Authors: David Foster.
Hardcover, 272 pages
Publisher: Pocket
Publication Date: 2008-11-04


Reviews :

    After almost four decades in the music business, David Foster -- producer, arranger, songwriter, performer -- is finally ready to talk. In this compelling and outspoken memoir, Foster shares some of his incredible stories: the first time he met Barbra Streisand, as a young session player in Los Angeles; his first of 15 Grammys® for "After the Love Has Gone," Earth, Wind & Fire's memorable hit; the making of Unison, Celine Dion's English-language debut; the challenges he faced on his way to putting the group Chicago back on the charts; his award-winning contribution to Unforgettable: With Love, Natalie Cole's comeback album; those back-to-back recording sessions with Madonna and Michael Jackson; and the incredible chain of events that spawned Whitney Houston's historic blockbuster, "I Will Always Love You."

Foster has worked with superstars of every decade, including:

Celine Dion - Josh Groban - Whitney Houston - Michael Bublé - Barbra Streisand - Andrea Bocelli - Madonna - Michael Jackson - Natalie Cole - George Harrison - Earth, Wind & Fire - *NSYNC - Chicago - Paul McCartney - All-4-One - Katharine McPhee - Toni Braxton - Alice Cooper - Olivia Newton-John - Michael Bolton

...and many more.

From his unique and privileged vantage point, Foster describes the delicate balancing act between artist and producer, offers revealing portraits of some of those artists at work, and shares his secrets for success in the maddeningly fickle music industry.

At its heart, this is the story of a boy with perfect pitch who grew up to become one of the most influential musical forces of our time -- the solid gold hitman who produced the soundtrack of our lives....

Authors: Christopher Ciccone. Wendy Leigh.
Hardcover, 352 pages
Publisher: Simon Spotlight Entertainment
Publication Date: 2008-07-14


Reviews :

    Ciccone's extraordinary memoir is based on his life and forty-seven years of growing up with and working with his sister - the most famous woman in the world....

Authors: Jimmy Buffett.
Paperback, 448 pages
Publisher: Ballantine Books
Publication Date: 2000-11-28


Reviews :

    For the millions of fans of Jimmy Buffett's music as well as his bestselling books, Tales From Margaritaville and Where Is Joe Merchant?, here is the ultimate Jimmy Buffett philosophy on life and how to live it.  As hard as it is to believe, the irrepressible Jimmy Buffett has hit the half-century mark and, in A PIRATE LOOKS AT 50, he brings us along on the remarkable journey which he took through the Southern hemisphere to celebrate this landmark birthday.
        
Jimmy takes us from the legendary pirate coves of the Florida Keys to the ruins of ancient Cartegena.  Along the way, we hear a tale or two of how he got his start in New Orleans, how he discovered his passion for flying planes, and how he almost died in a watery crash in Nantucket harbor.  We follow Jimmy to jungle outposts in Costa Rica and on a meandering trip down the Amazon, through hair-raising negotiations with gun-toting customs  officials and a 3-year-old aspiring co-pilot.  And he is the inimitable Jimmy Buffett through it all.
        
For Parrotheads, for armchair adventurers, and for anyone who appreciates a good yarn and a hearty laugh, here is the ultimate backstage pass -- you'll read the kind of stories Jimmy usually reserves for his closest friends and you'll see a wonderful, wacky life through eyes of the man who's lived it.   A PIRATE LOOKS AT 50 is a breath of fresh air and a ingenious manual for getting to 50 . . . and beyond.


From the Hardcover edition....

    Tales from Margaritaville (stories) and Where Is Joe Merchant? (a mystery) secured songwriter Jimmy Buffett's niche reputation as an affable, poetic beach bum. A Pirate Looks at Fifty, a travel-diary-cum-autobiography, features Buffett behind the wheel of his Grumman Albatross seaplane, safely piloting family and friends through a three-week trip around South and Central America and the Caribbean. He blends gentle scenic narration with rambling, unplugged life stories meant to convey that he's made peace with the whole aging process. For Buffett, turning 50 "can be a ball of snakes that conjures up immediate thoughts of mortality and accountability. (`What have I done with my life?') Or, it can be a great excuse to reward yourself for just getting there. (`He who dies with the most toys wins.') I instinctively chose door number two."

On this tack, Buffett plans an opulent, laid-back trip for his brood and goes into so many details about his favorite possessions (three pages on knapsacks!) that the cheerful vagabond in flip-flops is nearly eclipsed by the rich, domesticated businessman/dad he's become. In addition, stinging losses and limitations--his dad's Alzheimer's disease, his own terrifying solo plane crash in 1996--creep into his cozy yarns. Yet Buffett's infectious, grinning attitude towards life eventually finds resurrection in extended riffs on fly-fishing, solo piloting over water, and surfing. In such passages, he earns his claim to a "saline psyche," a legacy inherited from his grandfather, skipper of a five-masted barkentine that ferried lumber from New Orleans to the Caribbean. Sailing and soaring over Atlantic, Caribbean, and Pacific seas, Buffett looks at 50 and sees a very good life. ...

Authors: Tom Santopietro.
Hardcover, 544 pages
Publisher: Thomas Dunne Books
Publication Date: 2008-11-11
Edition: 1st

Reviews :

    (20080915)...

Authors: Lance Bass.
Hardcover, 208 pages
Publisher: Simon Spotlight Entertainment
Publication Date: 2007-10-23
Edition: illustrated edition

Reviews :

    At sixteen, Lance Bass received a phone call from Justin Timberlake that would change his life forever. Soon after, he left his small-town home in Clinton, Mississippi, to join an emerging musical group called *NSYNC. Two years later *NSYNC was inspiring Beatles-esque mania around the world, becoming the face of the new MTV generation, and earning the all-time record for most album sales in a single day (more than one million) and in a single week for No Strings Attached.

He's remained in the spotlight ever since, and here he talks in depth for the first time about his childhood, his astonishing experiences as a young man and Christian growing up in one of the biggest bands in the world, his shock and frustration at the band's eventual dissolution, and his subsequent career, including his four months in Russia, training to become a cosmonaut.

He also frankly discusses life as a gay man -- his first same-sex relationship at twenty-one, his struggle to keep his sexuality hidden from *NSYNC's fans in case it jeopardized the band's success, and the true circumstances that led to his decision to publicly come out at the age of twenty-seven.

Full of fascinating behind-the-scenes lore and revealing insights from a pop star who, until now, has been notoriously private, Out of Sync is the book that millions of fans have been waiting for....

Authors: Sterling Whitaker.
Paperback, 382 pages
Publisher: BookSurge Publishing
Publication Date: 2007-03-08
Edition: 1st

Reviews :

    Culled from the author's personal interviews with band members, record company executives, management, friends and fans, 'The Grand Delusion' is the first biography of the superstar rock group Styx. Beginning with 'Lady' in 1974, Styx delivered a string of hits including 'Come Sail Away', 'Fooling Yourself', 'Miss America', 'Renegade', 'Blue Collar Man', 'Babe', 'The Best Of Times', 'Too Much Time On My Hands', 'Don't Let It End', 'Show Me The Way' and 'Mr. Roboto'. Styx has sold more than 35 million albums in a career that spans three decades. 'The Grand Delusion' tells the unauthorized story of one of the true superstar acts of the rock era....

Authors: Steve Malins.
Paperback, 304 pages
Publisher: Andre Deutsch
Publication Date: 2007-05-01


Reviews :

    ...

Authors: Bill Zehme.
Paperback, 256 pages
Publisher: Harper Paperbacks
Publication Date: 1999-06-01


Reviews :

    Within is a masterful assembly of the most personal details and gorgeous minutiae of Frank Sinatra's way of living--matters of the heart and heartbreak, friendship and leadership, drinking and cavorting, brawling and wooing, tuxedos and snap-brims--all crafted from rare interviews with Sinatra himself as well as many other intimates, including Tony Bennett, Don Rickles, Angie Dickinson, Tony Curtis, and Robert Wagner, in addition to daughters Nancy and Tina Sinatra. Illustrated with scores of photos, The Way You Wear Your Hat captures the timeless romance and classic style of the fifties and the loose sixties and is a stunning exploration of the Sinatra mystique....

Authors: Britney Spears. Sheryl Berk.
Paperback, 103 pages
Publisher: NVU Editions/Team Power Publishing
Publication Date: 2002-12
Edition: Package

Reviews :

    After years of intense scrutiny under the media's microscope, pop icon Britney Spears takes a step back to reflect. The result is a collectible book and DVD set, a personal gift from Britney to her millions of fans to mark her 21st birthday. Much more than a kid's keepsake, the set is a beautifully designed commemorative piece and an ideal gift for the holidays. The Book Four of the world's leading photographers [Jim Luning, Howard Rosenberg, Marc Serota, Jeff Sciortino] capture Britney in full colour and intimate black and white. Original photography of Britney onstage and backstage will be contrasted with images of her in her limited personal time, a view rarely seen and shared. Bestselling author Sheryl Berk compiles stories from Britney and the people who are closest to her. The DVD An unprecedented all-access glimpse of Britney, captured by legendary documentarian Albert Maysles [Gimme Shelter], shot during the final leg of her 2002 world tour and culminating in her dramatic experiences performing in Mexico City....

Authors: Charles Pignone.
Hardcover, 144 pages
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
Publication Date: 2007-11-01
Edition: 1

Reviews :

    Drawing from the Sinatra family's private archive, FRANK SINATRA: THE FAMILY ALBUM vividly chronicles the private life of America's iconic star. Accompanied by unique firsthand recollections and stories from Nancy Sinatra and other family and close friends, these color and black-and-white images are bound in an elegant package designed in the form of a family album. Fans of Frank Sinatra will see the star clowning with his accompanist, relaxing on the sets of his movies, vacationing with his family on the beach, and well over 100 other images, many of them taken by Sinatra himself. FRANK SINATRA: THE FAMILY ALBUM will feature the images and behind-the-curtain stories that only a family can provide---and that fans love....