Our picks this month. Click the links to order items from Amazon.
Celebrate Return of the Jedi with this deluxe volume that presents incredible photography and concept art, complemented by anecdotes about the film’s production. Drawing connections from the film to contemporary Star Wars storytelling, this book also offers a fresh perspective on its indelible influence. Featuring a wealth of inserts such as booklets and foldout pages, this book is a fascinating tribute to the epic conclusion of the original Star Wars trilogy.
Henry Mancini (1924-1994) is renowned as the Oscar- and Grammy-winning composer of such timeless standards as “Moon River” and “Days of Wine and Roses,” as well as such memorable instrumental themes as “The Pink Panther” and “Baby Elephant Walk.” But preceding all of them was the wildly popular theme from Peter Gunn, a television series whose soundtrack won the very first Grammy ever awarded for Album of the Year.
Award-winning author and journalist Jon Burlingame chronicles the backstory of Peter Gunn and how its music propelled Mancini to fame and fortune, launching a decades-long collaboration with filmmaker Blake Edwards that encompassed nearly 30 movies, from Breakfast at Tiffany’s to Victor / Victoria and beyond.
Burlingame (author of six books including The Music of James Bond and Music for Prime Time) relates the untold story of Peter Gunn and its companion series Mr. Lucky; examines the music Mancini wrote for both series and their chart-topping success as modern jazz albums; and tells how this 1958-61 period in TV history set the stage for one of the most remarkable careers of any American composer in the Twentieth Century.
Step back in time to the iconic EMI Recording Studios in London during the revolutionary 1960s, where legendary music acts like The Beatles, Pink Floyd, and countless others crafted their timeless sound. In "The Beatles' Recording Techniques," musicians, audio engineers, mix engineers, and producers are invited on a journey through the tools and techniques that transformed the sound of the 1960s and beyond.
Unlock the mysteries behind the pop music that defined an era. With this meticulously researched and expertly compiled guide, you'll gain an intimate understanding of the innovative recording and mixing techniques that producer George Martin and groundbreaking engineers, Norman Smith, Geoff Emerick, Ken Scott and Glyn Johns pioneered. Dive deep into their creative process and harness the same methodologies to shape your own musical masterpieces.
Listen in as Pete unabashedly shares historical and family stories; tells of learning the banjo, traveling with Woody Guthrie, and finding commercial success with The Weavers; explains how he wrote books and put together songs; delves into controversial subjects like communism and the Peekskill Riots; and highlights those he admired and respected, including Bruce Springsteen, who honoured Pete with his Seeger Sessions album in 2006.
Pete and David share the heavy lifting as they tackle subjects such as the 1965 Newport Folk Festival, Pete’s relationship to Greenwich Village, and the need for copyright reform. Together, they describe how Pete put his worldview into practice in his local community, how he lived with local hero status in later life, and how they made recordings together that resulted in two Grammy Awards.
For the midcentury Americans who wished to better their golf game through hypnosis, teach their parakeet to talk, or achieve sexual harmony in their marriage, the answers lay no further than the record player. In Designed for Success, Janet Borgerson and Jonathan Schroeder shed light on these endearingly earnest albums that contributed to a powerful American vision of personal success. Rescued from charity shops, record store cast-off bins, or forgotten boxes in attics and basements, these educational records reveal the American consumers’ rich but sometimes surprising relationship to advertising, self-help, identity construction, and even aspects of transcendentalist thought.
Relegated to obscurity and novelty, instructional records such as Secrets of Successful Varmint Calling, You Be a Disc Jockey, and How to Ski (A Living-Room Guide for Beginners) offer distinct insights into midcentury media production and consumption. Tracing the history of instructional records from the inception of the recording industry to the height of their popularity, Borgerson and Schroeder offer close readings of the abundant topics covered by “designed for success” records. Complemented by over a hundred full-color illustrations, Designed for Success is a wonderfully nostalgic tour that showcases the essential role these vinyl records played as an unappreciated precursor to contemporary do-it-yourself culture and modern conceptions of self-improvement.
From the New York Times bestselling author of Satchel and Bobby Kennedy, a sweeping and spellbinding portrait of the longtime kings of jazz—Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong, and Count Basie—who, born within a few years of one another, overcame racist exclusion and violence to become the most popular entertainers on the planet.
This is the story of three revolutionary American musicians, the maestro jazzmen who orchestrated the chords that throb at the soul of twentieth-century America.
Spanning three centuries and eight thousand nautical miles, and compiled by a direct descendant of a sailor who waged war with pirates in the early nineteenth century, The Penguin Book of Pirates takes us behind the eye patches, the peg legs, and the skull and crossbones of the Jolly Roger and into the no-man’s-land of piracy that is rife with paradoxes and plot twists.
Here, in a fascinating array of accounts that include trial transcripts, journalism, ship logs, and more, are the grit and patois of real maritime marauders like the infamous Blackbeard; the pirates who inspired Jack Sparrow in Pirates of the Caribbean,Stede Bonnet in Max’s Our Flag Means Death, and the Dread Pirate Roberts in The Princess Bride; the astoundingly egalitarian multi-ethnic and multilingual crews that became enmeshed in historical horrors like the slave trade; and lesser-known but no less formidable women pirates, many of whom disguised themselves as men.
By turns brutal, harrowing, and inspiring, these accounts of the “radically free” sailors who were citizens more of the oceangoing world than of any nation on land remind us of the glories and dangers of the open seas and the seductive appeal of communities forged in resistance.
Bruce Lee’s blockbuster movies, pioneering martial arts practice and motivational philosophy continue to inspire millions worldwide. Published in the fiftieth year of his passing, In My Own Process celebrates Lee’s legacy as a martial artist, actor and philosopher, offering readers the definitive book of his spectacular career.
Collating rare photographs, drawings and writings, In My Own Process opens up the Bruce Lee family archives. A wealth of fascinating items are shared, including handwritten poems; personal affirmations and diary entries; movie scripts; workout regimes; teaching notes; martial arts drawings and philosophical observations. Hundreds of photographs reveal Bruce Lee in action, starring in classic movies such as Enter the Dragon, as well as during private moments away from the spotlight.
Reflecting on key areas of his life, in 1973 Bruce Lee wrote a series of letters titled ‘In My Own Process’. Lee's writings introduce the chapters of his career, from developing his philosophy of Jeet Kune Do, to his first screen test, to his big Hollywood breakthrough.
Tove Jansson achieved fame as the creator of the Moomins, beloved by generations of readers around the world. Remarkably, the Moomins were only part of the prodigious creative output of this Finnish-Swedish writer and artist. Jansson’s work also includes short stories and five novels for adults, as well as paintings, murals, and book illustrations. In this acclaimed biography, Boel Westin relies on numerous conversations with Jansson and unprecedented access to her journals, letters, and personal archives to present an engrossing and comprehensive review of the life and world of Scandinavia’s best-loved author.
In 2024, the enormously influential tabletop role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons—also known as D&D—celebrates its fiftieth anniversary. To mark the occasion, editors Premeet Sidhu, Marcus Carter, and José Zagal have assembled an edited collection that celebrates and reflects on important parts of the game’s past, present, and future. Each chapter in Fifty Years of Dungeons & Dragons explores why the nondigital game is more popular than ever—with sales increasing 33 percent during the COVID-19 pandemic, despite worldwide lockdowns—and offers readers the opportunity to critically reflect on their own experiences, perceptions, and play of D&D.
Now including more than 200 characters from Black Panther and Ms. Marvel to Iron Man and Shang-Chi, the Marvel Studios Character Encyclopedia Updated Edition is any young fan’s go-to guide to find out all about the heroes, villains, spies, school kids, scientists, aliens, inventors, and others in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU). Discover their strengths, super-powers, friends, allies, weapons, epic battles, and much more.
An informative look at how Star Wars: Return of the Jedi came together, from the conception of the story to the design and filming of the movie to the intensive post production process. Full of outstanding, impactful photography and art chronicling the creation of the cinematic masterpiece.
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