Essays on Pianist

Bebop is a jazz style known for fast paces and complex improvisations based on playing off of harmonies. It developed in the 1940s in the United States of America and symbolized the new stage in the ideas about jazz music and its perception. This paper aims to discuss the history of bebop, its establishment as the major modern jazz movement around the days of the decline of big bands, its fragmentation into the styles of cool and hard bop, and the role African-American musicians played in its development. As Gioia writes, from its beginning, jazz was the genre of ...

<Institution> Few months ago, on March 17, two daughters of Van Cliburn, an award-winning pianist, were found dead on their Benbrook home (Parry, 2016). Police reports revealed that Sofya Tsygankova, the estranged wife of Cliburn and the mother of the victims, killed her daughters by smothering them with pillow (Parry, 2016). This case is just one of the many cases of filicide ever reported. Merriam-Webster (2015) defines filicide as “the murder of one’s own daughter or son.” Each gut-wrenching case of filicide makes people’s mind wonder about how parents can possible cause an end to the ...

Thelonious Monk is known as one of the most gifted jazz musicians. He was the pioneer of bebop and his influence as a pianist and composer had significant effects on different kinds of music (Monkinstitute). Music of Thelonious Monk is based on Ingrid Monson’s and Paul Berliner’s work (Solis 3). Nevertheless, Monk is famous for his improvisations, which are so outstanding that a jazz critic Whitney Balliett once pointed out “His improvisations were molten Monk compositions, and his compositions were frozen Monk improvisations.” (Deveaux 169) Thelonious was born in North Carolina on October 10, 1917, but his ...

Casablanca: Plot

Directed by Curtiz Michael, Casablanca is an American film of 1942 that features romance and drama. It is a production of the Warner Brothers who base it on Burnett Murray and unproduced play Everybody Comes to Rick's of Alison Joan. The setting of Casablanca took place during the Second World War, which underlies the plot of the film. It focuses on an expatriate of the United States who has to sacrifice his relationship with a lady he loves for helping her husband – a leader of the Czech Resistance - escape from Casablanca. Getting out this Vichy-controlled town would help ...

Storyville or as the locals simply called “The District” was the area of ​​New Orleans, residents and visitors of which attended for the carnal pleasures they could receive from living there numerous priestesses of love. Music lovers went there to listen to jazz virtuosos. Actually, this “red light district”, or Storyville, was established in 1897 by the authorities of New Orleans to put prostitution to order. The authorities legalized these “activities” based on the schemes tested in the Dutch and German port cities. Storyville was named after Sydney Storey, city council member, who is considered one of the founding ...

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

It is common knowledge that every well-educated person should know, understand and appreciate music. However, no matter how well aware of various composers and genres people might be, many of us find it difficult to feel it. There are numerous examples of musicians who can technically perform a piece, but when you listen to them playing, you realize that you might as well listen to a robot. Only the emotion behind the melody gives music a truly human feel and makes it a universal human language that will be understood all over the world. Thus, it is extremely important ...