1.
Album
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Album, is a collection of audio recordings issued as a single item on CD, record, audio tape, or another medium. Albums of recorded music were developed in the early 20th century, first as books of individual 78rpm records, vinyl LPs are still issued, though in the 21st century album sales have mostly focused on compact disc and MP3 formats. The audio cassette was a format used from the late 1970s through to the 1990s alongside vinyl, an album may be recorded in a recording studio, in a concert venue, at home, in the field, or a mix of places. Recording may take a few hours to years to complete, usually in several takes with different parts recorded separately. Recordings that are done in one take without overdubbing are termed live, the majority of studio recordings contain an abundance of editing, sound effects, voice adjustments, etc. With modern recording technology, musicians can be recorded in separate rooms or at times while listening to the other parts using headphones. Album covers and liner notes are used, and sometimes additional information is provided, such as analysis of the recording, historically, the term album was applied to a collection of various items housed in a book format. In musical usage the word was used for collections of pieces of printed music from the early nineteenth century. Later, collections of related 78rpm records were bundled in book-like albums, the LP record, or 33 1⁄3 rpm microgroove vinyl record, is a gramophone record format introduced by Columbia Records in 1948. It was adopted by the industry as a standard format for the album. Apart from relatively minor refinements and the important later addition of stereophonic sound capability, the term album had been carried forward from the early nineteenth century when it had been used for collections of short pieces of music. Later, collections of related 78rpm records were bundled in book-like albums, as part of a trend of shifting sales in the music industry, some commenters have declared that the early 21st century experienced the death of the album. Sometimes shorter albums are referred to as mini-albums or EPs, Albums such as Tubular Bells, Amarok, Hergest Ridge by Mike Oldfield, and Yess Close to the Edge, include fewer than four tracks. There are no rules against artists such as Pinhead Gunpowder referring to their own releases under thirty minutes as albums. These are known as box sets, material is stored on an album in sections termed tracks, normally 11 or 12 tracks. A music track is a song or instrumental recording. The term is associated with popular music where separate tracks are known as album tracks. When vinyl records were the medium for audio recordings a track could be identified visually from the grooves
2.
Cat Stevens
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Yusuf Islam, commonly known by his former stage name Cat Stevens, is a British singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, humanitarian, and education philanthropist. His 1967 debut album reached the top 10 in the UK, and his albums Tea for the Tillerman and Teaser and the Firecat were both certified triple platinum in the US by the RIAA. His musical style consists of folk, pop, rock, and his 1972 album Catch Bull at Four spent three weeks at number one on the Billboard 200, and fifteen weeks at number one in the Australian ARIA Charts. He earned two ASCAP songwriting awards in 2005 and 2006 for The First Cut Is the Deepest, and his other hit songs include Father and Son, Wild World, Peace Train, Moonshadow, and Morning Has Broken. In 2007 he received the British Academys Ivor Novello Award for Outstanding Song Collection, in December 1977, Stevens converted to Islam, and he adopted the name Yusuf Islam the following year. In 1979, he auctioned all his guitars for charity and left his career to devote himself to educational. He was embroiled in a controversy regarding comments he made in 1989 about the death fatwa on author Salman Rushdie. He has received two doctorates and awards for promoting peace from two organisations founded by Mikhail Gorbachev. In 2006, he returned to pop music – releasing his first album of new pop songs in 28 years, with that release and subsequent ones, he dropped the surname Islam from the album cover art – using the stage name Yusuf as a mononym. In 2009, he released the album Roadsinger, and in 2014, he released the album Tell Em Im Gone and he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2014. His second North American tour since his resurgence, featuring 12 shows in intimate venues, steven Georgiou, born on 21 July 1948 in the Marylebone area of London, was the youngest child of a Greek Cypriot father, Stavros Georgiou, and a Swedish mother, Ingrid Wickman. He had a sister, Anita, and a brother. All family members worked in the restaurant and his parents divorced when he was about eight years old, but they continued to maintain the family restaurant and live above it. Although his father was Greek Orthodox and his mother a Baptist, Georgiou was sent to St. Joseph Roman Catholic Primary School, Macklin Street, which was closer to his fathers business on Drury Lane. Georgiou developed an interest in piano at a young age, eventually using the family baby grand piano to work out the chords. Inspired by the popularity of the Beatles, at 15 he extended his interest to the guitar, persuaded his father to pay £8 for his first instrument, Stevens emphasised that the advent of West Side Story in particular affected him, giving him a different view of life. He attended other local West End schools, where he says he was constantly in trouble and he was called the artist boy and mentions that I was beat up, but I was noticed. He went on to take a course of study at Hammersmith School of Art
3.
Muscle Shoals Sound Studio
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The group closed the Jackson Highway studio in 1979, moving the operation to 1000 Alabama Avenue. The old studio, listed on the National Register of Historic Places since June 2006, was restored in the early 2000s and was sold to the Muscle Shoals Music Foundation in 2013. This group completed a restoration and the location reopened on January 9,2017. The Alabama Avenue location ceased operations in 2005 when it was sold to a record label, Chers sixth album was titled 3614 Jackson Highway and this became the informal name for the studio in 1969. The studio at this closed in 1979, the recording facility was moved to new premises at 1000 Alabama Avenue. The Jackson Highway building had been restored and open for tours in 2013 when the documentary Muscle Shoals raised public interest in a major restoration of the studio. The Muscle Shoals Music Foundation was formed in 2013 to raise funds to purchase the building, in June 2013, Noel Webster sold the property, without the historic recording equipment, to the Muscle Shoals Music Foundation. The foundation praised the contribution made to the project by Sheffield resident, a large grant from Beats Electronics, a manufacturer of headphones and similar devices founded by Dr. Dre and Jimmy Iovine, provided an essential $1 million. State tourism director Lee Sentell told the media in August 2015 that the 2013 Muscle Shoals had significant influence, the financial support from Beats is a direct result of their film. Additional donations were made by groups and individuals. In 2015, Rodney Hall, a foundation Board member, reminded fans of the value of the additional donations, the foundation was able to purchase the building through the generosity of private investors like Gene Hamby, who understand the importance of preserving the legacy of Muscle Shoals music. As recently as August 2015, tours were visiting the studio on Jackson Highway. It was closed when major work started in September 2015. Muscle Shoals Sound Studio reopened as a finished tourist attraction on January 9,2017, owned and operated by the foundation, the interior is reminiscent of the 1970s, with relevant recording equipment and paraphernalia. There are plans to allow artists to record in the studio, even before the Jackson Highway studio reopened, The Alabama Tourism Department named Muscle Shoals Sound Studio as the states top attraction in 2017. They are referred to as The Swampers in the lyrics of Sweet Home Alabama by Lynyrd Skynyrd, initially they worked for Rick Hall, the founder of FAME Studios and they are recognized as having crafted the Muscle Shoals sound in conjunction with Hall. After leaving Rick Halls FAME studio, the four musicians partnered with Jerry Wexler who provided funding to found Muscle Shoals Sound Studio at 3614 Jackson Highway in Sheffield. The first hit to the credit was R. B. Greaves’ Take a Letter Maria
4.
Sheffield, Alabama
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Sheffield is a city in Colbert County, Alabama, United States, and is included in the Shoals metropolitan area. As of the 2010 census, the population of the city was 9,039. S, senator Mitch McConnell, whose father was working in nearby Athens when he was born. It sometimes is referred to as the City of Senators due to the births of Heflin, McConnell, col. Harland Sanders worked in the Sheffield depot for Southern Railway in the 1900s. It is also home to the Muscle Shoals Sound Studio where many popular 20th century musicians recorded their work, including Alexander and it is the site of historic Helen Keller Hospital, formerly known as Colbert County Hospital and originally constructed in 1921. It was changed to Helen Keller Hospital in 1979, and Kellers birthplace Ivy Green is located less than one mile southwest of the hospital in adjacent Tuscumbia, Sheffield is located in eastern Colbert County at 34°45′35″N 87°41′41″W, on the south bank of the Tennessee River. Sheffield is bordered to the south by the city of Tuscumbia, to the southeast by Muscle Shoals, and to the north, across the river, by Florence. According to the U. S. Census Bureau, the city has an area of 6.4 square miles, of which 6.4 square miles is land and 0.08 square miles. The embarkation site was at what is now the Spring Creek boat launch, in 1940, Reynolds Metal Company set up its first aluminum smelting facility in Sheffield, paving the way for wartime expansion of aircraft production in the country. Sheffield was the home of Muscle Shoals Sound Studios at 3614 Jackson Highway, as of the census of 1990, there were 10,380 people residing in the city. 2. 01% of the population were Hispanic or Latino of any race, as of the census of 2000, there were 9,652 people,4,243 households, and 2,711 families residing in the city. The population density was 1,471.4 people per square mile, there were 4,760 housing units at an average density of 725.6 per square mile. 1. 50% of the population were Hispanic or Latino of any race,32. 5% of all households were made up of individuals and 15. 5% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.27 and the family size was 2.87. In the city, the population was out with 23. 7% under the age of 18,8. 0% from 18 to 24,26. 6% from 25 to 44,22. 6% from 45 to 64. The median age was 39 years, for every 100 females there were 85.5 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 80.6 males, the median income for a household in the city was $26,673, and the median income for a family was $33,877. Males had an income of $30,378 versus $18,033 for females. The per capita income for the city was $16,022, about 16. 5% of families and 18. 7% of the population were below the poverty line, including 27. 5% of those under age 18 and 10. 4% of those age 65 or over
5.
Minneapolis
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Minneapolis is the county seat of Hennepin County, and the larger of the Twin Cities, the 16th-largest metropolitan area in the United States. As of 2015, Minneapolis is the largest city in the state of Minnesota, Minneapolis and Saint Paul anchor the second-largest economic center in the Midwest, after Chicago. Minneapolis lies on both banks of the Mississippi River, just north of the confluence with the Minnesota River, and adjoins Saint Paul. It was once the worlds flour milling capital and a hub for timber, the city and surrounding region is the primary business center between Chicago and Seattle, with Minneapolis proper containing Americas fifth-highest concentration of Fortune 500 companies. As an integral link to the economy, Minneapolis is categorized as a global city. Noted for its music and performing arts scenes, Minneapolis is home to both the award-winning Guthrie Theater and the historic First Avenue nightclub. The name Minneapolis is attributed to Charles Hoag, the citys first schoolteacher, who combined mni, a Dakota Sioux word for water, and polis, Dakota Sioux had long been the regions sole residents when French explorers arrived around 1680. For a time relations were based on fur trading, gradually more European-American settlers arrived, competing for game and other resources with the Dakota. In the early 19th century, the United States acquired this territory from France, fort Snelling was built in 1819 by the United States Army, and it attracted traders, settlers and merchants, spurring growth in the area. The United States government pressed the Mdewakanton band of the Dakota to sell their land, the Minnesota Territorial Legislature authorized present-day Minneapolis as a town in 1856 on the Mississippis west bank. Minneapolis incorporated as a city in 1867, the rail service began between Minneapolis and Chicago. It later joined with the city of St. Anthony in 1872. Minneapolis developed around Saint Anthony Falls, the highest waterfall on the Mississippi River, forests in northern Minnesota were a valuable resource for the lumber industry, which operated seventeen sawmills on power from the waterfall. By 1871, the west river bank had twenty-three businesses, including mills, woolen mills, iron works, a railroad machine shop, and mills for cotton, paper, sashes. Due to the hazards of milling, six local sources of artificial limbs were competing in the prosthetics business by the 1890s. The farmers of the Great Plains grew grain that was shipped by rail to the citys thirty-four flour mills, a father of modern milling in America and founder of what became General Mills, Cadwallader C. Some ideas were developed by William Dixon Gray and some acquired through industrial espionage from the Hungarians by William de la Barre, pillsbury Company across the river were barely a step behind, hiring Washburn employees to immediately use the new methods. The hard red spring wheat that grows in Minnesota became valuable, not until later did consumers discover the value in the bran that Minneapolis
6.
Ardent Studios
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Ardent Studios is a recording studio located in Memphis, Tennessee. Ardent Records/Ardent Music is the in-house label, Ardent Studios was founded by John Fry and was initially a studio in his familys garage, where he recorded his first Ardent Records 45s. In 1966 the operation moved into a new building on Memphis National Street. The original equipment came from the operation, Altec tube console, Ampex 2-track, Pultec EQ. Tom Dowd was consulting with Auditronics on an early multitrack console for nearby Stax Records, next came a Scully 4-track, and the first EMT plate reverbs in the area. In 1971, Ardent Studios moved to its present location on Madison Avenue, followed by the acquisition of 24-track recorders, bigger consoles, Ardent came to have three studios equipped, all with large format Neve and SSL desks alongside Pro Tools rigs. It is managed by Jody Stephens -- an early Ardent group whose first two appeared on Ardent Records label in the early 1970s. All three Big Star albums were named in Rolling Stones Top 500 albums of all time, and “In The Street, ” from their first album, became the theme for “That 70s Show. ”Early on, the studio recorded Sam & Dave, Led Zeppelin, Isaac Hayes, Leon Russell and The Staples Singers, and in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s recorded James Taylor, ZZ Top, R. E. M. George Thorogood, The Allman Brothers, Bob Dylan, Joe Walsh, to date, Ardent has recorded over 70 gold and platinum albums and singles. Official site Discography of albums recorded at Ardent
7.
Memphis, Tennessee
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Memphis is a city in the southwestern corner of the U. S. state of Tennessee and the county seat of Shelby County. The city is located on the fourth Chickasaw Bluff, south of the confluence of the Wolf, Memphis had a population of 653,450 in 2013, making it the largest city in the state of Tennessee. It is the largest city on the Mississippi River, the third largest in the greater Southeastern United States, the greater Memphis metropolitan area, including adjacent counties in Mississippi and Arkansas, had a 2014 population of 1,317,314. This makes Memphis the second-largest metropolitan area in Tennessee, surpassed by metropolitan Nashville, Memphis is the youngest of Tennessees major cities, founded in 1819 as a planned city by a group of wealthy Americans including judge John Overton and future president Andrew Jackson. A resident of Memphis is referred to as a Memphian, and the Memphis region is known, particularly to media outlets, as Memphis and the Mid-South. Occupying a substantial bluff rising from the Mississippi River, the site of Memphis has been a location for human settlement by varying cultures over thousands of years. The historic Chickasaw Indian tribe, believed to be their descendants, French explorers led by René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle and Spanish explorer Hernando de Soto would encounter the Chickasaw in that area, in the 16th century. J. D. L. Chickasaw Bluffs, located on the Mississippi River at the present day location of Memphis, spain and the United States vied for control of this site, which was a favorite of the Chickasaws. The United States gained the right to navigate the Mississippi River, the Spanish dismantled the fort, shipping its lumber and iron to their locations in Arkansas. Captain Isaac Guion led an American force down the Ohio River to claim the land, by this time, the Spanish had departed. The forts ruins went unnoticed twenty years later when Memphis was laid out as a city, the city of Memphis was founded on May 22,1819 by John Overton, James Winchester and Andrew Jackson. They named it after the ancient capital of Egypt on the Nile River, Memphis developed as a trade and transportation center in the 19th century because of its flood-free location high above the Mississippi River. Located in the delta region along the river, its outlying areas were developed as cotton plantations. The cotton economy of the antebellum South depended on the labor of large numbers of African-American slaves. Through the early 19th century, one million slaves were transported from the Upper South, Many were transported by steamboats along the Ohio and Mississippi rivers. This gave planters and cotton brokers access to the Atlantic Coast for shipping cotton to England, the citys demographics changed dramatically in the 1850s and 1860s under waves of immigration and domestic migration. Due to increased immigration since the 1840s and the Great Famine, ethnic Irish made up 9.9 percent of the population in 1850, but 23.2 percent in 1860, when the total population was 22,623. They had encountered considerable discrimination in the city but by 1860 and they also gained many elected and patronage positions in the Democratic Party city government, and an Irish man was elected as mayor before the Civil War
8.
Le Studio
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Le Studio was a residential recording studio located just south of the town of Morin-Heights, Quebec built in 1974 by André Perry and Yaël Brandeis. The studio, where artists recorded and stayed, was the venue for many notable Canadian and international artists, including Rush and The Police. Renowned for its location as well as its equipment, it was one of the earliest studios to install Solid State Logic mixing desk. By 2008 the studio had gone out of business, and as of 2015 the property was up for sale, André Perry gained fame as a recording engineer working for John Lennon, and in 1974 was looking to expand his studio, built in a downtown Montreal church. He work with the Olive Company to develop one of the first recording consoles with motorized faders feeding two 24 track Studers synchronized to provide 48 tracks and he moved to Morin Heights, where he owned a lake, and built his studio there, with his wife Yaël Brandeis. Initially it had a guesthouse, a half an hour away, later, a house across the lake was acquired and expanded. By the early 1980s it had acquired a reputation as a premium North American recording venue, after Rush, David Bowie, and April Wine had recorded albums there. In 1986 Le Studio issued stock on the Montreal Exchange looking to acquire funding for building a studio, with audio and video capabilities. 1.1 million shares valued at $3.50 were sold, Perry and Brandeis retained majority interests. They spent $500,000 on a Quantel Mirage digital video effects unit, hoping to more equipment to allow the recording of sound effects and film music. In 1988 Perry and Brandeis sold the studio, and Perry retired in the early 1990s, the studio, by then called Studio Morin Heights, was acquired in 1993 by LEquipe Spectra, an entertainment company that had a number of local artists on record. Rush and other continued to do their tracking there. The new owners built a new studio room, called Far Side. The 233-acre site was listed for sale in July 2007, with a price of C$2.45 million. The studio was shut down in March 2003 by Spectra, the property remained for sale until 2009, when the land was purchased with the intent to convert the area to a retreat and spa. Other international artists to record at Le Studio include Nazareth, The Police, Sting, Cat Stevens, The Bee Gees, Keith Richards, Kim Mitchell and Bryan Adams. In January 1992 Celine Dion recorded With This Tear, a written by Prince. Rush recorded at Le Studio during the peak and the end of the Terry Brown era, the house and grounds are featured in the music videos of the recording sessions of the Rush songs Tom Sawyer, Limelight and Vital Signs
9.
Morin-Heights
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Morin-Heights is a town in the Laurentian Mountains region of Quebec, Canada. It is west of Saint-Sauveur and north of Lachute, municipally and it is primarily a tourist town, having a large ski hill that is popular during the winter months and being on a recreational trailway, which is used year-round. A dense network of hiking, cross country skiing, snowshoeing and mountain biking trails surround Morin Heights, the old train station, on Lac Écho road, is the starting point for most recreational activities, year-round. The Rivière à Simon offers enjoyable canoeing and kayaking all the way down to Christieville, formerly located just south of the town was a recording studio, called Le Studio, built in 1975, which is now closed. In 1994, another important music recording facility was built in Morin Heights, conceived and built by Swedish-born artist Lars Westvind, Studio Nomade exclusively hosted Sarah McLachlans recording projects up to 2000. It then became opened to artists as well, and is still a frequently used production facility. The town hosts a company, as well as a choir. The first European settlers arrived from Ireland around 1850, followed by French Canadians from Lachute, Saint-Jérôme, in 1852, the Morin Township was formed and in 1855, the Township Municipality of Morin-Partie-Sud was established in a part of the township. Until 1911, the territory had just the names of Bas-Morin or Morin Flats, in 1950, Morin-Partie-Sud changed its statutes and name to become the Municipality of Morin-Heights. The town gained notoriety in 1994 when members of the Order of the Solar Temple took part in a mass suicide, on March 12,2008, a tragic roof collapse in the Gourmet du Village bakery warehouse killed three women. An excessive accumulation of snow was suspected to be the cause of the accident. The victims, Barbara Elliott,54, Sharon Kirkpatrick,62, and Marilyn Ofiaza,46, were just three of a total of 40 people who were in the building at the time of the collapse
10.
Folk rock
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It has also been influential in those parts of the world with close cultural connections to Britain and gave rise to the genre of folk punk. By the 1980s the genre was in decline in popularity. When English bands of the late 1960s and early 1970s defined themselves as electric folk they were making a distinction with the existing folk rock. Folk rock was what they had already been producing, American or American style singer-songwriter material played on instruments, as undertaken by Bob Dylan. They drew the distinction because they were focusing on indigenous songs, the result of this hybridisation was an exchange of specific features drawn from Traditional music and Rock music. For example, electric folk groups, while using traditional material as their source for lyrics and tunes. In the same year, The Beatles began incorporating overt folk influences into their music, the Beatles and other British Invasion bands, in turn, influenced the Californian band The Byrds, who began playing folk-influenced material and Bob Dylan compositions with rock instrumentation. The Byrds recording of Dylans Mr Tambourine Man was released in April 1965 and reached #1 on the U. S. and UK singles charts, setting off the mid-1960s folk rock movement. The Beatles late 1965 album, Rubber Soul, contained a number of songs clearly influenced by the American folk rock boom, such as Nowhere Man and If I Needed Someone. Folk rock became an important genre among emerging English bands, particularly those in the London club scene towards the end of the 1960s. Like the American revival, it was often overtly left wing in its politics, most important among their responses were the foundation of folk clubs in major towns, starting with London where MacColl began the Ballads and Blues Club in 1953. These clubs were usually urban in location, but the songs sung in them often hearkened back to a rural pre-industrial past, in many ways this was the adoption of abandoned popular music by the middle classes. This meant that there were, by the later 1960s, a group of performers with musical skill and knowledge of a variety of traditional songs. The result was an interpretation of the song A Sailors Life. The rapid expansion of electric folk that followed in the wake of Liege, five Hand Reel a band formed out of the remnants of Spencers Feat proved to be one of the more successful and influential folk rock bands. Releasing 4 albums with Topic/RCA records they were popular in Europe. He then quit that and eventually formed the Albion Country Band, later the Albion Band, a much smaller group of English bands were formed in emulation of existing electric rock bands. Fiddlers Dram were often dismissed as one hit wonders for their single Day Trip to Bangor, most of their career, from that point until they disbanded in 1979, was one of declining profile and sales
11.
Blue-eyed soul
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Blue-eyed soul is rhythm and blues and soul music performed by white artists. The term was coined in the mid-1960s, to describe artists who performed soul and R&B that was similar to the music of the Motown. Though many rhythm and blues radio stations would play music by black musicians. The Righteous Brothers named their 1964 LP Some Blue-Eyed Soul, Blue-eyed soul was applied to such artists as Sonny & Cher, the Beatles, Tom Jones, Barry McGuire, and Roy Head. White musicians playing R&B music, however, began before the term blue-eyed soul was coined, lonnie Macks 1963 gospel-infused vocals earned him widespread critical acclaim as a blue-eyed soul singer. Groups such as The Rascals had soul-tinged pop songs, but it was the vocals of Felix Cavaliere that gave them the blue-eyed soul sound. By the mid-1960s, British singers Dusty Springfield, Eric Burdon, Blue-eyed soul singer, Chris Clark became the first white singer to have an R&B hit with Motown Records in 1966. In 1967, Jerry Lee Lewis, whose latter days at Sun Records had been characterized by R&B covers, delaney and Bonnie produced the blue-eyed soul album Home on Stax in 1969. Michael Sembello, who left home at age 17 to tour with Stevie Wonder, wrote and performed on numerous blue-eyed soul hits for Wonder, Brian McKnight, David Sanborn, Bill Champlin and Bobby Caldwell. Todd Rundgren began his career in Woodys Truck Stop, a based on the model of the Paul Butterfield Blues Band. He left the band to form the rock band Nazz in 1967. Outside the Anglo-American scene, in Italy, Mina and Carmen Villani fused elements of music with the traditional Italian pop music. Carola and Doris were notable Scandinavian artists who were influenced by soul music, in February 1975, Tower of Power became the first white/mixed act to appear on Soul Train. Also in 1975, David Bowie, another early white artist to appear on Soul Train, released Young Americans and it featured the funk-inspired Fame, which became Bowies first number-one hit in the US. Hall & Oates 1975 Silver Album includes the ballad Sara Smile, shes Gone, another soulful hit, was originally released in 1973 but did better as a re-release after Sara Smile. Boz Scaggs 1976 Lowdown, which featured Scaggs laid-back vocals and a funky groove. In April 1976, The Faragher Brothers became the first all-white ensemble to make an appearance on Soul Train. In September that year, white funk band Wild Cherry released the Billboard Hot 100 chart topping funk/rock single Play That Funky Music, the single would eventually sell 2.5 million copies
12.
Synthpop
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Synth-pop is a subgenre of new wave music that first became prominent in the late 1970s and features the synthesizer as the dominant musical instrument. It was prefigured in the 1960s and early 1970s by the use of synthesizers in progressive rock, electronic, art rock, disco, and particularly the Krautrock of bands like Kraftwerk. It arose as a genre in Japan and the United Kingdom in the post-punk era as part of the new wave movement of the late-1970s to the mid-1980s. In Japan, Yellow Magic Orchestras success opened the way for bands such as P-Model, Plastics. The development of polyphonic synthesizers, the definition of MIDI. This, its adoption by the acts from the New Romantic movement, together with the rise of MTV. Synth-pop is sometimes deployed interchangeably with electropop, but electropop may also denote a variant of synth-pop that places emphasis on a harder. In the late 1980s duos such as Erasure and Pet Shop Boys adopted a style that was successful on the US dance-charts. Some artists and bands were criticised for gender bending, Synth-pop was defined by its primary use of synthesizers, drum machines and sequencers, sometimes using them to replace all other instruments. Borthwick and Moy have described the genre as diverse but, many synth-pop musicians had limited musical skills, relying on the technology to produce or reproduce the music. The result was often minimalist, with grooves that were woven together from simple repeated riffs often with no harmonic progression to speak of. Early synth-pop has been described as eerie, sterile, and vaguely menacing, using droning electronics with little change in inflection, common lyrical themes of synth-pop songs were isolation, urban anomie, and feelings of being emotionally cold and hollow. Synthesizers were increasingly used to imitate the conventional and clichéd sound of orchestras, thin, treble-dominant, synthesized melodies and simple drum programmes gave way to thick, and compressed production, and a more conventional drum sound. Lyrics were generally optimistic, dealing with more traditional subject matter for pop music such as romance, escapism. According to music writer Simon Reynolds, the hallmark of 1980s synth-pop was its emotional, at times operatic singers such as Marc Almond, Alison Moyet and Annie Lennox. Because synthesizers removed the need for groups of musicians, these singers were often part of a duo where their partner played all the instrumentation. Later synth-pop saw a shift to a style influenced by other genres. Electronic musical synthesizers that could be used practically in a recording studio became available in the mid-1960s, the portable Minimoog, which allowed much easier use, particularly in live performance was widely adopted by progressive rock musicians such as Richard Wright of Pink Floyd and Rick Wakeman of Yes
13.
Island Records
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Island Records is a major record label that operates as a division of UMG Recordings, Inc. It was founded by Chris Blackwell, Graeme Goodall and Leslie Kong in Jamaica in 1959, Blackwell sold the label to PolyGram in 1989. Three Island labels exist in the world, Island UK, Island US, and Island Australia, current key people of Island Records include Island president Darcus Beese, OBE and MD Jon Turner. Partially due to the labels significant legacy, Island remains one of UMGs pre-eminent record labels, Island Records was founded in Jamaica on 4 July 1959 by Chris Blackwell, Graeme Goodall and Leslie Kong, and partially financed by Stanley Borden from RKO. Its name was inspired by the Harry Belafonte song Island in the Sun. Blackwell explained in 2009, “I loved music so much, I just wanted to get into it, or be as close to it as I could. ”Tom Hayes, the labels sales manager between 1965 and 1967, referred to the early period of the label in the UK as “organized chaos”. “My Boy Lollipop”, sung by Millie Small, was the labels first success in the UK, Blackwell explained in a 50-year-anniversary documentary that he was only interested in building long-term careers at that stage in time, rather than short-term projects. Suzette Newman has been a colleague of Chris Blackwells since working together in the early days of Island Records. Suzette Newman and Chris Salewicz were the editors for the book “The Story of Island Records, Blackwell relocated to England in May 1962 to garner greater levels of attention after the local Jamaican sound systems proved to be overwhelmingly successful. The vast majority of the artists who had signed to Blackwells fledgling label while he was in Jamaica agreed to allow the entrepreneur to release their music in the UK. While in England, Blackwell travelled throughout the city carrying his stock with him and he did not provide any copies to radio stations, as they would not play any of the Island music, the music was also not reviewed by the press. Meanwhile, Goodall left to start the Doctor Bird record label in 1965, Blackwell signed the Spencer Davis Group to the label. The group became popular and Island started their own independent series to spotlight UK rock talent. They signed artists like John Martyn, Fairport Convention, Free, by the late 1960s and early 1970s, they were a major label in England with artists like Roxy Music, King Crimson, Traffic, The Wailers, and many others. Blackwell had signed Bob Marley, and now Toots and the Maytals, in November 2016, Jackie Jackson described the formation of the group in a radio interview for Kool 97 FM Jamaica. Accompanied by Paul Douglas and Radcliffe Dougie Bryan in studio, Jackson explained, Were all original members of Toots, first it was Toots and the Maytals, three guys, Toots, Raleigh, and Jerry. …And then they were signed to Island Records, Chris Blackwell, and we were their recording band. One day we were summoned to Chris house, and he says, Alright gentleman, I think its time
14.
A&M Records
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A&M Records was an American record label founded as an independent label by Herb Alpert and Jerry Moss in 1962. Due to the success of the discography A&M released, the label garnered interest and was acquired by PolyGram in 1989. Today, A&Ms catalog releases are managed by Verve Records, Universal Music Enterprises, A&M Records was formed in 1962 by Herb Alpert and Jerry Moss. Their first choice for a name was Carnival Records, under which they released two singles before discovering another label had already taken the Carnival name, the company was subsequently renamed A&M, after Alperts and Mosss initials. From 1966 to 1999, the headquarters were on the grounds of the historic Charlie Chaplin Studios at 1416 North La Brea Avenue. Marc Benno, Liza Minnelli, Rita Coolidge, Wes Montgomery, Paul Desmond, Bobby Tench, Hummingbird, Toni Basil, folk artists Joan Baez, Phil Ochs and Gene Clark also recorded for the label during the 1970s. Billy Preston joined the label in 1971, followed by Andre Popp, in the 1970s, under its manufacturing and distribution agreement with Ode Records, A&M released albums by Carole King and the comedy duo Cheech & Chong. On March 10,1977, A&M signed the Sex Pistols after the band had dropped by EMI. However, A&M dropped the band within a week, within a decade of its inception, A&M became the worlds largest independent record company. A&M releases were issued in the United Kingdom by EMIs Stateside Records label. From 1969, A&M set up their own UK base appointing John Deacon as General Manager - a post he held until 1979, A&M releases were also issued in Australia through Festival Records until 1989. A&M Records Ltd. was established in 1970, with distribution handled by other labels with a presence in Europe, A&M Records of Canada Ltd. was also formed in 1970, and A&M Records of Europe in 1977. In 1979, A&M entered an agreement with RCA Records in the USA. A&M was bought by PolyGram in 1989, Alpert and Moss continued to manage the label until 1993. In 1998, Alpert and Moss sued PolyGram for breach of the integrity clause, in 1991, A&M launched Perspective Records as a joint venture with producing team Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis. Jam and Lewis stepped down as CEOs of the imprint in 1997, in 1999, the label was absorbed into A&M. In the mid-1990s, A&M began distributing its PolyGram sister label Polydor Records in the USA, ceCe Peniston, Intelligent Hoodlum, Dred Scott, Ridel High and the Gin Blossoms. The company released the soundtracks Robin Hood, Prince of Thieves, The Three Musketeers, Sabrina, The Living Sea, Demolition Man, and Lethal Weapon 3
15.
Record producer
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A record producer or music producer oversees and manages the sound recording and production of a band or performers music, which may range from recording one song to recording a lengthy concept album. A producer has many roles during the recording process, the roles of a producer vary. The producer may perform these roles himself, or help select the engineer, the producer may also pay session musicians and engineers and ensure that the entire project is completed within the record companies budget. A record producer or music producer has a broad role in overseeing and managing the recording. Producers also often take on an entrepreneurial role, with responsibility for the budget, schedules, contracts. In the 2010s, the industry has two kinds of producers with different roles, executive producer and music producer. Executive producers oversee project finances while music producers oversee the process of recording songs or albums. In most cases the producer is also a competent arranger, composer. The producer will also liaise with the engineer who concentrates on the technical aspects of recording. Noted producer Phil Ek described his role as the person who creatively guides or directs the process of making a record, indeed, in Bollywood music, the designation actually is music director. The music producers job is to create, shape, and mold a piece of music, at the beginning of record industry, producer role was technically limited to record, in one shot, artists performing live. The role of producers changed progressively over the 1950s and 1960s due to technological developments, the development of multitrack recording caused a major change in the recording process. Before multitracking, all the elements of a song had to be performed simultaneously, all of these singers and musicians had to be assembled in a large studio and the performance had to be recorded. As well, for a song that used 20 instruments, it was no longer necessary to get all the players in the studio at the same time. Examples include the rock sound effects of the 1960s, e. g. playing back the sound of recorded instruments backwards or clanging the tape to produce unique sound effects. These new instruments were electric or electronic, and thus they used instrument amplifiers, new technologies like multitracking changed the goal of recording, A producer could blend together multiple takes and edit together different sections to create the desired sound. For example, in jazz fusion Bandleader-composer Miles Davis album Bitches Brew, producers like Phil Spector and George Martin were soon creating recordings that were, in practical terms, almost impossible to realise in live performance. Producers became creative figures in the studio, other examples of such engineers includes Joe Meek, Teo Macero, Brian Wilson, and Biddu
16.
Numbers (Cat Stevens album)
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Numbers is the ninth studio album, and the first concept album by singer/songwriter Cat Stevens released in November 1975. The album Numbers, subtitled A Pythagorean Theory Tale, was based on a planet in a far-off galaxy named Polygor. The album included a booklet with excerpts from a book of the same name written by Chris Bryant. The booklet features pen-and-ink illustrations drawn by Stevens, the concept of the album is a fantastic spiritual musical which is set on the planet Polygor. In the story there is a castle with a number machine. This machine exists to fulfill the purpose of the planet – to disperse numbers to the rest of the universe,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8. The nine inhabitants of Polygor, the Polygons, are Monad, Dupey, Trezlar, Cubis, Qizlo, Hexidor, Septo, Octav, as the last lines of the book say, they followed a life of routine that had existed for as long as any could remember. It was, therefore, all the more shocking when on an ordinary day things first started to go wrong, the change takes the form of Jzero, who comes from nowhere as a slave and eventually confuses everybody with his simple truth. At one point A&M Records contemplated terminating his contract, but he still had two left to make for them. Stevens continued to be bitter about the process of fame and the pressures to make money for his label, and distanced himself from participating in promotion for the album. Confronted with an ultimatum from the label along the lines of make a pop record or else, he set out to one of the more expensive records of his career, 1977s Izitso. But he would return to pop music in the 2000s with the release of An Other Cup in 2006. In 1994, Numbers was released as a limited edition along with the albums Izitso and this box is no longer available, and is thus highly prized among collectors. All the tracks were written by Cat Stevens, the original LP broke with tradition and called the second side Side 0, a reference to Jzero
17.
Back to Earth (Cat Stevens album)
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Back to Earth is the eleventh studio album released by the British singer/songwriter Cat Stevens. It was the album he recorded using the name Cat Stevens after his conversion to Islam in December 1977. It was also the last album of western music that he recorded until An Other Cup. On 8 December 1977 Stevens was awarded the Sun Peace Award by the Symphony for the United Nations in New York City, on 23 December 1977 Stevens entered the Regents Park Mosque in London and formally embraced Islam. On 4 July 1978, Steven Georgiou changed his name to Yusuf Islam, although he wanted to retire from popular music after his religious conversion, Islam owed his record company Island/A&M one more Cat Stevens album under his recording contract. The old team had now come together to complete the final record. At this point, Yusuf was praying five times daily and the took on a melancholy edge. On 3 December 1978, the album Back to Earth was released, the same day the album was released, Yusufs father Stavros Georgiou died. The UK single release, Last Love Song/Nascimento, released on Island in February 1979, the album features a return to the acoustic guitar sound of Stevens early 1970s albums like Tea for the Tillerman. Two of the songs, Just Another Night and Last Love Song, express bitterness about how he was treated by the industry, with lyrics such as If you dont want me. However, in the song Never, Stevens hints that he may return to music someday, Theres going to be another time,27 years later, after his retirement, he would return to popular music
18.
AllMusic
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AllMusic is an online music guide service website. It was launched in 1991 by All Media Guide which later became All Media Network, AllMusic was launched in 1991 by Michael Erlewine of All Media Guide. The aim was to discographic information on every artist whos made a record since Enrico Caruso gave the industry its first big boost and its first reference book was published the following year. When first released onto the Internet, AMG predated the World Wide Web and was first available as a Gopher site, the AMG consumer web properties AllMusic. com, AllMovie. com and AllGame. com were sold by Rovi in July 2013 to All Media Network, LLC. All Media Network, LLC. was formed by the founders of SideReel. com. The following are contributors to AllMusic, as of this date, All Media Network also produced the AllMusic guide series that includes the AllMusic Guide to Rock, the All Music Guide to Jazz and the All Music Guide to the Blues. Vladimir Bogdanov is the president of the series, in August 2007, PC Magazine included AllMusic in its Top 100 Classic Websites list. All Media Network AllGame AllMovie SideReel All Music Guide to the Blues All Music Guide to Jazz Stephen Thomas Erlewine Official website
19.
Rolling Stone
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Rolling Stone is an American biweekly magazine that focuses on popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner, who is still the publisher. It was first known for its coverage and for political reporting by Hunter S. Thompson. In the 1990s, the magazine shifted focus to a readership interested in youth-oriented television shows, film actors. In recent years, it has resumed its traditional mix of content, Rolling Stone magazine was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner and Ralph Gleason. To get it off the ground, Wenner borrowed $7,500 from his own family and from the parents of his soon-to-be wife, Jane Schindelheim. The first issue carried a date of November 9,1967. Some authors have attributed the name solely to Dylans hit single, At Gleasons suggestion, Rolling Stone initially identified with and reported the hippie counterculture of the era. In the very first edition, Wenner wrote that Rolling Stone is not just about the music, in the 1970s, Rolling Stone began to make a mark with its political coverage, with the likes of gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson writing for the magazines political section. Thompson first published his most famous work Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas within the pages of Rolling Stone, where he remained a contributing editor until his death in 2005. In the 1970s, the magazine also helped launch the careers of prominent authors, including Cameron Crowe, Lester Bangs, Joe Klein, Joe Eszterhas, Patti Smith. It was at point that the magazine ran some of its most famous stories. One interviewer, speaking for a number of his peers, said that he bought his first copy of the magazine upon initial arrival on his college campus. In 1977, the magazine moved its headquarters from San Francisco to New York City, editor Jann Wenner said San Francisco had become a cultural backwater. During the 1980s, the magazine began to shift towards being an entertainment magazine. Music was still a dominant topic, but there was increasing coverage of celebrities in television, films, the magazine also initiated its annual Hot Issue during this time. Rolling Stone was initially known for its coverage and for Thompsons political reporting. In the 1990s, the changed its format to appeal to a younger readership interested in youth-oriented television shows, film actors
20.
Electronic musical instrument
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An electronic musical instrument is a musical instrument that produces sound using electronics. Such an instrument sounds by outputting an electrical signal that ultimately drives a loudspeaker. An electronic instrument might include a user interface for controlling its sound, often by adjusting the pitch, frequency, all electronic musical instruments can be viewed as a subset of audio signal processing applications. Simple electronic musical instruments are called sound effects, the border between sound effects and actual musical instruments is often hazy. Electronic musical instruments are now used in most styles of music. Development of new musical instruments, controllers, and synthesizers continues to be a highly active. In the 18th-century, musicians and composers adapted a number of instruments to exploit the novelty of electricity. The former instrument consisted of an instrument of over 700 strings. The latter was an instrument with plectra activated electrically. However, neither instrument used electricity as a sound-source, the first electric synthesizer was invented in 1876 by Elisha Gray. The Musical Telegraph used steel reeds oscillated by electromagnets and transmitted over a telephone line, Gray also built a simple loudspeaker device into later models, which consisted of a diaphragm vibrating in a magnetic field. A significant invention, which later had an effect on electronic music, was the audion in 1906. This was the first thermionic valve, or vacuum tube and which led to the generation and amplification of signals, radio broadcasting. Other early synthesizers included the Telharmonium, the Theremin, Jörg Magers Spharophon and Partiturophone, Taubmanns similar Electronde, Maurice Martenots ondes Martenot, only two models of this latter were built and the only surviving example is currently stored at the Lomonosov University in Moscow. It has been used in many Russian movies—like Solaris—to produce unusual, Hugh Le Caine, John Hanert, Raymond Scott, composer Percy Grainger, and others built a variety of automated electronic-music controllers during the late 1940s and 1950s. In 1959 Daphne Oram produced a method of synthesis, her Oramics technique, driven by drawings on a 35 mm film strip. In 1897 Thaddeus Cahill patented an instrument called the Telharmonium, using tonewheels to generate musical sounds as electrical signals by additive synthesis, it was capable of producing any combination of notes and overtones, at any dynamic level. This technology was used to design the Hammond organ
21.
Electro (music)
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Electro is a genre of electronic music and early hip hop directly influenced by the use of the Roland TR-808 drum machines, and funk. This is the distinction between electro and previously prominent genres such as disco, in which the electronic sound was only part of the instrumentation. It also palpably deviates from its predecessor boogie for being less vocal-oriented, following the decline of disco music in the United States, electro emerged as a fusion of funk and New York boogie. Early hip hop and rap combined with German and Japanese electropop influences such as Kraftwerk, Planet Rock was followed later that year by another breakthrough electro record, Nunk by Warp 9. In 1983, Hashim created an electro funk sound which influenced Herbie Hancock, the early 1980s were electros mainstream peak. By the mid 1980s, the genre moved away from its electronic and funk influences, using harder edged beats and rock samples, Electro became popular again in the late 1990s with artists such as Anthony Rother and DJs such as Dave Clarke. A third wave of popularity occurred in 2007, Electro has branched out into subgenres, including Electrocore and Skweee, which developed in Sweden and Finland. From its inception, one of the characteristics of the electro sound was the use of drum machines, particularly the Roland TR-808. As the genre evolved, computers and sampling replaced drum machines in electronic music and it is important to note, that although the electro of the 1980s and contemporary electro both grew out of the dissolution of disco, they are now different genres. Classic electro drum patterns tend to be electronic emulations of breakbeats, with a kick drum. The difference between electro drumbeats and breakbeats is that electro tends to be mechanical, while breakbeats tend to have more of a human-like feel. The definition however is somewhat ambiguous in nature due to the uses of the term. The Roland TR-808 drum machine hit the market in 1980, defining early electro with its immediately recognizable sound, staccato, percussive drumbeats tended to dominate electro, almost exclusively provided by the TR-808. As an inexpensive way of producing a sound, the TR-808 caught on quickly with the producers of early electro because of the ability of its bass drum to generate extreme low-frequencies. This aspect of the Roland TR-808 was especially appealing to producers who would test drive their tracks in nightclubs and its unique percussion sounds like handclaps, open and closed high-hat, clave and cowbell became integral to the electro sound. A number of songs in the early 1980s employed the TR-808, including Marvin Gaye’s “Sexual Healing, ” Cybotron’s “Clear, ” and Afrika Bambaataa’s “Planet Rock. ”The Roland TR-808 has attained iconic status. Through the use of samples, the Roland TR-808 remains popular in electro, most electro is instrumental, but a common element is vocals processed through a vocoder. Additionally, speech synthesis may be used to create robotic or mechanical lyrical content, as in the iconic Planet Rock, although primarily instrumental, early electro utilized rap
22.
Electronic music
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In general, a distinction can be made between sound produced using electromechanical means and that produced using electronic technology. Examples of electromechanical sound producing devices include the telharmonium, Hammond organ, purely electronic sound production can be achieved using devices such as the theremin, sound synthesizer, and computer. During the 1920s and 1930s, electronic instruments were introduced and the first compositions for instruments were composed. Musique concrète, created in Paris in 1948, was based on editing together recorded fragments of natural and industrial sounds, Music produced solely from electronic generators was first produced in Germany in 1953. Electronic music was created in Japan and the United States beginning in the 1950s. An important new development was the advent of computers for the purpose of composing music, algorithmic composition was first demonstrated in Australia in 1951. In America and Europe, live electronics were pioneered in the early 1960s, during the 1970s to early 1980s, the monophonic Minimoog became once the most widely used synthesizer at that time in both popular and electronic art music. In the 1980s, electronic music became dominant in popular music, with a greater reliance on synthesizers, and the adoption of programmable drum machines. Electronically produced music became prevalent in the domain by the 1990s. Contemporary electronic music includes many varieties and ranges from art music to popular forms such as electronic dance music. Today, pop music is most recognizable in its 4/4 form. At the turn of the 20th century, experimentation with emerging electronics led to the first electronic musical instruments and these initial inventions were not sold, but were instead used in demonstrations and public performances. The audiences were presented with reproductions of existing music instead of new compositions for the instruments, while some were considered novelties and produced simple tones, the Telharmonium accurately synthesized the sound of orchestral instruments. It achieved viable public interest and made progress into streaming music through telephone networks. Critics of musical conventions at the time saw promise in these developments, ferruccio Busoni encouraged the composition of microtonal music allowed for by electronic instruments. He predicted the use of machines in future music, writing the influential Sketch of a New Esthetic of Music, futurists such as Francesco Balilla Pratella and Luigi Russolo began composing music with acoustic noise to evoke the sound of machinery. They predicted expansions in timbre allowed for by electronics in the influential manifesto The Art of Noises, developments of the vacuum tube led to electronic instruments that were smaller, amplified, and more practical for performance. In particular, the theremin, ondes Martenot and trautonium were commercially produced by the early 1930s, from the late 1920s, the increased practicality of electronic instruments influenced composers such as Joseph Schillinger to adopt them
23.
Billboard 200
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The Billboard 200 is a record chart ranking the 200 most popular music albums and EPs in the United States, published weekly by Billboard magazine. It is frequently used to convey the popularity of an artist or groups of artists, often, a recording act will be remembered by its number ones, those of their albums that outperformed all others during at least one week. The chart is based mostly on sales of albums in the United States, the weekly sales period was originally Monday to Sunday when Nielsen started tracking sales in 1991, but since July 2015, tracking week begins on Friday and ends on Thursday. A new chart is published the following Tuesday with an issue post-dated to the Saturday of the following week, the charts streaming schedule is also tracked from Friday to Thursday. Example, Friday January 1 – sales tracking week begins Thursday January 7 – sales tracking week ends Tuesday January 12 – new chart published, New product is released to the American market on Fridays. Digital downloads of albums are included in Billboard 200 tabulation. Albums that are not licensed for sale in the United States are not eligible to chart. As of the issue dated April 15,2017, the album on the Billboard 200 is More Life by Drake. Billboard began an album chart in 1945, initially only five positions long, the album chart was not published on a weekly basis, sometimes three to seven weeks passing before it was updated. A biweekly, 15-position Best-Selling Popular Albums chart appeared in 1955, the position count varied anywhere from 10 to 30 albums. The first number-one album on the new weekly list was Belafonte by Harry Belafonte, the chart was renamed to Best-Selling Pop Albums later in 1956, and then to Best-Selling Pop LPs in 1957. Beginning on May 25,1959, Billboard split the ranking into two charts Best-Selling Stereophonic LPs for stereo albums and Best-Selling Monophonic LPs for mono albums and these were renamed to Stereo Action Charts and Mono Action Charts in 1960. In January 1961, they became Action Albums—Stereophonic and Action Albums—Monophonic, three months later, they became Top LPs—Stereo and Top LPs—Monaural. On August 17,1963 the stereo and mono charts were combined into a 150-position chart called Top LPs, on April 1,1967, the chart was expanded to 175 positions, then finally to 200 positions on May 13,1967. In 1960, Billboard began concurrently publishing album charts which ranked sales of older or mid-priced titles and these Essential Inventory charts were divided by stereo and mono albums, and featured titles that had already appeared on the main stereo and mono album charts. In January 1961, the Action Charts became Action Albums—Monophonic, Albums appeared on either chart for up to nine weeks, then were moved to an Essential Inventory list of approximately 200 titles, with no numerical ranking. This list continued to be published until the consolidated Top LPs chart debuted in 1963, in 1982, Billboard began publishing a Midline Albums chart which ranked older or mid-priced titles. The chart held 50 positions and was published on a bi-weekly basis, on May 25,1991, Billboard premiered the Top Pop Catalog Albums chart
24.
Polyphony and monophony in instruments
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Polyphony is a property of musical instruments that means that they can play multiple notes simultaneously. Instruments featuring polyphony are said to be polyphonic, instruments that are not capable of polyphony are monophonic or paraphonic. A monophonic synthesizer or monosynth is a synthesizer that produces one note at a time. Well-known monosynths include the Minimoog, the Roland TB-303, and the Korg Prophecy, duophonic synthesizers, such as the ARP Odyssey and Formanta Polivoks built in the 1970s and 1980s respectively, have a capability to independently play two pitches at a time. These synthesizers have at least two oscillators that are controllable, and a duophonic keyboard that can generate two control voltage signals for the lowest- and highest-note. When two or more keys are pressed simultaneously, the lowest- and highest-note will be heard, when only one key is pressed, both oscillators are assigned to one note, possibly with a more complex sound. The earliest polyphonic synthesizers were built in the late-1930s, but the concept did not become popular until the mid-1970s, harald Bodes Warbo Formant Orguel, developed in 1937, was an archetype of a voice allocation polyphonic synthesizer. Novachord by Hammond Organ Company, released in 1939, is a product of frequency divider organs. It uses octave divider technology to generate polyphony, and about 1,000 Novachords were manufactured until 1942, using an octave divider a synthesizer needs only 12 oscillators - one for each note in the musical scale. The additional notes are generated by dividing down the outputs of these oscillators, to produce a note one octave lower, the frequency of the oscillator is divided by two. Polyphony is achieved so long as one of each note in the scale is played simultaneously. One notable early polyphonic synthesizer was the Sequential Circuits Prophet 5, six-voice polyphony was standard by the middle 1980s. With the advent of synthesizers, 16-voice polyphony became standard by the late 1980s. 64-voice polyphony was common by the middle 1990s and 128-note polyphony arrived shortly after, there are several reasons for providing such large numbers of simultaneous notes, Even with only ten fingers, it is possible to play more than ten notes at once. Notes may continue to sound even after a key is released, the synthesizers resources may still be in use to produce the sound of the previously struck notes tapering off, especially when a sustain pedal is used. A sound may be generated by more than one oscillator or sound-source to allow more complicated sounds to be produced, a synthesizer with 16 oscillators may be capable of 16-note polyphony only when simple, single-oscillator sounds are produced. If a particular patch requires four oscillators, then the synthesizer is only capable of four-note polyphony, synthesizers may be configured to produce multiple timbres, particularly necessary when sounds are layered or sequenced. Multitimbral instruments are always polyphonic but polyphonic instruments are not necessarily multitimbral, some multitimbral instruments have a feature which allows the user to specify the amount of polyphony reserved or allowed for each timbre
25.
Elkie Brooks
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Elkie Brooks is an English singer, a vocalist with the bands Dada and Vinegar Joe, and later a solo artist. She gained her biggest success in the late 1970s and 1980s and has been nominated twice for Brit Awards. She is known for her husky voice and hit singles such as Pearls a Singer, Lilac Wine, Dont Cry Out Loud, Fool, and No More the Fool. She is generally referred to as the British Queen of Blues, by April 2012, Brooks had released more albums that had reached the top 75 of the UK album chart than any other British female artist. Brooks was born Elaine Bookbinder in Broughton, Salford, the daughter of Marjorie Violet Vi and her paternal grandparents and great-grandparents were Jewish immigrants from Kielce, Russian Poland. Her mother, who had been born to a Catholic family and she attended North Salford Secondary Modern School. Her older brother is Anthony Bookbinder, who went by the name of Tony Mansfield. According to Brooks, her debut was a gig at a club called the Laronde on Cheetham Hill Road, Manchester. She first sang professionally at the age of 15, and her first record, Brooks spent most of the 1960s on Britains cabaret scene, a period of her life that she did not particularly enjoy. In the mid 1960s she supported the Beatles in their Christmas show in London, then, as an established act and she went on to tour the United States with several bands, including the Animals. After she met Pete Gage, whom she would marry, she joined the short-lived fusioneers Dada before forming Vinegar Joe with Gage, Brooks gained the reputation as the wild woman of rock n roll due to her wild stage performances. After three albums, they split up in 1974, and Brooks and Palmer formed separate solo careers, after a time as backing singer with the American southern boogie band Wet Willie, she returned to England. Her first solo album on A&M records was Rich Mans Woman and it was released to critical acclaim, but Brooks was given a hard time because of the albums cover, which was considered outrageous for the time. It came before a run of 16 albums in 25 years, starting with Two Days Away, produced by the songwriting duo Leiber & Stoller, Brooks also wrote some tracks with them. The hits Pearls a Singer and Sunshine After the Rain came from this album, the albums Shooting Star and Live and Learn also saw success along with the singles Lilac Wine and Dont Cry Out Loud. However, her polished, powerful cover of Gallagher and Lyles The Runaway, in 1980 Brooks performed at the Knebworth Festival with the Beach Boys, Santana and Mike Oldfield. Pearls, released in 1981 achieved the biggest success of her career, Fool was a hit for Brooks taken from this album, written by Chris Rea. Pearls II, Minutes and Screen Gems, were all UK chart hits, in 1986 she sang the title song for the BBC television series A Very Peculiar Practice
26.
First Love (1977 film)
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First Love is a 1977 American romantic drama film starring William Katt and Susan Dey and directed by Joan Darling. The movie is based upon the story Sentimental Education by Harold Brodkey, the original music score was composed by John Barry. Elgin is a student who spends much of his time studying literature. One day, he overhears his friend David making love next door and he then hears Davids girlfriend pounding on the door, demanding to know whos in his room with him. Shelly comes into Elgins room wearing only a towel, implying she was the woman with David just a moment ago, Shelly says she will only be there for a short time until David finishes making love with his girlfriend, but it takes a lot longer. David thanks Elgin by setting him up with Shelly, Elgin first sees Caroline during a meal. After the meal, Elgin and Shelly separate from David and his girlfriend, Shelly declares that she likes Elgin and offers to make love to him. When she disrobes, he is shocked and spurns her advances, in a later scene, Elgin is working as the busboy at the schools cafeteria. There, he has his first conversation with Caroline but ends up spilling tea on her and her book and she still leaves her dormitory name on a sheet of paper and he goes to see her with a new copy of the book. After a rough start, she agrees to go and have coffee with him and she alludes to having another boyfriend, but he is smitten and decides to join a class she is in, three weeks after it had started. After talking to Caroline, Elgin learns that her father had died a long time ago and they go on their first real date to the symphony and the chemistry between them becomes clear. Caroline introduces Elgin to the man, John, who is already married. She is visibly shaken by this meeting and asks to spend a night with Elgin and their love making is interrupted by David who says Elgin is late for work. Elgin runs to work and David convinces Caroline to take a back to her dorm on his motorcycle. Elgin spots them together and he fights David in a jealous rage, Elgin gets fired for being late to work. David and Caroline watch Elgin while he plays a game of soccer. Elgin and Caroline were making love again when he asks about John, who worked with her father as a lawyer, and he gets jealous after he learns that she slept with John, but Caroline gets mad about the entire conversation. Elgin gets nervous when he cant get hold of her, but finds a note which tells him to join her, alone, Elgin meets Caroline and they pick up where they left off, but she resists him while they are in her childhood playhouse
27.
Susan Dey
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A three-time Emmy Award nominee and six-time Golden Globe Award nominee, she won the Golden Globe for Best Actress in a Drama Series for L. A. Law in 1988. She attended Columbus Elementary School in Thornwood, New York, later moving to Bedford, New York, Dey was a model before starring as Laurie Partridge in the television series The Partridge Family from 1970 to 1974. She was 17 years old when she won the part and had no acting experience. She returned to network television in 1977 as the co-star of the short-lived situation comedy Loves Me. Her first film role was as a passenger in the 1972 airline hijack movie Skyjacked starring Charlton Heston, also in 1977, Dey starred opposite William Katt in a romance film, First Love, directed by Joan Darling. Dey co-starred with Albert Finney in the 1981 science-fiction film Looker, written and she had a leading role in 1986s Echo Park as a struggling waitress-actress who takes a job as a stripper who delivers singing telegrams. She starred on L. A. Law as California assistant district attorney Grace Van Owen, Dey won a Golden Globe Award as Actress in a Leading Role – Drama Series for the role in 1988. She was also nominated in each of the four years. She was also nominated for the Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series in 1987,1988 and she hosted a 1992 episode of Saturday Night Live. Later that year, she co-starred in the Diane English/CBS sitcom Love & War with Jay Thomas, although the show ran until 1995, Dey was replaced in 1993 by Annie Potts because producers reportedly felt she had no chemistry with co-star Thomas. In 1993, she produced and starred in the ABC Movie of the Week Lies & Lullabies, Dey was mentioned in Shirley Joness memoir as the only cast member who consistently refused to take part in Partridge Family reunions. Dey was married to Leonard Lenny Hirshan from 1976 to 1981 and they have one daughter, Sarah, who was born in 1978. Dey has been married to her husband, television producer Bernard Sofronski. She serves as a member of the Rape Treatment Center at UCLA Medical Center. Encyclopedia of Television Series, Pilots and Specials, 1974–1984, susan Dey at the Internet Movie Database
28.
William Katt
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William Theodore Katt is an American film and television actor, voice artist and musician best known as the star of the television series The Greatest American Hero. Between 1985 and 1988, he starred in nine Perry Mason television films alongside his mother Barbara Hale, Katt was born in Los Angeles to actors Bill Williams and Barbara Hale. He grew up in the San Fernando Valley and began acting as a teenager, Katt attended Orange Coast College before pursuing a career as a musician. Inspired by his father, he started an acting career, appearing in summer stock theatre. His earliest film credits include the role of a jock, Tommy Ross in Brian De Palmas 1976 horror film adaptation Carrie, in 1978, he appeared as Barlow, a young surfer, in the John Milius drama film Big Wednesday opposite Jan-Michael Vincent and Gary Busey. His mother in that film was his mother, Barbara Hale. The following year he took the role of Sundance Kid in the 1979 film Butch and Sundance, Katt explained in a 1979 interview with critic Roger Ebert that he was holding out only for parts that were personally interesting to him. In December 1975, Katt auditioned for the part of Luke Skywalker in 1977s science fiction blockbuster Star Wars, in 1981, Katt was cast as the title role in a filmed version of the Broadway musical comedy Pippin, which received mixed reviews. Also starring veteran actor Robert Culp, the show retains a cult fanbase and its theme song, Believe It or Not, penned by Mike Post, also became a hit in the music charts. In 1982, due to the success of the first season of The Greatest American Hero, Katt signed to MCA and released a rock album. Katt continues to appear on television and in supporting film roles and he appeared in an episode of House in 2006. In recent years, he has returned to work, with appearances in Andromeda and Justice League and roles in the award-winning film Gamers, The Man from Earth. Katt briefly appeared in Heroes season 3 in The Butterfly Effect as a reporter investigating Ali Larters character. He portrayed Jack Matheson in the film, Mirrors 2. In 2010 during season 6, Katt guest starred as C. J. Paynes musician birth-father in the episode Whos Your Daddy Now. in the Tyler Perry comedy House of Payne, Katt also has written a Greatest American Hero comic book and contributed to that series Facebook page. In 2013, Katt played himself in the spoof film Paranormal Movie directed by Kevin Farley, Katt married Deborah Kahane in 1979 and they had two sons, Clayton and Emerson. He married Danielle Hirsch in 1993 and has a daughter with her, Dakota, as well as a stepson, audio interview with William Katt at comic book site comiXology William Katt at the Internet Movie Database William Katt at AllMovie
29.
Techno
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Techno is a form of electronic dance music that emerged in Detroit, Michigan, in the United States during the mid-to-late 1980s. The first recorded use of the word techno in reference to a genre of music was in 1988. Many styles of techno now exist, but Detroit techno is seen as the foundation upon which a number of subgenres have been built. Added to this is the influence of futuristic and fictional themes relevant to life in American late capitalist society, pioneering producer Juan Atkins cites Tofflers phrase techno rebels as inspiring him to use the word techno to describe the musical style he helped to create. This unique blend of influences aligns techno with the referred to as afrofuturism. To producers such as Derrick May, the transference of spirit from the body to the machine is often a central preoccupation, in this manner, techno dance music defeats what Adorno saw as the alienating effect of mechanisation on the modern consciousness. Stylistically, techno is generally repetitive instrumental music, oftentimes produced for use in a continuous DJ set, the tempo tends to vary between approximately 120 to 150 beats per minute, depending on the style of techno. The creative use of production technology, such as drum machines, synthesizers. Many producers use retro electronic musical devices to create what they consider to be an authentic techno sound, drum machines from the 1980s such as Rolands TR-808 and TR-909 are highly prized, and software emulations of such retro technology are popular among techno producers. The Electrifying Mojo was the first radio DJ to play music by the Detroit techno producers Juan Atkins, Derrick May, Mojo refused to follow pre-established radio formats or playlists, and he promoted social and cultural awareness of the African American community. In exploring technos origins writer Kodwo Eshun maintains that Kraftwerk are to Techno what Muddy Waters is to the Rolling Stones, the authentic, the origin, the real. Juan Atkins has acknowledged that he had an enthusiasm for Kraftwerk and Giorgio Moroder, particularly Moroders work with Donna Summer. Atkins also mentions that around 1980 I had a tape of nothing but Kraftwerk, Telex, Devo, Giorgio Moroder and Gary Numan, and Id ride around in my car playing it. Regarding his initial impression of Kraftwerk, Atkins notes that they were clean, Derrick May identified the influence of Kraftwerk and other European synthesizer music in commenting that it was just classy and clean, and to us it was beautiful, like outer space. Living around Detroit, there was so little beauty, everything is an ugly mess in Detroit, and so we were attracted to this music. May has commented that he considered his music a direct continuation of the European synthesizer tradition and he also identified Japanese synthpop act Yellow Magic Orchestra, particularly member Ryuichi Sakamoto, and British band Ultravox, as influences, along with Kraftwerk. In 1980 or 1981 they met with Mojo and proposed that they provide mixes for his show, which they did end up doing the following year. These young promoters developed and nurtured the local music scene by both catering to the tastes of the local audience of young people and by marketing parties with new DJs
30.
Hip hop music
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It developed as part of hip hop culture, a subculture defined by four key stylistic elements, MCing/rapping, DJing/scratching with turntables, break dancing, and graffiti writing. Other elements include sampling beats or bass lines from records, while often used to refer solely to rapping, hip hop more properly denotes the practice of the entire subculture. Hip hops early evolution occurred as sampling technology and drum machines became available and affordable. Turntablist techniques such as scratching and beatmatching developed along with the breaks and Jamaican toasting, rapping developed as a vocal style in which the artist speaks or chants along rhythmically with an instrumental or synthesized beat. The Sugarhill Gangs 1979 song Rappers Delight is widely regarded to be the first hip hop record to gain popularity in the mainstream. The 1980s marked the diversification of hip hop as the genre developed more complex styles, prior to the 1980s, hip hop music was largely confined within the United States. However, during the 1980s, it began to spread to scenes in dozens of countries. New school hip hop was the wave of hip hop music, originating in 1983–84 with the early records of Run-D. M. C. The Golden age hip hop period was a period between the mid-1980s and the early 1990s. Notable artists from this era include the Juice Crew, Public Enemy, & Rakim, Boogie Down Productions and KRS-One, EPMD, Slick Rick, Beastie Boys, Kool G Rap, Big Daddy Kane, Ultramagnetic MCs, De La Soul, and A Tribe Called Quest. Gangsta rap is a subgenre of hip hop that often focuses on the violent lifestyles, in the West Coast hip hop style, G-funk dominated mainstream hip hop for several years during the 1990s. I. G. In the 1990s, hip hop began to diversify with other regional styles emerging, such as Southern rap, at the same time, hip hop continued to be assimilated into other genres of popular music, examples being Neo soul and nu metal. Hip hop became a pop music genre in the mid-1990s. The popularity of hip hop music continued through the 2000s, with hip hop influences also increasingly finding their way into mainstream pop, the United States also saw the success of regional styles such as crunk, a Southern genre that emphasized the beats and music more than the lyrics. Starting in 2005, sales of hip hop music in the United States began to severely wane, during the mid-2000s, alternative hip hop secured a place in the mainstream, due in part to the crossover success of artists such as OutKast and Kanye West. Creation of the hip hop is often credited to Keith Cowboy, rapper with Grandmaster Flash. However, Lovebug Starski, Keith Cowboy, and DJ Hollywood used the term when the music was known as disco rap. Cowboy later worked the hip hop cadence into a part of his stage performance, the first use of the term in print was in The Village Voice, by Steven Hager, later author of a 1984 history of hip hop
31.
Music sequencer
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This software also improved on the quality of the earlier sequencers which tended to be mechanical sounding and were only able to play back notes of exactly equal duration. Software-based sequencers allowed musicians to program performances that were more expressive and these new sequencers could also be used to control external synthesizers, especially rackmounted sound modules, and it was no longer necessary for each synthesizer to have its own devoted keyboard. As the technology matured, sequencers gained more features, such as the ability to record multitrack audio, Sequencers used for audio recording are called digital audio workstations. Many modern sequencers can be used to control virtual instruments implemented as software plug-ins and this allows musicians to replace expensive and cumbersome standalone synthesizers with their software equivalents. Today the term sequencer is used to describe software. Workstation keyboards have their own proprietary built-in MIDI sequencers, drum machines and some older synthesizers have their own step sequencer built in. There are still also standalone hardware MIDI sequencers, although the demand for those has diminished greatly due to the greater feature set of their software counterparts. Music sequencers are often categorized by handling data types, as following, or, the phrase samplers including Groove machines, etc. Also, music sequencer can be categorized by its construction and supporting modes, realtime sequencers record the musical notes in real-time as on audio recorders, and play back musical notes with designated tempo, quantizations, and pitch. For editing, usually punch in/punch out feature originated in the recording is provided. For detailed editing, possibly another visual editing modes under graphical user interface may be more suitable, anyway, this mode provides usability similar to the audio recorder already familiarized by musicians, and it is widely supported on software sequencer, DAW, and built-in hardware sequencers. Analog sequencers are typically implemented with analog electronics, and play the musical notes designated by a series of knobs or sliders corresponding to each musical note and it is designed for both composition and live performance, users can change the musical notes at any time without regarding recording mode. And also possibly, the time-interval between each note can be independently adjustable. Typically, analog sequencer is used to generate the repeated minimalistic phrases which is reminiscent of Tangerine Dream, on the bass machines, select a step note from a chromatic keypads, then select a step duration from a group of length-buttons, sequentially. In general, step mode, along with roughly quantized semi-realtime mode, is supported on the analog drum machines, bass machines. Software sequencer is a class of application software providing a functionality of music sequencer, the features provided as sequencers vary widely depending on the software, even an analog sequencer can be simulated. The user may control the software sequencer either by using the user interfaces or a specialized input devices. The early music sequencers were sound producing devices such as musical instruments, music boxes, mechanical organs, player pianos
32.
Matthew and Son
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Matthew and Son is a single written, composed, and performed by Cat Stevens. It was selected as the song for his 1967 debut album. Stevens was a newly signed teenage singer-songwriter, was performing to elaborate arrangements quite different from the skiffle which had, in part, the song remains Cat Stevens highest charting single in the British Isles, reaching Number 2 in the UK and Number 3 in Ireland in early 1967. The song, according to Stevens, took its name from the tailor, Henry Matthews, who made suits for Stevens, who thought up the story of the worker who is the main character in the song. Stevens later commented, I had a girlfriend, and she was working for this big firm, the riff seemed to fit the words, Matthew and Son. There was a bit of social comment there about people being slaves to other people, the song was covered by the band The Delgados in a 2002 Peel session and included on their 2006 collection The Complete BBC Peel Sessions. The songs verse sounds similar to Tears For Fears 1982 single Mad World. ‘ and they receive few breaks in their routine, and their food is generally poor. The kind of business in which Matthew And Son engages is not specified in the lyrics, the song appears on the soundtrack of Michael Apteds Stardust. Song Cat Stevens - vocals Alun Davies -guitar John Paul Jones - bass guitar Nicky Hopkins - keyboards Alan Tew - orchestral arrangements
33.
Mona Bone Jakon
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His second album was a commercial failure and in the fall of 1968, he collapsed, with the diagnosis of tuberculosis and a collapsed lung. For over a year, while recovering, Stevens virtually disappeared from the British pop scene, Mona Bone Jakon is notable not only for his return, but for the emergence of a very different artist. The album was certified gold for sales/shipments of more than 500,000 copies in the United States, during his hospital-dictated year of bedrest, he began writing a catalogue of songs to fill far more than his next album. Smith also produced the album and brought Stevens a high fidelity sound that was not as present on his previous releases, Stevens began to make the transition from pop star to a folk-rock performer, when the term singer-songwriter was just being coined. The songs themselves were darker in tone, the madrigal-inspired ballad Lady DArbanville elevated the tragedy of a lost lover to that of a deceased one, there were also lighter songs, Pop Star showcased Stevens dramatic change in voice by satirising the triviality of celebrity. Though Lady DArbanville would reach No.8 on the British charts, according to a 1972 interview with Stevens, the inspiration for the title was a name he created to describe his penis, Mona Bone Jakon is another name for my penis. Its not some sort of secret vocabulary, its just something I made up and they added that Stevens craggy voice, with its odd breaks of tone and occasional huskiness, lent these sometimes sketchy songs depth. All tracks written by Cat Stevens
34.
Ringo Starr
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Richard Starkey, MBE, known professionally as Ringo Starr, is an English musician, singer, songwriter and actor who gained worldwide fame as the drummer for the Beatles. He occasionally sang lead vocals, usually for one song on an album, including With a Little Help from My Friends, Yellow Submarine and their cover of Act Naturally. He also wrote the Beatles songs Dont Pass Me By and Octopuss Garden, Starr was twice afflicted by life-threatening illnesses during childhood, and as a result of prolonged hospitalisations fell behind in school. In 1955, he entered the workforce and briefly held a position with British Rail before securing an apprenticeship at a Liverpool equipment manufacturer, soon afterwards, he became interested in the UK skiffle craze, developing a fervent admiration for the genre. In 1957, he cofounded his first band, the Eddie Clayton Skiffle Group, when the Beatles formed in 1960, Starr was a member of another Liverpool group, Rory Storm and the Hurricanes. After achieving moderate success with that band in the UK and Hamburg, he quit the Hurricanes and joined the Beatles in August 1962, Starr played key roles in the Beatles films and appeared in numerous others. After the bands break-up in 1970, he released several singles including the US number four hit It Dont Come Easy. In 1972, he released his most successful UK single, Back Off Boogaloo and he achieved commercial and critical success with his 1973 album Ringo, which was a top ten release in both the UK and the US. He has been featured in a number of documentaries and hosted television shows, since 1989, he has toured with twelve variations of Ringo Starr & His All-Starr Band. Ringos popularity brought forth a new paradigm and we started to see the drummer as an equal participant in the compositional aspect. His parts are so signature to the songs that you can listen to a Ringo drum part without the rest of the music and he was inducted into the Modern Drummer Hall of Fame in 1998. In 2011, Rolling Stone readers named Starr the fifth-greatest drummer of all time. Starr, who was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a Beatle in 1988, was inducted for his solo career in 2015. Richard Starkey was born on 7 July 1940, at 9 Madryn Street, in Dingle and he is the only child of confectioners Elsie and Richard Starkey. Elsie enjoyed singing and dancing, a hobby that she shared with her husband, an avid fan of swing. Prior to the birth of their son, whom they nicknamed Ritchie, the couple had spent much of their time on the local ballroom circuit. Elsie adopted an approach to raising her son that bordered on fixation. Subsequently, Big Ritchie, as Starkeys father became known, lost interest in his family, choosing instead to spend hours drinking and dancing in pubs
35.
The Beatles
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The Beatles were an English rock band, formed in Liverpool in 1960. With members John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr, the Beatles built their reputation playing clubs in Liverpool and Hamburg over a three-year period from 1960, with Stuart Sutcliffe initially serving as bass player. The core of Lennon, McCartney and Harrison went through a succession of drummers, including Pete Best, before asking Starr to join them. They acquired the nickname the Fab Four as Beatlemania grew in Britain the next year, from 1965 onwards, the Beatles produced increasingly innovative recordings, including the albums Rubber Soul, Revolver, Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band, The Beatles and Abbey Road, after their break-up in 1970, they each enjoyed successful musical careers of varying lengths. McCartney and Starr, the members, remain musically active. Lennon was shot and killed in December 1980, and Harrison died of cancer in November 2001. The Beatles are the band in history, with estimated sales of over 600 million records worldwide. They have had more number-one albums on the British charts and sold more singles in the UK than any other act, according to the RIAA, the Beatles are also the best-selling music artists in the United States, with 178 million certified units. In 2008, the group topped Billboard magazines list of the all-time most successful Hot 100 artists, as of 2016 and they have received ten Grammy Awards, an Academy Award for Best Original Song Score and fifteen Ivor Novello Awards. The group was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1988 and they were also collectively included in Time magazines compilation of the twentieth centurys 100 most influential people. In March 1957, John Lennon, then aged sixteen, formed a group with several friends from Quarry Bank school. They briefly called themselves the Blackjacks, before changing their name to the Quarrymen after discovering that a local group was already using the other name. Fifteen-year-old Paul McCartney joined as a rhythm guitarist shortly after he, in February 1958, McCartney invited his friend George Harrison to watch the band. The fourteen-year-old auditioned for Lennon, impressing him with his playing, after a month of Harrisons persistence, they enlisted him as their lead guitarist. By January 1959, Lennons Quarry Bank friends had left the group, the three guitarists, billing themselves at least three times as Johnny and the Moondogs, were playing rock and roll whenever they could find a drummer. They used the name until May, when they became the Silver Beetles, before undertaking a tour of Scotland as the backing group for pop singer. By early July, they had changed their name to the Silver Beatles, allan Williams, the Beatles unofficial manager, arranged a residency for them in Hamburg, but lacking a full-time drummer they auditioned and hired Pete Best in mid-August 1960
36.
Islam
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Islam is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion which professes that there is only one and incomparable God and that Muhammad is the last messenger of God. It is the worlds second-largest religion and the major religion in the world, with over 1.7 billion followers or 23% of the global population. Islam teaches that God is merciful, all-powerful, and unique, and He has guided mankind through revealed scriptures, natural signs, and a line of prophets sealed by Muhammad. The primary scriptures of Islam are the Quran, viewed by Muslims as the word of God. Muslims believe that Islam is the original, complete and universal version of a faith that was revealed many times before through prophets including Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses. As for the Quran, Muslims consider it to be the unaltered, certain religious rites and customs are observed by the Muslims in their family and social life, while social responsibilities to parents, relatives, and neighbors have also been defined. Besides, the Quran and the sunnah of Muhammad prescribe a comprehensive body of moral guidelines for Muslims to be followed in their personal, social, political, Islam began in the early 7th century. Originating in Mecca, it spread in the Arabian Peninsula. The expansion of the Muslim world involved various caliphates and empires, traders, most Muslims are of one of two denominations, Sunni or Shia. Islam is the dominant religion in the Middle East, North Africa, sizable Muslim communities are also found in Horn of Africa, Europe, China, Russia, Mainland Southeast Asia, Philippines, Northern Borneo, Caucasus and the Americas. Converts and immigrant communities are found in almost every part of the world, Islam is a verbal noun originating from the triliteral root s-l-m which forms a large class of words mostly relating to concepts of wholeness, submission, safeness and peace. In a religious context it means voluntary submission to God, Islām is the verbal noun of Form IV of the root, and means submission or surrender. Muslim, the word for an adherent of Islam, is the active participle of the verb form. The word sometimes has connotations in its various occurrences in the Quran. In some verses, there is stress on the quality of Islam as a state, Whomsoever God desires to guide. Other verses connect Islām and dīn, Today, I have perfected your religion for you, I have completed My blessing upon you, still others describe Islam as an action of returning to God—more than just a verbal affirmation of faith. In the Hadith of Gabriel, islām is presented as one part of a triad that also includes imān, Islam was historically called Muhammadanism in Anglophone societies. This term has fallen out of use and is said to be offensive because it suggests that a human being rather than God is central to Muslims religion
37.
Religious conversion
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Religious conversion is the adoption of a set of beliefs identified with one particular religious denomination to the exclusion of others. Thus religious conversion would describe the abandoning of adherence to one denomination and this might be from one to another denomination within the same religion, for example, from Baptist to Catholic Christianity or from Sunni to Shia Islam. In some cases, religious conversion marks a transformation of identity and is symbolized by special rituals. When people marry one spouse may convert to the religion of the other, forced conversion is adoption of a different religion under duress. The convert may secretly retain the previous beliefs and continue, covertly, with the practices of the original religion, over generations a family forced against their will to convert may wholeheartedly adopt the new religion. Proselytism is the act of attempting to convert by persuasion another individual from a different religion or belief system, apostate is a term used by members of a religion or denomination to refer to someone who has left that religion or denomination. Jewish law has a number of requirements of potential converts and they should desire conversion to Judaism for its own sake, and for no other motives. A male convert needs to undergo a ritual circumcision conducted according to Jewish law, a convert must join the Jewish community and reject any previous religious affiliation. Ritual immersion in a pool of water known as a mikvah is required. The Greek word proselyte means a convert to Judaism and it is known that some Chinese, Khazars, Edomites, and Ethiopians, as well as many Arabs, particularly in Yemen, were converts. As late as the 6th century the Eastern Roman empire and Caliph Umar ibn Khattab were issuing decrees against conversion to Judaism, Conversion to Christianity is the religious conversion of a previously non-Christian person to some form of Christianity. Some Christian sects require full conversion for new members regardless of any history in other Christian sects, the exact requirements vary between different churches and denominations. All Christian sects hold that baptism is a ritual. Jesus Christ was baptized at the beginning of his ministry, and prior to event, John the Baptist had been baptizing Jewish believers as a sign of repentance. Baptism is usually understood as an symbol of an inward change. Prior to that Awakening at Antioch, all converts to Christianity were ethnic, following the Awakening, Pagans and infidels were required to undergo Christian baptism to be ultimately accepted in the Kingdom of God. Christian Baptism has some parallels with Jewish Immersion by Mikvah, converting to Catholicism involves religious education followed by initial participation in the sacraments, which are baptism, confession, penance, and communion. Most other sects require a period of prior to acceptance
38.
Epiphone Casino
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The Epiphone Casino is a thinline hollow body electric guitar manufactured by Epiphone, a branch of Gibson. Glenn Frey, John Illsley, Peter Green and Dave Grohl, Casinos have been manufactured in USA, Japan, Korea and China. The Casino, also designated by Epiphone as model E230TD, is a thinline hollow-bodied guitar with two Gibson P-90 pick-ups, although generally fitted with a trapeze-type tailpiece, often a Bigsby vibrato tailpiece is used in its place. This makes it lighter, and louder when played without an amplifier, early versions of the Casino had a spruce top. Through 1970, the Casino headstock was set at a 17-degree angle and the top was made of five laminated layers of maple, birch, maple, birch, and maple. With the exception of the John Lennon models, subsequent Casinos have been made with 14-degree headstock angle with five layer all maple laminated tops, current versions have a laminated maple top, sides, and back, and a mahogany neck. Per the Epiphone String Gauge Guide, the Casino comes with string gauges,0.0100.0130.0170.0260.0360.046. In 1966 John Lennon and George Harrison bought 1965 Casinos, which are seen in photos of Japan concerts. John Lennon used the Epiphone Casino as his main instrument during the remainder of his time with the Beatles, in the early seventies, the original tuners were replaced with a set of gold Grover tuners or machine heads. His stripped guitar, is first seen in the Revolution promo film and it can also be seen in the Let It Be film, and most other pictures of Lennon playing guitar after that time. Harrison had his fitted with a Bigsby trem, removed the pickguard and he also had it sanded down in 1968. Epiphone currently builds several versions of the Casino and these include, Regular Archtop-Series Casino made in China and uses non-American made parts Elitist Casino. Made in Japan and set-up in America, and contains American made parts such as the pickups, body is 5-ply maple, Gibson P-90 pickups, and nickel hardware. The body is the size as a Gibson ES-339. Inspired by John Lennon 1965 or Revolution Casino, the 1965 version has a sunburst finish, white pick guard and small button Grover tuners. This limited version is offered in Royal Tan and Vintage Sunburst and it sports a 5-layer maple-birch body, Gibson P-90 pickups, short headstock, bullet trussrod cover, tortoiseshell pickguard, and pre-Gibson era Epiphone badge
