1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910959621103321

Autore

Smith Larry David

Titolo

Elvis Costello, Joni Mitchell, and the torch song tradition / / Larry David Smith

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Westport, Conn. : , : Praeger, , 2004

London : , : Bloomsbury Publishing, , 2024

ISBN

9798400644795

9786611105815

9781281105813

1281105813

9780313067877

0313067872

Edizione

[1st ed.]

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (331 p.)

Disciplina

782.42164/092/2

Soggetti

Popular music - Analysis, appreciation

Love songs - History and criticism

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references (p. [289]-307) and index.

Nota di contenuto

Intro -- Preface -- Introduction -- Part I: Joni Mitchell -- 1 The Artist -- 2 The Impulse -- 3 The Oeuvre -- 4 The Exemplars -- Part II: Elvis Costello -- 5 The Artist -- 6 The Impulse -- 7 The Oeuvre -- 8 The Exemplars -- Part III: Conclusion -- 9 The Auteurs -- References -- Index.

Sommario/riassunto

The torch song has long been a vehicle for expression-perhaps American song's most sheerly visceral one. Two artists in particular have built upon this tradition to express their own unique outlooks on their lives and the world around them. Joni Mitchell, Elvis Costello, and the Torch Song Tradition combines biographical material, artist commentary, critical interpretation, and selected exemplars of the writers' work to reveal the power of authorship and the creative drive necessary to negotiate an artistic vision in the complicated mechanisms of the commercial music industry. Author Larry David Smith, as in his Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, and American Song, considers the complicated intersection of biography, creative philosophy, artistic



imperative, and stylistic tendencies in the work of both Joni Mitchell and Elvis Costello-two songwriters with seemingly nothing in common, one famously confessional and one famously confrontational. Yet, as Smith shows so incisively, they are two personalities that prove fascinatingly complementary. Mitchell and Costello both yielded bodies of work that are cohesive, coherent, and rich in meaning. Both have made historic contributions to the singer-songwriter model, two rebellious respones to the creative and commercial compromises associated with their chosen field, and two distinct thematic responses to the torch song tradition. Smith examines these responses, offering a unique and invaluable exploration of the craft of two of the last century's most towering musical figures.