This book is a useful guide for adult learners who are thinking of taking up a musical instrument for the first time or who want to pick up from where they left off as children. The author helps the reader to answer such questions as which instrument they should choose, the level of difficulty involved in learning and the likely costs. The book discusses the various benefits of taking up music for fun and general well-being. The author provides practical...

Text and pictures introduce musical instruments from early times to the present--from pipes and flutes to electronic synthesizers.

"An alligator with an accordion! A bunny with a banjo! Strum, clap, and tap your way through the alphabet of instruments and the animals who play them!"--Back cover.

"This deeply imaginative and entertaining poetry collection details the pleasures of the orchestra, from strong-willed A to satisfied Z"--

Presents a pictorial history of acoustic and electric guitars from the sixteenth to the twenty-first century, covering Fender, Martin, Gibson, Ibanez, Jim Burns, and other makers from around the world.

Describes the features, sounds, and role of each musical instrument in the orchestra.

Get to know the guitars so famous that their names are household words among enthusiasts. First published in 2010, the first-ever illustrated history of the specific guitars of the men and women who made the music is now expanded to include 32 additional iconic guitars and their owners. Ultimate Star Guitars showcases B.B. King's "Lucille," Eric Clapton's "Blackie," Stevie Ray Vaughan's "First Wife," Billy F Gibbons's "Pearly Gates," Neil Young's...

Presenting a new, comprehensive and highly original approach to piano technique with a fascinating series of exercises to help the reader put this approach into practice, this guide uses numerous musical examples and sketches to show how many common movement habits at the keyboard are counterproductive. Fraser provides a new way of manipulating the skeletal frame of the hand to produce astonishing sonic results from the instrument.

Jacob Rees tells why he took up the French horn again at the age of 39-and-three-quarters and persevered to play in front of a packed London auditorium and perform a Mozart concerto on this notoriously treacherous instrument. He also relates the story of man's first musical instrument, and its journey from the walls of Jericho to Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, from the hunting fields of aristocratic France to the heart of Hollywood.

Describes the orchestra, the families of instruments of which it is made, and the individual instruments in each family.