Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart is no ordinary boy, sporting a white wig and elegantly dressed in red velvet, on his way to playing several concerts in the city. To the surprise of all, he proudly begins to play with his sister for the tired customs officer and gloomy dockworkers. The evening air begins to glisten and soon, everyone's faces are beaming, their ears ringing with music! Included are introductory notes on the composer along with recordings of the narrated story and the composition "The Little Night Music" ("Eine Kleine Nachtmusik"). A unique code for the digital download of the recordings is also included.

Bind: hardback

Pages: 36

Dimensions: 180 x 250 mm

Echoes from Hawaiki is a comprehensive account of taonga pūoro ancestral musical traditions and instrument-playing techniques. In this thoroughly researched and beautifully illustrated book, Jennifer Cattermole traces the origins and development of taonga pūoro, the stories they carry and how they connect present-day iwi with ancestral knowledge and traditions. She shows how traditional Māori and Moriori musical instruments have developed in response to available materials and evolving cultural needs, from their ancestral origins through the suppression of their use in nineteenth and early twentieth-century Aotearoa New Zealand, to their revival in the present day. An essential resource for all who are interested in taonga pūoro as treasured objects and as voices through time and place. ‘How did our forebears succeed in creating a bountiful array of musical instruments using stone tools and natural materials? This book answers that question in fine detail and also reveals how our present generation is reviving indigenous culture and language, thereby sustaining our brightly burning fires.’ —Huata Holmes (Kāitahu, Kāti Mamoe, Waitaha, Hāwea a Rapuwai ano)

Bind: paperback

Pages: 236

Dimensions: 170 x 240 mm

Publication Date: 20-06-2024

This updated and expanded edition of Tommy at Fifty is the definitive illustrated companion to the album that made the Who one of the greatest and most influential bands of the rock era. Written by two leading experts on, and close associates of, the group—journalist and author Chris Charlesworth and original album cover designer Mike McInnerney—it considers the album from four distinct angles, examining the mood of its creation, the origins of its music, the look of the artwork and its subsequent film adaptation, and its enduring legacy. With a foreword by Pete Townshend and cover art created exclusively for this book by McInnerney, Tommy at Fifty offers an unparalleled window into the Who’s finest hour. With the exception perhaps of My Generation, Tommy remains the work with which the Who are most closely associated. It’s the album that turned Pete Townshend, Roger Daltrey, John Entwistle, and Keith Moon into millionaire superstars, and, like its Messiah figure title character, it casts a long shadow over both their subsequent work together and the canon of 20th‐century rock music.

Bind: paperback

Pages: 192

Dimensions: 228 x 228 mm

Publication Date: 01-11-2023

Taylor Swift is a superstar, a global sensation, and the greatest singer-songwriter of her generation! There's no better way for Swifties to celebrate all Taylor's amazing achievements and her dynamic personality than with the SUPER FAN-tastic Taylor Swift Coloring & Activity Book! The perfect gift for a Swiftie of any age - kids, teens, or adults - inside this unofficial Taylor Swift celebration, you'll unleash your creativity, test your Swift knowledge, and solve fun quizzes, games, and puzzles that range from easy to challenging and are all dedicated to the unstoppable force that is Taylor Swift! 33 high-quality line art designs capture T-Swizzle's facial expressions and personality, and each page is accompanied by a fun fact about the musician so iconic she's known simply as: The Music Industry. Learn fascinating trivia about her career, revisit songs from her early performances, and learn details of her early years, her songwriting and music style evolution, and her iconic fashion looks. You'll also find incredible full color photographs of Swift throughout the years, 7 fun-filled activity pages, 3 test-your-knowledge quizzes, and an answer key in the back of the book.

Bind: paperback

Pages: 96

Dimensions: 216 x 276 mm

Publication Date: 23-01-2024

Enter the world of music by not only hearing the difference in musical tones and chords, but also seeing the difference! Children learn best when they can learn through multi-sensory means. By using hearing, seeing, and kinesthetic methods, Emily Arrow has created this easy and fun book for children to use as an introduction to learn how to play the piano! This book is a simple and much needed piano method for beginning musicians ages 6 and older. Emily's process, which follows the Orff Schulwerk method, is very approachable as she walks young musicians through seven lessons learning musical notes and chords on a keyboard through a color dot method. She uses colorful stickers to represent the notes, flashcards to learn the rainbow chords, and video/audio links for students to access for further help. Students will learn how to play 30 fun songs, including The Colorful Musical Alphabet, Row, Row, Row Your Boat, The Itsy Bitsy Spider, Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, The Bear Went Over the Mountain, and more! Kids' Guide to Playing the Piano and Keyboard also introduces young minds to important musical vocabulary, fun facts, and the history of the piano, as well as providing a practice chart. Online video and audio access of Emily teaching is included so kids can hear what the piece should sound like. Emily Arrow graduated from Berklee College of Music and is certified in Orff Schulwerk approach to music education. She has been teaching piano for over 15 years. A very popular YouTube influencer, she has over 30,000 subscribers to her YouTube Channel and her videos have been viewed over 2 million times. She is also the author of Kids' Guide to Learning the Ukulele and Kids' Ukulele Songbook, both from Happy Fox Books. If your child needs an easy and fun guide to learning the piano, Kids' Guide to Playing the Piano and Keyboard is the book for you!

Bind: paperback

Pages: 116

Dimensions: 216 x 279 mm

Publication Date: 21-11-2023

How do you remember the seventies? Whether it's as the "Me Decade," the heatwave of 1976, or the Winter of Discontent, you'll find something in these pages to stir up nostalgia for the pop culture that defined a generation! Cinemas were showing groundbreaking movies, from Star Wars and Suspiria to Smokey and the Bandit, and TV programming was in its golden age with classic kids' shows like The Tom and Jerry Show and The Muppet Show, sitcoms from Sanford and Son to Happy Days, dramas including Little House on the Prairie and Dallas, and more, all played out on brand-new color TV sets. Then came the first-ever video game consoles — the Magnavox Odyssey, which released just a few months before the Atari 2600 — and along with it, Pong. In The Ultimate 70s Collection, you'll read and remember (or imagine!) what life was like in this momentous decade filled with legendary toys, trends, music, movies, celebrities, and other pop culture phenomena. Explore all the childhood favorite toys and games like Connect 4, Etch a Sketch, Speak & Spell, Simon, Weebles, Rock 'Em Sock 'Em Robots, Hungry Hippos, Boggle, Battleship, and more. Remember the chart-topping songs, albums, artists, and musical events of the decade, including Michael Jackson going solo, the soundtrack to Grease, My Sharona from one-hit wonders The Knack, David Bowie's The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars, AC/DC's Highway to Hell, Led Zepplin IV, Kiss, Queen, Blondie, The Clash, Ramones, Bee Gees, Love to Love You Baby from Donna Summer, and many more. Discover how the iconic Dungeons & Dragons game was first created, the origins of Paddington Bear, the unique makeup of Stretch Armstrong, the musical revolution of the Sony Walkman, the story of Pong, 70 films that defined the '70s, from Dirty Harry and Escape from the Planet of the Apes to Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory and Young Frankenstein, and explore a Star Wars retrospective. Filled with fascinating articles, high-quality photography, and so much more, take a trip down memory lane and rediscover the most notable developments of the seventies with The Ultimate 70s Collection!

Bind: paperback

Pages: 144

Dimensions: 216 x 279 mm

Publication Date: 12-09-2023

The Beatles: Fab but True examines 16 discrete stories about the Beatles that range from the merely unreal to the cosmically coincidental. Unlike the countless other Beatles books that have been written over the decades, The Beatles: Fab but True does a deep dive on some of the lesser-known—but more remarkable—aspects of the lives and career of the Fab Four and their numerous and colorful associates and colleagues. You'll learn: • How a lucky bet on a longshot racehorse helped birth the Beatle • How a drum salesman and a partially disabled signwriter created the enduring Beatles log • How Paul McCartney conjured the fictional name Eleanor Rigby in 1966, only later to find that the real one lay buried beneath his feet • How the Beatles battled racial segregation in the South and played the first integrated concert at the Gator Bowl • Why the Beatles were labeled as “hustlers” by the Rolling Stones • How an innocent musical homage to Chuck Berry got John Lennon entangled with a music industry mobster This book tells these and many other remarkable stories in a quick-reading, fun, and authoritatively researched book.

Bind: hardback

Pages: 224

Dimensions: 152 x 228 mm

Publication Date: 28-08-2023

Let's face it, without the larger-than-life character and imagination of the art that complements it, metal just wouldn't have had the same impact. From the colourful, outlandish, yet sophisticated use of visuals for album artwork and posters, to the immediately recognisable logos of such bands as Black Sabbath, Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, Motoerhead, Metallica, Slayer, and a host of others across many subgenres, there's a close-knit relationship between the riffs that thunder from the guitar and the images that have come to represent the songs, anthems, and sheer nature of the beast. Does any other form of music immediately conjure up such evocative and distinctive images as the mere mention of the term "heavy metal" does? The answer is simple: no! From its inception in the 1960s through to today's giants, the art has been closely connected to the music. Every classic album brings to mind a readily identifiable album cover. Each great band has an immediately identifiable logo. All of the landmark gigs have a poster that quintessentially depicts the time, place, and passion of the event. It's all developed so far along the road that, today, the art that has been used to illustrate the music now stands on its own. There are exhibitions of the finest examples created by the truly outstanding artists. These works are collectible in their own right. What might have begun as a way of packaging metal has taken on a life of its own -- moreover, it's even possible to trace the way the genre itself has evolved, and changed, by looking at its art. This book explores the ways in which the art has helped define each of the crucial subgenres that make up the multifaceted and colourful centipede that is metal.

Bind: hardback

Pages: 240

Dimensions: 254 x 279 mm

Publication Date: 28-03-2023

Cream, the hugely influential 1960s British rock power trio -- featuring guitarist Eric Clapton, bassist Jack Bruce, and drummer Ginger Baker -- and the American city of San Francisco, California, were a legendary pairing. The Fillmore Auditorium and Winterland were the venues where, in February-March 1968, the band's live sound was first officially immortalized on tape and film. Yet, detailed coverage of those historic performances appears far from complete. Inaccurate documentation, as well as a devastating 1978 fire at the Atlantic Records audio archive, made the definitive chronicle of these famed shows difficult to construct. However, recent archival discoveries led author Edoardo Genzolini to look back at those days with a new perspective. This book presents his thorough documentation of Cream on and off the Fillmore and Winterland stages, when, during those two months of 1968, they really were sitting on top of the world. The author's detailed analysis of all sets played by the band at both venues -- recorded by Atlantic Records and filmed by legendary British documentary filmmaker Tony Palmer -- and his precise look at which live performances ended up on which Cream albums present the definitive account for the first time. Also featured are rare, never-before-published concert photographs, presenting Cream at the height of their powers.

Bind: hardback

Pages: 144

Dimensions: 228 x 228 mm

Publication Date: 28-03-2023

This unique, visually exciting look at the evolution of nightclubs across America and Europe since the 1960s reveals an unwavering truth about club culture—the one constant is change. Opening with the psychedelic haunts of the 1960s New York pop art scene and closing more than half a century later with the rise of post-club happenings, "Temporary Pleasure" shows how nightlife spaces have evolved to meet the needs of their generation, and how each generation was seeking something a little different from the one before. Each chapter focuses on a distinct phase and location: Italy’s politically radical clubs of the ’60s; New York City’s disco scene; Detroit and Chicago’s techno and house paradises; Ibiza’s counterculture communal retreats; Britain’s rave culture; and Berlin’s techno scene. The clubs come to life in double-page spreads that feature specs and detailed profiles. Author John Leo Gillen offers his take on various important cultural, design, and architectural details, while numerous photographs offer their own vibey stories. The book features interviews with people who were involved in a number of the scenes included, from NYC disco mainstay DJ Justin Strauss to Ben Kelly, architect of Manchester’s legendary venue The Haçienda. As the world emerges from its Covid-induced isolation, this celebration of crowded rooms, dance-worthy beats, and communal transcendence feels more important than ever.

Bind: hardback

Pages: 224

Dimensions: 240 x 280 mm

Publication Date: 25-04-2023