Frank Carlson Library

Even as a little child, Marian Anderson knew what she wanted to do. More than anything in the world, she wanted to sing. From the age of six, Marian amazed her listeners with the beauty of her voice. All through her long life, what Marian Anderson had was a gift for singing. But she had other gifts as well. When she faced discrimination, Marian gave us all the gift of her example. At a time when fear and hatred divided the nation, Marian showed dignity...

"Legendary singer Roberta Flack reflects on her early childhood and her love of music"--

With nearly 1,500 Broadway performances, six Tony Awards, more than three million albums sold, and five Academy Awards, The Sound of Music, based on the lives of Maria, the baron, and their singing children, is as familiar to most of us as our own family history. But much about the real-life woman and her family was left untold. Here, Baroness Maria Augusta Trapp tells in her own beautiful, simple words the extraordinary story of her romance with...

2005 Sibert Medal Winner A 2005 Newbery Honor Book "A voice like yours," celebrated conductor Arturo Toscanini told contralto Marian Anderson, "is heard once in a hundred years." This insightful account of the great African American vocalist considers her life and musical career in the context of the history of civil rights in this country. Drawing on Anderson's own writings and other contemporary accounts, Russell Freedman shows readers a singer...

"Rihanna is an award-wining, worldwide music superstar. But her success extends beyond music. She is also a successful businesswoman. Discover more about Rihanna from her personal life to her next big projects"--

Chronicles the life of a renowned classical singer who, despite numerous setbacks, became a singing sensation, a voice of the Civil Rights Movement, and the winner of the first ever Presidential Medal of Freedom and a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award.

Elizabeth Cotten was only a little girl when she picked up a guitar for the first time. It wasn't hers (it was her big brother's), and it wasn't strung right for her (she was left-handed). But she flipped that guitar upside down and backwards and taught herself how to play it anyway. By age eleven, she'd written "Freight Train," one of the most famous folk songs of the twentieth century. And by the end of her life, people everywhere from the sunny...

The touching, triumphant story of a young black man's journey from violence and despair to one of the world's most elite artistic institutions. In 2011, at the age of twenty-four, Ryan Speedo Green won a nationwide competition hosted by New York's Metropolitan Opera. Today, he is a rising star performing major roles at the Met and Europe's most prestigious opera houses.

"Me & Patsy Kickin' Up Dust shares the 'important and inspiring' (Miranda Lambert) never-before-told complete story of the remarkable relationship between country music icons Patsy Cline and Loretta Lynn. Loretta Lynn and the late Patsy Cline are legends--country icons and sisters of the heart. For the first time ever Loretta tells their story: a celebration of their music and their relationship up until Patsy's tragic and untimely death. Full of...

Simon's memoir reveals her remarkable life, beginning with her storied childhood as the third daughter of Richard L. Simon, the co-founder of publishing giant Simon & Schuster, her musical debut as half of The Simon Sisters performing folk songs with her sister Lucy in Greenwich Village, to a meteoric solo career that would result in 13 top-40 hits, including the #1 song "You're So Vain." She was the first artist in history to win a Grammy Award,...