Isolated examples of concept albums appear from the 1950s on, including efforts by Frank Sinatra and Ray Charles, but the idea really took off with the release of
Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band by The Beatles in 1967 — not surprising given how it was a time of great cultural and creative experimentation. Paralleling the rise of the singer-songwriter in the 1960s, the term “concept album” became imbued with the notion of artistic purpose.
Today, that notion of artistic purpose has become so pervasive that, whether consciously or unconsciously, artists routinely infuse concepts into their albums, or feel compelled to come up with a snappy response when a reviewer asks “so what is the CD about?” I want to share four examples of especially interesting, artistically successful concept albums that stand out from the crowd. [Read more →]
Tags: great music, lyrics, religion by Jon O
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Music infuses everything in the universe, from the rotational beat of a pulsar in space to the rhythm of the heart. Is it possible that music is the essence of the universe itself? My newly released ebook Song of Fire is a journey to discover this fundamental truth. The interconnected, real-life stories are a rhapsody on the elements that constitute how we experience the world: the moments of humor, sorrow, passion and revelation that give significance to our origins and endings. [Read more →]
Bells in the Russian Orthodox tradition are not just bells. Because they are not tuned to a major or minor chord, as Western European bells commonly are, they don’t represent a note or a chord but, rather, the voice of God. So says Father Roman in an article by Elif Batuman in the April 27 issue of 
