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Author: Benjamin Sears
Publisher: OUP Us
ISBN: 0195383745
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 233
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Book Description
The Irving Berlin Reader offers fascinating glimpses the life and work of this most famous of American songwriters. Berlin is presented here in full through writings from his earliest years to the present, including Berlin's own thoughts on songwriting. Many of the articles are otherwise difficult or impossible to find, and all are expertly contextualized by Ben Sears's introductions.
Author: Benjamin Sears
Publisher: OUP Us
ISBN: 0195383745
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 233
Get Book Here
Book Description
The Irving Berlin Reader offers fascinating glimpses the life and work of this most famous of American songwriters. Berlin is presented here in full through writings from his earliest years to the present, including Berlin's own thoughts on songwriting. Many of the articles are otherwise difficult or impossible to find, and all are expertly contextualized by Ben Sears's introductions.
Author: Benjamin Sears
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199913501
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 233
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Book Description
Without any formal training in music composition, Irving Berlin took a knack for music and turned it into the most successful songwriting career in American history. Berlin was the first Tin Pan Alley songwriter to go uptown to Broadway with a complete musical score (Watch Your Step in 1914); he is the only songwriter to build a theater exclusively for his own work (The Music Box); and his name appears above the title of his Broadway shows and Hollywood films (Irving Berlin's Holiday Inn), still a rare honor for songwriters. Berlin is also notable due the length of his career in American Song; he sold his first song at the age of 18 and passed away at the age of 101 having outlived several of his own copyrights. Throughout his career, Berlin showed that a popular song need not be of a lesser quality than songs informed by the principles of "classical" music composition. Forty years after his last published song many of his songs remain popular and several have even entered folk song status, something no other 20th-century American songwriter can claim. As one of the most seminal figures of twentieth century, both in the world of music and in American culture more generally, and as one of the rare songwriters equally successful with popular songs, Broadway shows, and Hollywood scores, Irving Berlin is the subject of an enormous corpus of writing, scattered throughout countless publications and archives. A noted performer and interpreter of Berlin's works, Benjamin Sears has unprecedented familiarity with these sources and brings together in this Reader a broad range of the most insightful primary and secondary materials. Grouped together according to the chronology of Berlin's life and work, each section and article features a critical introduction to orient the reader and contextualize the materials within the framework of American musical history. Taken as a whole, the writings - many by Berlin himself -- provide a new perspective on Berlin that highlights his musical genius in the context of his artistic development.
Author: Nancy Churnin
Publisher: Creston Books
ISBN: 1954354223
Category : Juvenile Nonfiction
Languages : en
Pages : 38
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Book Description
Irving Berlin came to the United States as a refugee from Tsarist Russia, escaping a pogrom that destroyed his village. Growing up on the streets of the lower East Side, the rhythms of jazz and blues inspired his own song-writing career. Starting with his first big hit, Alexander's Ragtime Band, Berlin created the soundtrack for American life with his catchy tunes and irresistible lyrics. With "God Bless America," he sang his thanks to the country which had given him a home and a chance to express his creative vision.
Author: Laurence Bergreen
Publisher: Da Capo Press
ISBN: 0786752521
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 706
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Book Description
Irving Berlin (1888–1989) was unable to read or write music and could only play the piano in the key of F-sharp major; yet, for the first half of the twentieth century he was America's most successful and most representative songwriter, composing such hits as "Alexander's Ragtime Band," "Cheek to Cheek," "Let's Face the Music and Dance," "Puttin' on the Ritz," "White Christmas," "Anything You Can Do," "There's No Business Like Show Business," and "God Bless America." As Thousands Cheer, winner of the Ralph J. Gleason Music Book Award, explores with precision and sensitivity Berlin's long, prolific career; his self-doubt and late-blooming misanthropy; and the tyrannical control he exerted over his legacy of song. From his immigrant beginnings through Tin Pan Alley, Broadway, and Hollywood to his reclusive and bitter final years, this definitive biography reveals the man who wrote 1500 songs but could never quash the fear that, for all his success, he wasn't quite good enough.
Author: James Kaplan
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 0300183216
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 422
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Book Description
From the prizewinning Jewish Lives series, a fast†‘moving, musically astute portrait of arguably the greatest composer of American popular music Irving Berlin (1888–1989) has been called—by George Gershwin, among others—the greatest songwriter of the golden age of the American popular song. “Berlin has no place in American music,” legendary composer Jerome Kern wrote; “he is American music.” In a career that spanned an astonishing nine decades, Berlin wrote some fifteen hundred tunes, including “Alexander’s Ragtime Band,” “God Bless America,” and “White Christmas.” From ragtime to the rock era, Berlin’s work has endured in the very fiber of American national identity. Exploring the interplay of Berlin’s life with the life of New York City, noted biographer James Kaplan offers a visceral narrative of Berlin as self†‘made man and witty, wily, tough Jewish immigrant. This fast†‘paced, musically opinionated biography uncovers Berlin’s unique brilliance as a composer of music and lyrics. Masterfully written and psychologically penetrating, Kaplan’s book underscores Berlin’s continued relevance in American popular culture. About Jewish Lives: Jewish Lives is a prizewinning series of interpretative biography designed to explore the many facets of Jewish identity. Individual volumes illuminate the imprint of Jewish figures upon literature, religion, philosophy, politics, cultural and economic life, and the arts and sciences. Subjects are paired with authors to elicit lively, deeply informed books that explore the range and depth of the Jewish experience from antiquity to the present. In 2014, the Jewish Book Council named Jewish Lives the winner of its Jewish Book of the Year Award, the first series ever to receive this award. More praise for Jewish Lives: “Excellent.” – New York times “Exemplary.” – Wall St. Journal “Distinguished.” – New Yorker “Superb.” – The Guardian
Author: Jeffrey Magee
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199911630
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 409
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Book Description
From patriotic "God Bless America" to wistful "White Christmas," Irving Berlin's songs have long accompanied Americans as they fall in love, go to war, and come home for the holidays. Irving Berlin's American Musical Theater is the first book to fully consider this songwriter's immeasurable influence on the American stage. Award-winning music historian Jeffrey Magee chronicles Berlin's legendary theatrical career, providing a rich background to some of the great composer's most enduring songs, from "There's No Business Like Show Business" to "Puttin' on the Ritz." Magee shows how Berlin's early experience singing for pennies made an impression on the young man, who kept hold of that sensibility throughout his career and transformed it into one of the defining attributes of Broadway shows. Magee also looks at darker aspects of Berlin's life, examining the anti-Semitism that Berlin faced and his struggle with depression. Informative, provocative, and full of colorful details, this book will delight song and theater aficionados alike as well as anyone interested in the story of a man whose life and work expressed so well the American dream.
Author: Adah Nuchi
Publisher: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
ISBN: 1368022529
Category : Juvenile Nonfiction
Languages : en
Pages : 44
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Book Description
An inspiring portrait of an immigrant and the gift he gave his new home. Persecuted as Jews, Izzy Baline and his family emigrated from Russia to New York, where he fell in love with his new country. He heard music everywhere and was full to bursting with his own. Izzy's thump-two-three, ting-a-ling, whee tunes soon brought him acclaim as the sought-after songwriter Irving Berlin. He ignited the imaginations of fellow countrymen and women with his Broadway and Hollywood numbers, crafting tunes that have become classics we still sing today. But when darker times came and the nation went to war, it was time for Irving to compose a new kind of song: A boom-rah-rah song. A big brass belter. A loud heart-melter. A song for America. And so "God Bless America" was born, the heart swelling standard that Americans have returned to again and again after its 1918 composition. This is the tale of how a former refugee gave America one of its most celebrated patriotic songs. With stirring, rhythmic text by Adah Nuchi and delightful, energetic art by Rob Polivka, readers will be ready to hum along to this exuberant picturebook.
Author: Mary Ellin Barrett
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
ISBN: 9781439170960
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 0
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Book Description
Written by his eldest daughter, this touching memoir shares the life of the man behind some of the nation’s favorite songs, including “God Bless America,” “White Christmas,” and “There’s No Business Life Show Business.” Irving Berlin: A Daughter’s Memoir is an affectionate, intimate, and frank memoir of America’s most famous and enduring songwriter of the century including exclusive photos. “A dramatic and wonderfully touching book. It is the first biography that really gives you a sense of who the mysterious Irving Berlin really was. — Michael Feinstein
Author: Robert Kimball
Publisher: Hal Leonard Corporation
ISBN: 9781557836816
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 564
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Book Description
(Applause Books). Gathered together in one volume for the first time, here are all of the incomparable song lyrics of Irving Berlin the lyrics of more than 1,200 songs, 400 of which have never before appeared in print along with anecdotal, historical, and musicological commentary and dozens of photographs. Berlin came from a poor immigrant family and began his career as a singing waiter, but by the time he was nineteen he was publishing his songs and quickly found fame with "Alexander's Ragtime Band" in 1911. In the extraordinary six decades that followed, Berlin wrote one popular hit after another: Blue Skies * Always * Cheek to Cheek * White Christmas * God Bless America * There's No Business Like Show Business * and many more. He also wrote a number of the classics of musical theater's Golden Age, climaxing with Annie Get Your Gun . He penned three Astaire and Rogers films Top Hat, Carefree , and Follow the Fleet as well as the scores of Holiday Inn, Easter Parade , and other films. The breadth of his accomplishment is staggering.
Author: Wilfrid Sheed
Publisher: Random House
ISBN: 1588367223
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 370
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Book Description
From Irving Berlin to Cy Coleman, from “Alexander’s Ragtime Band” to “Big Spender,” from Tin Pan Alley to the MGM soundstages, the Golden Age of the American song embodied all that was cool, sexy, and sophisticated in popular culture. For four glittering decades, geniuses like Jerome Kern, George Gershwin, Cole Porter, and Harold Arlen ran their fingers over piano keys, enticing unforgettable melodies out of thin air. Critically acclaimed writer Wilfrid Sheed uncovered the legends, mingled with the greats, and gossiped with the insiders. Now he’s crafted a dazzling, authoritative history of the era that “tripled the world’s total supply of singable tunes.” It began when immigrants in New York’s Lower East Side heard black jazz and blues–and it surged into an artistic torrent nothing short of miraculous. Broke but eager, Izzy Baline transformed himself into Irving Berlin, married an heiress, and embarked on a string of hits from “Always” to “Cheek to Cheek.” Berlin’s spiritual godson George Gershwin, in his brief but incandescent career, straddled Tin Pan Alley and Carnegie Hall, charming everyone in his orbit. Possessed of a world-class ego, Gershwin was also generous, exciting, and utterly original. Half a century later, Gershwin love songs like “Someone to Watch Over Me,” “The Man I Love,” and “Love Is Here to Stay” are as tender and moving as ever. Sheed also illuminates the unique gifts of the great jazz songsters Hoagy Carmichael and Duke Ellington, conjuring up the circumstances of their creativity and bringing back the thrill of what it was like to hear “Georgia on My Mind” or “Mood Indigo” for the first time. The Golden Age of song sparked creative breakthroughs in both Broadway musicals and splashy Hollywood extravaganzas. Sheed vividly recounts how Cole Porter, Richard Rodgers, Jerome Kern, and Johnny Mercer spread the melodic wealth to stage and screen. Popular music was, writes Sheed, “far and away our greatest contribution to the world’s art supply in the so-called American Century.” Sheed hung out with some of the great artists while they were still writing–and better than anyone, he knows great music, its shimmer, bite, and exuberance. Sparkling with wit, insight, and the grace notes of wonderful songs, The House That George Built is a heartfelt, intensely personal portrait of an unforgettable era. A delightfully charming, funny, and most illuminating portrait of songwriters and the Golden Age of American Popular Song. Mr. Sheed’s carefully chosen depictions and anecdotes recapture that amazingly creative period, a moment in time in which I was so fortunate to be surrounded by all that magic.” –Margaret Whiting
