Surveys the history and components of music, concentrating on Western musical traditions.

Presents the history of hip-hop including, how it evolved from folktales, spirituals, and poetry, to the showmanship of James Brown, to the culture of graffiti art and breakdancing that formed around the art form.

Provides a history of comic books in America during the twentieth century, showing how it has influenced and been influenced by American culture. Includes an epilogue about comics in the early twenty-first century.

Presents a collection of twenty poems written in tribute to well-known poets from around the world. Newbery Medalist and a Caldecott Honoree offer a glorious, lyrical ode to poets who have sparked a sense of wonder. Out of gratitude for the poet's art form, Newbery Award-winning author and poet Kwame Alexander, along with Chris Colderley and Marjory Wentworth, present original poems that pay homage to twenty famed poets who have made the authors'...

"Millie danced to jazz in her Italian neighborhood. Pedro danced to Latin songs in his Puerto Rican neighborhood. It was the 1940s in New York City, and they were forbidden to dance together . . . until first a band and then a ballroom broke the rules. Machito and His Afro-Cubans hit the scene with a brand-new sound, blending jazz trumpets and saxophones with Latin maracas and congas creating Latin jazz, music for the head, the heart, and the hips....

Words and pictures, this book presents a look into the life, the work, the influences, and the times of Frederic Chopin and his contemporaries. Words and pictures, this book presents a look into the life, the work, the influences, and the times of Frederic Chopin and his contemporaries. Music is one of our greatest delights -- and these unusually handsome and informative volumes transport readers into virtually every corner of music's universe, from...