analysis, appreciation

Offers technical guide to composing music, explaining the spotting process, timing, synchronization, and general approaches to composition.

Gives an analysis of eleven key operas.

Chronicles the history of jazz music and provides information on the major types of jazz, the key musicians of the twentieth centuries, European and African influences on jazz, and other related topics.

The author, a Pulitzer Prize-winning musician and composer, explores jazz and explains how developing an understanding of this music can enrich all areas of your life, from personal relationships and individual creativity to how you conduct business and contribute to society. Explains how to listen to and interpret jazz, and uses personal stories to impart how the key ideas in jazz can influence the way you think and behave with others.

"Offers insight into how operas are written and the personalities, incidents, and musical circumstances that have shaped their composition"--Dust jacket.

Pulitzer Prize-winning musician Wynton Marsalis, discusses the different styles of jazz music and musicians, as well as its influence on music and society.