A thorough and enthusiastic introduction to the life and works of Mozart, perfect for readers of all ages.
This fourth installment of a series focuses on the music of Mozart.
Alexander (Sex and Romance, 2015, etc.) continues his series of manuals with a slight departure from the norm. Previous volumes have centered on providing readers with lucid, accessible guides to such practical matters as sex, romance, money, finances, and general life lessons, but in this updated version of Book 4, the emphasis turns quite specific: the journey, music, and genius of Mozart. The author contends that listening to and properly appreciating Mozart’s music can usher readers into what Alexander calls a “heavenly state of consciousness.” Great art, according to the author, transports listeners to a realm where they ask: How is it possible that a human being actually made something so beautiful and stirring? Offering copious musical examples, Alexander deftly describes several of Mozart’s best known or most technically virtuosic pieces, grounding them in the particulars of the composer’s life and career. The author presents e-book readers with links to YouTube clips featuring Mozart performances or various discussions by experts on the music’s splendor and significance. At several points, readers are taken on deeper examinations of key works (both Mozart’s and those of other classical composers who either influenced or were inspired by his music). The Mozart offerings range from popular operas like The Marriage of Figaro and complex pieces like the string quartets and quintets to such towering achievements as the “Jupiter” Symphony. The technical details of instruments and arrangements are broken down in clear language. The author is always alert to the ways Mozart “stretched the ears” of his listeners, perfecting many of the musical forms that had come before him and foreshadowing several later developments in the genre. And throughout the book, as in the previous entries in this series, Alexander is very effective at stressing the excitement of discovery, the great personal rewards to be reaped with patient and meticulous study. The guide is brightly and invitingly designed, clearly intended to welcome readers to a grand adventure.
A thorough and enthusiastic introduction to the life and works of Mozart, perfect for readers of all ages.Pub Date: Dec. 9, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-937597-24-5
Page Count: 180
Publisher: The School of Pythagoras
Review Posted Online: Nov. 27, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.
The legendary booze-addled metal rocker turned reality-TV star comes clean in his tell-all autobiography.
Although brought up in the bleak British factory town of Aston, John “Ozzy” Osbourne’s tragicomic rags-to-riches tale is somehow quintessentially American. It’s an epic dream/nightmare that takes him from Winson Green prison in 1966 to a presidential dinner with George W. Bush in 2004. Tracing his adult life from petty thief and slaughterhouse worker to rock star, Osbourne’s first-person slang-and-expletive-driven style comes off like he’s casually relating his story while knocking back pints at the pub. “What you read here,” he writes, “is what dribbled out of the jelly I call my brain when I asked it for my life story.” During the late 1960s his transformation from inept shoplifter to notorious Black Sabbath frontman was unlikely enough. In fact, the band got its first paying gigs by waiting outside concert venues hoping the regularly scheduled act wouldn’t show. After a few years, Osbourne and his bandmates were touring America and becoming millionaires from their riff-heavy doom music. As expected, with success came personal excess and inevitable alienation from the other members of the group. But as a solo performer, Osbourne’s predilection for guns, drink, drugs, near-death experiences, cruelty to animals and relieving himself in public soon became the stuff of legend. His most infamous exploits—biting the head off a bat and accidentally urinating on the Alamo—are addressed, but they seem tame compared to other dark moments of his checkered past: nearly killing his wife Sharon during an alcohol-induced blackout, waking up after a bender in the middle of a busy highway, burning down his backyard, etc. Osbourne is confessional to a fault, jeopardizing his demonic-rocker reputation with glib remarks about his love for Paul McCartney and Robin Williams. The most distinguishing feature of the book is the staggering chapter-by-chapter accumulation of drunken mishaps, bodily dysfunctions and drug-induced mayhem over a 40-plus-year career—a résumé of anti-social atrocities comparable to any of rock ’n’ roll’s most reckless outlaws.
An autobiography as toxic and addictive as any drug its author has ever ingested.Pub Date: Jan. 25, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-446-56989-7
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2009
IN THE NEWS
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
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