Titles in the Listener's Companion Series provide readers with a deeper understanding of key musical genres and the work of major artists and composers. Aimed at nonspecialists, each volume clearly explains how to listen to works from particular artists, composers, and genres. Examining both the context in which the music appeared and its form, authors provide the environments in which key musical works were written and performed-from a 1950s bebop...

Along with his contemporaries Chopin and Wagner, Verdi is among the few composers whose place in the musical pantheon is based almost entirely upon the mastery of a single genre. This is largely owing to his staggering output in a career that lasted over fifty years. Several of his operas comprise the nucleus of the modern repertoire, and he almost single-handedly maintained the Italian lyric tradition against the tide of Wagnerian music drama. In...

"Experiencing Broadway Music: A Listener's Companion will cover approximately the last century of American musical theater, beginning with the early-twentieth-century shift from European-influenced operettas and bawdy variety shows to sophisticated works of seamlessly integrated song and dance that became uniquely American. It will conclude with an examination of current musical trends and practices on Broadway. As a musician who works on Broadway...

Jeff Sultanof takes a fresh look at big band jazz, examining why the big band era started when it did, how pop music and big bands evolved in response to one another, and the key roles played by well-known band leaders and the bands they led.

Black Sabbath has often been credited with inventing heavy metal with their first album released in 1970. Their new style of music was loud, brutal, scary, innovative, and it has greatly influenced heavy metal bands since then. Their five decades of music cross generations of fans, and they remain relevant to this day, with their 2013 album charting #1 in the United States and at least five other countries. In Experiencing Black Sabbath: A Listener's...