No musical partnership has enjoyed greater success during its time span than that of Gilbert and Sullivan in the later 19th century. No fewer than a dozen Savoy operas are still regularly performed. The operas present audiences with splendidly rich and satirical evocations of Victorian England and its society: the prime subject matter of this ......
The Heart of a Woman offers the first-ever biography of Florence B. Price, a composer whose career spanned both the Harlem and Chicago Renaissances, and the first African American woman to gain national recognition for her works. Price's twenty-five years in Chicago formed the core of a working life that saw her create three hundred works in ......
How a Nude Centerfold Sex Symbol Seduced Hollywood
In the 1970s and '80s, Burt Reynolds represented a new breed of movie star: Charming and relentlessly macho, he was a good ol' Southern boy who made hearts throb and audiences laugh. He was Burt Reynolds, a football hero and a guy you might have shared some jokes with in a redneck bar. After an impressive but tormented career, rivers of negative ......
Of all the male stars of Golden Age Hollywood, Kirk Douglas became the final survivor, the last icon of a fabled era that the world will never see again. When he celebrated his birthday in 2016, a headline read - 'Legendary Hollywood horndog turns 100.' He was both a charismatic actor and a man of uncommon force and vigour. His restless and ......
EEric Clapton: A Life in MusicE tells the story a man who is arguably the world's greatest guitar player. Written by Clapton expert Marc Roberty author of the incredibly detailed two-volume music chronicle EEric Clapton Day by DayE (Backbeat Books) this book covers the entirety of Clapton's impressively long career (the artist celebrated his ......
Hefner, the Playboy of the Western World, was a visionary publisher, an empire-builder, an avatar of pleasure, and a pajama-clad pipe-smoker with a pre-coital grin. In 1953, he published his first edition of Playboy, with Marilyn Monroe on the cover and her nude calendar inside. He obtained the rights for $500 with money borrowed from his ......
From humble beginnings to yearnings of stardom; early setbacks, marriage to Dove; the struggle to the top and the endless quest to be the best. This comedy giant was voted in the top three greatest comics of all time. There was no one else like him. He remains a fans' favourite with the nation and is the greatest ever British magician and ......
With Robert Capa as Photojournalist in the Spanish Civil War
Paris in the summer of 1937. A giant funeral procession wends its way from the city centre eastward toward the Pere-Lachaise Cemetery, accompanied by the sounds of Chopin's Marche funebre. The photojournalist Gerda Taro had been killed in the Spanish Civil War a few days earlier. Thousands come to pay their last respects to the emigree from ......
Steve Winwood was successively lead vocalist and multi-instrumentalist with the chart-topping Spencer Davis Group, the more experimental Traffic, and the short-lived Blind Faith. He then embarked on a successful career as a solo performer, session musician and regular collaborator with his peers. This is the first biography for nearly 30 years.
