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Il Divo: Our Music, Our Journey, Our Words

Il Divo

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 9 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Il Divo: Our Music, Our Journey, Our Words 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

The book is well written and the individual stories of each Il Divo singer brings the reader closer to a better appreciation of their music.

Best Book 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

I purchased this book as these 4 guys are the best. I have all there CD'S and Videos and this book was very interesting. I hope to be able to go see them in person when in the USA. I have to say that this is the best idea Simon Cowell ever came up with. I would recommend the book and vidoe's to everyone.

Phyllis Rutkowski
Westland Mi

Editorial Review:

In late 2004 Il Divo burst onto the music scene with their unique blend of opera and popular music. The group has since conquered the hearts of fans and the charts of nations around the world, selling 18 million albums worldwide and scoring an incredible 36 number-one records. This insider’s account features exclusive and intimate interviews with each member, as well as stunning, previously unreleased photographs. Rounded out by an afterword from the group's founder, Simon Cowell, this is an account no fan will want to be without.

24 Italian Songs and Arias - Medium High Voice (Book/CD): Medium High Voice - Book/CD

Amazon Price: $10.17 List Price: $14.95 Usually ships in 24 hours By: G. Schirmer, Inc. Amazon Marketplace: 52 new & used starting at $8.71

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 14 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

? 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

I love the fact that this music anthology now comes with a CD for practicing purposes. It makes it fun to rehearse.

Editorial Review:

For well over a century, the G. Schirmer edition of 24 Italian Songs and Arias of the 17th and 18th Centuries has introduced millions of beginning singers to serious Italian vocal literature. Offered in two accessible keys suitable for all singers, it is likely to be the first publication a voice teacher will ask a first-time student to purchase. The classic Parisotti realizations result in rich, satisfying accompaniments which allow singers pure musical enjoyment. For ease of practice, carefully prepared accompaniments are also recorded on CD by John Keene, a New York-based concert accompanist and vocal coach who has performed throughout the United States for radio and television. Educated at the University of Southern California, Keene has taught accompanying at the university level and collaborated with Gian Carlo Menotti and Thea Musgrave on productions of their operas.

Rent

Jonathan Larson

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 111 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Good Coffee Table Book 4 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

I wasn't a big fan of "Rent" until I saw the movie, and when I read this book, it gave me a bigger meaning to the play/movie.

Warning: This is just for fans of "Rent". Those who haven't seen the movie will get into the story of how it was made, but not as much the screenplay.

Editorial Review:

This is by far the must-get theater book of the year. With dazzling punk graphics that will quickly win book industry awards, the volume contains the entire libretto of the Tony- and Pulitzer-winning musical about love and loyalty among starving AIDS-stricken artists in New York's East Village. But editors Evelyn McDonnell and Katherine Silberger wisely understand that the story of the show's creation is as compelling as the musical itself--so more than half of this volume is devoted to an oral history of the composer/lyricist/librettist Jonathan Larson, who came to New York hoping to revolutionize musical theater--then died of an aortic aneurysm the night of the show's final preview. It's an event book for an event musical.

Broadway Musicals: Show by Show: Sixth Edition (Broadway Musicals Show by Show)

Stanley Green, Kay Green

Amazon Price: $12.89 List Price: $18.95 Usually ships in 3 to 5 weeks By: Applause Theatre and Cinema Books Amazon Marketplace: 1 new & used starting at $11.81

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 7 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

A true must-have book for all musical theatre fans! 5 out of 5 stars.
47 of 48 people found this review helpful.

This book has proven and indispensable part of my theatre library, and if you get it, it will become one for you as well. Want to know what date the original production of Show Boat opened on Broadway? This book will tell you. Who the original stars of Mexican Hayride were? That's in here, too. You will be able to find the answer to just about any question you could ever ask of Broadway's hit musicals. A perfect companion piece to Ken Mandelbaum's Not Since Carrie (which chronicles the flop musicals this book mostly excludes), and a wonderful way of tracking the history of the Broadway musical, Broadway Musicals: Show by Show is as comprehensive, helpful, and essential as reference books on Broadway come.

Editorial Review:

The long-awaited update of this acclaimed, best-selling title. The most comprehensive and widely used Broadway reference book has been expanded and updated to include more than 300 of the most important and memorable productions of the American musical theatre, including revivals. Chronologically arranged beginning with The Black Crook in 1866, the sixth edition adds entries on numerous musicals from recent years, including The Lion King, Hairspray, The Producers, Wicked, The Boy from Oz, Mamma Mia!, Thoroughly Modern Millie, Avenue Q, and others. Features a wealth of statistics and inside information, plus critical reception, cast lists, and pithy commentary about each show.

Opera 101: A Complete Guide to Learning and Loving Opera

Fred Plotkin

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 21 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Glad to see this book well-received 5 out of 5 stars.
26 of 29 people found this review helpful.

It is most heartening to see that opera lovers and novices almost universally agree that this book is excellent, informative, and illuminating. I was maybe 14 when I asked a salesperson in a bookstore "do you have a book that will teach me about opera?" Without hesitation, I was directed to "Opera 101".

I was skeptical. However, I am no longer!

Mr. Plotkin is experienced, informed, and well-read. So as not to belabour the structure of the book (since there are many descriptions of it) I'll say that the idea of walking someone through 11 operas is excellent. That Mr. Plotkin picks a particular recording (with commentary per track) is an indespensible fusion with the book.

That is to say Mr. Plotkin has carefully chosen themes, operas, and what he believes to be superior recordings of the above mentioned as illustrations of what opera can be to the average listener. His decisions on recordings are in no way arbitrary, and he takes special care to choose recordings more easily found than those that might be "better" but are less easily found outside of major metropolitan areas.

Let's remember, the original version of this book was written before the internet made just about any recording available in any area. He admits that sometimes he's arbitrary (especially with his recommendation for Il Barbiere di Siviglia...YUCK) but he always explains his good reasons for choosing inferior performances on disc. His are not "Gospel" recommendations, but those he thinks best illustrate the power of opera in recorded form, customs, and the sheer beauty of the human voice.

Beyond that, Mr. Plotkin performs a yeoman's task of qualifying the different kinds of voices in opera, provides an 90+ page history of opera, and gives the average American a primer in the esoteric "etiquette" of attending an opera performance.

Invaluable for its tutorial format, universal as a detailed introduction; "Opera 101" is a MUST for an opera lover's collection.

Editorial Review:

Just as the title says, this is a basic primer on what opera is, what to look for and what to listen to. There is nothing stuffy in Plotkin's style, which is clear and idiomatic. The book also boasts a foreword by supertenor Placido Domingo.

Metropolitain Opera: 2009 Wall Calendar

Metropolitan Opera

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Editorial Review:

This calendar features stunning color photography that captures unforgettable scenes from, and stars of, Met Opera performances, including Madama Butterfly, Aida, Lucia di Lammermoor, and Carmen.

Opera for Dummies (Book and Audio CD)

David Pogue, Scott Speck

Amazon Price: $16.49 List Price: $24.99 Usually ships in 24 hours By: For Dummies Amazon Marketplace: 58 new & used starting at $4.89

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 19 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

Opera is growing--in the size of its audience, in the number of companies, in general interest--and is attracting a lot of attention among younger, more visually oriented people. But opera can be intimidating to the uninitiated: it's sung in foreign languages and has odd little customs (such as women singing the parts of young boys, and hefty middle-aged singers portraying teenaged lovers) that may be disconcerting at first. But opera needn't be at all intimidating, thanks to the miracle of supertitles (like subtitles, but projected above the stage), the advent of generations of singers who work at staying in shape, and the appearance of reference works like Opera for Dummies that are designed to remove the snobbery and mystery from opera. If you don't mind the flippant tone, IDG Books' Opera for Dummies makes an excellent guide for those who are new to this splendid art form. All of opera's details are explained clearly and without pretension; there's a lot of useful information packed into its 358 pages. The package includes an enhanced compact disc (listen to it in your stereo's CD player or in your computer's CD-ROM drive), with more than an hour of operatic excerpts from classic EMI releases. The illustrations, while not lavish, are adequate.

There are, however, a few glaring errors in this book that demand correction: Scott Speck and David Pogue confuse the opera chorus with the supers (the "extras" who march in armies, wait on tables, and never, ever sing), and--even worse--maintain that soloists and choristers are two entirely separate breeds. In fact, there's not a soloist alive who has never done chorus work--and choristers frequently do solo work as well. These are rather foolish mistakes for a pair of acclaimed experts to make in a book that wants to be taken as a basic guide to opera.

100 Great Operas And Their Stories: Act-By-Act Synopses

Henry W. Simon

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 9 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

If you only buy one book on opera... 5 out of 5 stars.
16 of 17 people found this review helpful.

This is a great book for the opera novice or seasoned opera affectionado. Going to an upcoming opera? Reading the synopsis will refresh one's memory or help the novice to better understand what is going on by acts. This is a well written book and a true bargain for the extensive information provided. I have purchased one for myself and another for a friend. A great gift book!

A rare and USEFUL guide 5 out of 5 stars.
15 of 15 people found this review helpful.

I took an intrest in Opera and wanted to discover more about it. To my dismay, when I read reviews in the papers, I found nearlly nothing of value because they never did the simple job of brifely explaining what the story was actual about. That's why this book is great; it gives a brief summary of what the Opera is about act by act. Thus, this guide is a great tool to find a story that you like; however, one should still look into a local review of an Opera to see how the singers perform and the rendition is done; this book gives reviews in the general.

Editorial Review:

An invaluable guide for both casual opera fans and afficionados, this volume contains act-by-act descriptions of operatic works ranging from the early seventeenth century masterworks of Monteverdi and Purcell to the modern classics of Menotti and Britten. Written in a lively anecdotal style, entries include character descriptions, historical background, and much more.

A Soprano on Her Head: Right-Side-Up Reflections on Life and Other Performances

Eloise Ristad

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 15 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

(Foreword, by Lorin Hollander, concert pianist)

Eloise Ristad deals here with complex problems which torment and cripple so many of our most creative and talented people, and she does so with compassion, wisdom, and wit. The problem of stage fright, for instance, is a suffering of epidemic proportions in our society, and involves modalities of thought and projections that rob spontaneity and enthusiasm in artistic performance.

Those interested in creative education have long felt that an entirely new, holistic and nurturing process of allowing individuals to discover and express themselves is needed if our educational system is to avoid the neuroses and creative blocks of the past generation. This book illuminates through its conversational style the destructive inhibitions, fears, and guilt experienced by all of us as we fail to break through to creativity. This story is told to me day after day in conservatories and college campuses around the world. Indeed I felt at times that she was telling of my own most petty and debilitating fears.

But what is important, A Soprano on Her Head supplies answers and methods for overcoming these universal psychological blocks--methods that have not only been proven in her own studio, but which trace back through history to the oldest and wisest systems of understanding the integration of mind and body. The work bears scrutiny both scientifically and holistically.

This is a wonderful book. Read it. You are not alone.

Great Singers on Great Singing: A Famous Opera Star Interviews 40 Famous Opera Singers on the Technique of Singing

Jerome Hines

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 23 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Great Singers on Great Singing 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

My husband is an opera lover and has loved listening to the human singing voice his whole life. I bought this book for him for his birthday, and he is delighted with it. Any one of your opera-loving friends would enjoy receiving a copy.

A must for students! 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

I was assigned to read this book and write ten critiques from ten article in this book. I first read this book as a student who loved the great singers of the past. This book is not a how to book in singing great, but it gives different points of view on how to sing well. I got a copy of the book to study it more indepthly. This book is great if you are going to teach students. There are exercises and hints from the great singers on how they warm up, their views on proper breathing and the fundamentals of singing. Each singer has their own point of view so that is also great for a teacher to consider because every one has their own way of explaining what works for them when it comes to singing correctly. Again, a great book for voice teachers and students!

Editorial Review:

If some of renowned bass Hines's "great singers" seem to have been included more for political reasons (after all, he had to work with these people) than because they were truly great, most of them do rate the title, and there's something for the singer to learn from almost all of them--about technique, learning music, developing the voice, preserving the voice--even if in a few cases it's what not to do. If nothing else, the book proves what an inexact science vocal pedagogy really is, and the anecdotes are worth reading. Hines's subjects include Birgit Nilsson, Joan Sutherland, Marilyn Horne, Luciano Pavarotti, and other operatic stars, primarily of the generation just passing, that which came to prominence in the '60s and '70s.