Hymns to the Silence

Inside the Words and Music of Van Morrison

Peter Mills (Author)

Online Access / Resources

Hymns to the Silence

Inside the Words and Music of Van Morrison

Peter Mills (Author)

Online Access / Resources

Ebook (Epub & Mobi) ₹2974.00 Ebook (PDF) ₹2974.00

₹2974.00

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Description

Hymns to the Silence is a thoroughly informed and enlightened study of the art of a pop music maverick that will delight fans the world over. In 1991, Van Morrison said, Music is spiritual, the music business isn't. Peter Mills' groundbreaking book investigates the oppositions and harmonies within the work of Van Morrison, proceeding from this identified starting point. Hymns to the Silence is a detailed investigative study of Morrison as singer, performer, lyricist, musician and writer with particular attention paid throughout to the contradictions and tensions that are central to any understanding of his work as a whole. The book takes several intriguing angles. It looks at Morrison as a writer, specifically as an Irish writer who has recorded musical settings of Yeats poems, collaborated with Seamus Heaney, Paul Durcan and Gerald Dawe, and who regularly drops quotes from James Joyce and Samuel Beckett into his live performances. It looks at him as a singer, at how he uses his voice as an interpretive instrument. And there are chapters on his use of mythology, on his stage performances, and on his continuing fascination with America and its musical forms.

Acknowledgments

Author's Note

Introduction

Chapter One Imagining America: Jazz, Blues, Country, and the Mythologies of the West

Chapter Two What Makes the Irish Heart Beat? The Irishness of Van Morrison

Chapter Three Get the Words on the Page: Van Morrison as Writer

Chapter Four Caught One More Time: Themes and Thematics

Chapter Five Listening to the Lion: Van Morrison as a Singer

Chapter Six On the Burning Ground: Liveness and the Recording Studio
Chapter Seven Down the Road: Van Morrison, Exile, and the Idea of Eternal Movement

Chapter Eight A Three Cornered Quartet: Van Morrison and the Art of Through Composition

Postscript Make It Real One More Time Again: Astral Weeks Live

Appendix One - The 2006 Shows

Appendix Two - Recording Studios

Bibliography

Discography

Product details

Published	08 Apr 2010
Format	Ebook (PDF)
Edition	1st
Extent	448
ISBN	9781441156778
Imprint	Continuum
Publisher	Bloomsbury Publishing

Author

Peter Mills

Peter Mills is Senior Lecturer in Media & Popu…

"Littered with sparkling quotes from such artists as Kevin Rowland, Maria McKee, Kate Rusby and Fiachra Trench (themselves armed with an acute knowledge and understanding of Van Morrison's work), I cannot praise this book highly enough. Its investigative validity is agglutination to that of the musical importance of its subject." www.davidmarx.co.uk May 2010
Review on http://www.leedsmet.ac.uk/as/index_news_hymns_to_the_silence.htm
"As a highly academic treatment of an artist who deserves as much, Hymns to the Silence is a book that is long overdue, and Peter Mills opens many doors for fellow scholars in a variety of fields:music, literature, Irish studies, among many others. As a comprehensive analysis of Morrison's multi-decade body of work (one that remains very much "in progress" as Iwrite this), Hymns to the Silence should initiate many subsequent conversations across disciplines regarding Morrison's influences, songs, performances, and place in the history of popular music." - John P. McCombe - Popular Music and Society
"Hymns to the Silence represents an important contribution to the critical literature on this enigmatic, compelling musician, one that will hopefully inspire both a greater appreciation and a wider acknowledgement of Morrison's achievements." - Gerry Smyth, Irish Studies Review
Review on http://www.vanmorrisonnews.blogspot.com
"Mills, who clearly holds Morrison in the highest esteem and shows an exhaustive knowledge of the singer's body of work, has written an analysis of interest to academics in the field as well as any devoted fan. The complexities of Morrison's oeuvre are made visible in discussion that encompasses his vocal style; his use of jazz, gospel, folk, and blues; and the meaning and possible symbolism of repeated poetic themes and places in his music. In addition to lines from the songs, many quotations from interviews with Morrison are included." -Eithne O'Leyne, BOOK NEWS, Inc.