as old as England, that has all but vanished from this land. Generously illustrated with rare archival material.

All in the Downs

Author: Shirley Collins
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 1913689034
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 290

The Oxford Handbook of Shakespeare and Music

Author: Christopher R. Wilson
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190945141
Category : Drama
Languages : en
Pages : 1289

Book Description
"This compendium reflects the latest international research into the many and various uses of music in relation to Shakespeare's plays and poems, the contributors' lines of enquiry extending from the Bard's own time to the present day. The coverage is global in its scope, and includes studies of Shakespeare-related music in countries as diverse as China, the Czech Republic, France, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, Russia, South Africa, Sweden, and the Soviet Union, as well as the more familiar Anglophone musical and theatrical traditions of the UK and USA. The range of genres surveyed by the book's team of distinguished authors embraces music for theatre, opera, ballet, musicals, the concert hall, and film, in addition to Shakespeare's ongoing afterlives in folk music, jazz, and popular music. The authors take a range of diverse approaches: some investigate the evidence for performative practices in the Early Modern and later eras, while others offer detailed analyses of representative case studies, situating these firmly in their cultural contexts, or reflecting on the political and sociological ramifications of the music. As a whole, the volume provides a wide-ranging compendium of cutting-edge scholarship engaging with an extraordinarily rich body of music without parallel in the history of the global arts"--

England’s Folk Revival and the Problem of Identity in Traditional Music

Author: Joseph Williams
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1000582604
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 219

Book Description
Establishing an intersection between the fields of traditional music studies, English folk music history and the philosophy of Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari, this book responds to the problematic emphasis on cultural identity in the way traditional music is understood and valued. Williams locates the roots of contemporary definitions of traditional music, including UNESCO-designated intangible cultural heritage, in the theory of English folk music developed in 1907 by Cecil Sharp. Through a combination of Deleuzian philosophical analysis and historical revision of England’s folk revival of the Victorian and Edwardian eras, Williams makes a compelling argument that identity is a restrictive ideology that runs counter to the material processes of traditional music’s production. Williams reimagines Sharp’s appropriation of Darwinian evolutionary concepts, asking what it would mean today to say that traditional music ‘evolves’, in light of recent advances in evolutionary theory. The book ultimately advances a concept of traditional music that eschews the term’s long-standing ontological and axiological foundations in the principle of identity. For scholars and graduate students in musicology, cultural studies, and ethnomusicology, the book is an ambitious and provocative challenge to entrenched habits of thought in the study of traditional music and the historiography of England’s folk revival.

Popular Music Autobiography

Author: Oliver Lovesey
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
ISBN: 1501355848
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 265

Book Description
The 1960s saw the nexus of the revolution in popular music by a post-war generation amid demographic upheavals and seismic shifts in technology. Over the past two decades, musicians associated with this period have produced a large amount of important autobiographical writing. This book situates these works -- in the forms of formal autobiographies and memoirs, auto-fiction, songs, and self-fashioned museum exhibitions -- within the context of the recent expansion of interest in autobiography, disability, and celebrity studies. It argues that these writings express anxiety over musical originality and authenticity, and seeks to dispel their writers' celebrity status and particularly the association with a lack of seriousness. These works often constitute a meditation on the nature of postmodern fame within a celebrity-obsessed culture, and paradoxically they aim to regain the private self in a public forum.

England’s Green

Author: David Matless
Publisher: Reaktion Books
ISBN: 1789149711
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 559

Book Description
A sweeping history of how ecological challenges have shaped English society over the last sixty years. England’s Green explores how environmental concerns have shaped and reflected English national identity since the 1960s. From agriculture to leisure, climate change, folklore, archaeology, and religion, David Matless shows how national environmental debates connect to the local, regional, global, and postcolonial worlds. Moving across a breadth of material including government policy, popular music, ecological polemic, and television comedy, England’s Green shows the richness and complexity of English environmental culture. Along the way, Matless tracks how today’s debates over climate and nature, land, and culture, have been molded by events over the past sixty years.

America Over the Water

Author: Shirley Collins
Publisher: SAF Publishing Ltd
ISBN: 9780946719662
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 238

Book Description
At the age of 19 Shirley Collins was making a name for herself as a folk singer in post-war London. At a party she met famous American musical historian and folklorist, Alan Lomax and they became romantically involved. This is an account of the year of her life spent as Lomax's assistant and lover in America.

Rumours Of Glory

Author: Bruce Cockburn
Publisher: Harper Collins
ISBN: 1443415901
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 442

Book Description
Award-winning songwriter and pioneering guitarist Bruce Cockburn has been shaped by politics, protest, romance and spiritual discovery. He has toured the globe, visiting far-flung places such as Guatemala, Mali, Mozambique, Afghanistan and Nepal, performing and speaking out on important issues, from native rights and land mines to the environment and Third World debt. His journeys have been reflected in his music and evolving styles: folk, jazz, blues, rock and world beat. Drawing from his experiences, he continues to create memorable songs about his ever-expanding universe of wonders. As an artist with thirty-one albums, Cockburn has won numerous awards and the devotion of legions of fans across Canada and around the world. Yet the man himself has remained a mystery. In this memoir, Cockburn invites us into his private world and takes us on a lively cultural and musical tour through the late twentieth century, sharing his Christian convictions, his personal relationships and the social and political activism that has defined him and has both invigorated and incited his fans.

Never Look at the Empty Seats

Author: Charlie Daniels
Publisher: HarperChristian + ORM
ISBN: 0718074769
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 297

Book Description
The Incredible Story of a Country Music Legend Few artists have left a more indelible mark on America’s musical landscape than Charlie Daniels. Readers will experience a soft, personal side of Charlie Daniels that has never before been documented. In his own words, he presents the path from his post-depression childhood to performing for millions as one of the most successful country acts of all time and what he has learned along the way. The book also includes insights into the many musicians that orbited Charlie’s world, including Elvis Presley, Bob Dylan, Willie Nelson, Tammy Wynette and many more. Charlie was officially inducted into The Country Music Hall of Fame in 2016, shortly before his 80th birthday. He now shares the inside stories, reflections, and rare personal photographs from his earliest days in the 1940s to his self-taught guitar and fiddle playing high school days of the fifties through his rise to music stardom in the seventies, eighties and beyond. Charlie Daniels presents a life lesson for all of us regardless of profession: “Walk on stage with a positive attitude. Your troubles are your own and are not included in the ticket price. Some nights you have more to give than others, but put it all out there every show. You're concerned with the people who showed up, not the ones who didn't. So give them a show and…Never look at the empty seats!”

Been So Long

Author: Jorma Kaukonen
Publisher: Macmillan + ORM
ISBN: 1250125499
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 384

Book Description
"A modern parable." —from the foreword by Grace Slick “Jorma Kaukonen is a force in American music, equally adept at fingerpicked acoustic folk and blues as he is at wailing on an electric.” – Acoustic Guitar “Jorma Kaukonen lit a fuse and transformed his electric guitar into a firework.” – Live For Live Music Includes a CD of live music as a companion to the book! From the man who made a name for himself as a founding member and lead guitarist of Jefferson Airplane comes a memoir that offers a rare glimpse into the heart and soul of a musical genius—and a vivid journey through the psychedelic era in America. “Music is the reward for being alive,” writes Jorma Kaukonen in this candid and emotional account of his life and work. “It stirs memory in a singular way that is unmatched.” In a career that has already spanned a half century—one that has earned him induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award, among other honors—Jorma is best known for his legendary bands Jefferson Airplane and the still-touring Hot Tuna. But before he won worldwide recognition he was just a young man with a passion and a dream. Been So Long is the story of how Jorma found his place in the world of music and beyond. The grandson of Finnish and Russian-Jewish immigrants whose formative years were spent abroad with his American-born diplomat father, Jorma channeled his life experiences—from his coming-of-age in Pakistan and the Philippines to his early gigs with Jack Casady in D.C. to his jam sessions in San Francisco with Jerry Garcia, Janis Joplin, Bob Dylan, and other contemporaries—into his art in unique and revelatory ways. Been So Long charts not only Jorma’s association with the bands that made him famous but goes into never-before-told details about his addiction and recovery, his troubled first marriage and still-thriving second, and more. Interspersed with diary entries, personal correspondence, and song lyrics, this memoir is as unforgettable and inspiring as Jorma’s music itself.